GIS Data Base and Spatial Analysis of the Basin of Mexico

由国家科学基金会提供的资金将支持Kenneth Hirth博士指导的一个为期两年的项目，该项目将创建一个可视化计算机（GIS）数据库，研究现代墨西哥城周围盆地的史前人口发展。墨西哥盆地是墨西哥文明的摇篮。它是墨西哥第一个大城市特奥蒂瓦坎（Teotihuacan）的所在地，也是西班牙征服时期伟大的阿兹特克文明的中心。在1960年至1975年间，国家科学基金会资助了一系列考古定居调查，该地区覆盖了大约800平方公里。绵延数英里，分布着跨越3000年文化发展的2052个遗址。这些调查代表了古代世界最大的调查区域之一，并形成了对墨西哥中部复杂社会的理解。这些调查包含了重要的信息，这些信息不仅继续指导对墨西哥文化发展的解释，而且还指导对世界各地古代文明兴起的比较分析。不幸的是，墨西哥城的快速城市扩张已经摧毁或覆盖了大部分有价值的考古遗址，使这些调查成为该地区唯一的考古记录。虽然这些调查的结果是按照当时的学术惯例在20世纪60年代和70年代发表的，但这些考古遗址的数据现在都无法使用当代计算机方法来研究文化复杂性的演变。此外，墨西哥政府目前无法以一种对保护和保存其国家遗产有用的形式获得这些信息。由于用于记录地点位置的原始地图网格存在重大错误，最近在濒危地区重新安置地点的尝试一直没有成功。这一项目将确保保存来自世界主要文化发展中心之一的信息，供未来几代考古学家和史前历史学家分析。它将重新定位、正确定位和对现代地理校正地图和航空照片上的地点信息进行数字编码，并将对史前建筑和相关文物的重要数据进行编码。这将使研究人员能够对史前人口增长、土地利用、环境变化和生存风险进行一系列新的定量研究，这些研究在最初的分析中是不可能的。这些分析将为影响定居决策和古代世界这一重要地区复杂社会发展的各种因素提供新的见解。这个项目更广泛的影响是，它将创建一个持久的遗址档案，可以立即被国家人类历史研究所（INAH）的墨西哥考古学家用来调查和保护墨西哥城地区濒临灭绝的考古遗址。墨西哥盆地遗址的迅速破坏意味着，在21世纪，大多数关于前西班牙文化的新信息将不得不从城市打捞项目中获得。这个项目的数据将有助于指导这项研究。INAH计划将该项目的数据合并到其现场监测计划中，为大墨西哥城大都市区制定更全面的考古打捞和保护计划。

Funding by the National Science Foundation will support a 2-year project under the direction of Dr. Kenneth Hirth to create an visual computer (GIS) database on prehistoric population development in the Basin surrounding modern Mexico City. The Basin of Mexico was the cradle of Mexican civilization. It was the home of Mexico's first great city at Teotihuacan as well as the center of the great Aztec civilization encountered at the time of the Spanish conquest. Between 1960-1975 NSF funded a series archaeological settlement surveys in this area that covered approximately 800 sq. miles and located over 2,052 sites spanning 3,000 years of cultural development. These surveys represent one of the largest surveyed areas of the ancient world and have shaped understanding of complex society in Central Mexico. These surveys contain important information that continue to guide interpretations of cultural development not only in Mexico but also in the comparative analysis of the rise of ancient civilizations around the world.Unfortunately, the rapid urban expansion of Mexico City has destroyed or covered most of these valuable archaeological sites making these surveys the only archaeological record for the region. While the results of these surveys were published in the 1960's and 1970s following academic conventions of the day, none of these archaeological site data are now available for studying the evolution of cultural complexity using contemporary computer methods. Furthermore, none of this information is currently available to the Mexican government in a form useful for the conservation and preservation of its national patrimony. Recent attempts to relocate sites in endangered areas has been unsuccessful because of a significant error in the original map grid used to record site locations.This project will ensure that the information from one of world's major centers of cultural development will be preserved and available for analysis by future generations of archaeologists and prehistorians. It will relocate, correctly position, and digitally encode site information on modern geo-rectified maps and air photos and will code important data on prehistoric architecture and associated artifacts in linked databases. This will enable researchers to conduct a series of new quantitative studies on prehistoric population growth, land use, environmental change, and subsistence risk that were not possible during the original analysis. These analyses will provide new insights into the range of factors that influenced settlement decisions and the development of complex society in this important area of the ancient world.The broader impact of this project is that it will create an durable site archive that can be used immediately by Mexican archaeologists of the Instituto Nacional de Antropologia e Historia (INAH) to investigate and preserve endangered archaeological sites in the Mexico City area. The rapid destruction of sites in the Basin of Mexico means that in the 21st century most new information on prehispanic culture will have to be derived from urban salvage projects. The data from this project will help guide that research. INAH plans to merge the data from this project into its site monitoring program to develop a more comprehensive archaeological salvage and conservation program for the greater Mexico City metropolitan area.