Izapa Regional Settlement Project

在国家科学基金会的支持下，Robert Rosenswig博士将通过收集墨西哥恰帕斯州索科努斯科地区的地区定居数据来调查伊萨帕州的历史。由此产生的数据将有助于记录至少在形成后期(公元前350-100年)以伊萨帕为中心的等级社会的出现，并确定政体持续到早期后古典时期(公元前1000-1350)的政治性质。这项研究将通过记录伊萨帕政体在其兴起、繁荣和最终崩溃过程中的重要而鲜为人知的过程，从理论上有助于理解国家一级社会的起源和发展。该项目将实施一项调查战略，比较Soconusco三个环境区之间的变化。调查工作将辅之以对形成时期、古典时期和后古典时期遗址进行有限的试掘。在最基本的层面上，这项拟议的研究提出的问题是：我们的分层世界是如何从构成人类历史大部分的平等主义狩猎-采集人演变而来的？在现代人在地球上存在了10多万年后，不到1万年前，世界各地出现了等级制度形式的政治组织。权力和等级制度是许多社会科学研究的基本问题，考古学家在探索渗透到现代生活中的制度化等级制度的起源和发展方面具有独特的地位。与中美洲的大多数地区不同，在这些地区，古典时期的国家是主要的研究重点，Soconusco提供了一个案例，在那里，人们目前对早期政治创新的理解远远好于随后伊萨帕州的崛起。考虑到伊萨帕是中美洲太平洋沿岸最大的遗址之一，人们对它的了解令人惊讶地很少。自20世纪40年代以来，当它的土丘和雕塑出现在国家地理杂志的页面上时，它就已经广为人知。尽管其核心是高质量的纪念性建筑地图，但伊萨帕的完整范围尚不清楚。此外，伊萨帕维持区的总体人口模式是未知的，在该遗址长期占据的任何时间内，较低级别中心的数量和分布也是未知的。这个项目将记录这些人口和政治模式，以及它们是如何随着时间的推移而变化的。这项研究的更广泛影响是记录伊萨帕的政治史，从而提高对该地区考古资源的认识。伊萨帕是索科努斯科唯一对旅游开放的地方，扩大其已知的政治历史将有助于当地和墨西哥的国家文化遗产。要做到这一点，最持久的方法之一就是通过编写教材，向当地学校发起一项外展计划。奥尔巴尼大学的研究生马克思·纳瓦罗在塔帕丘拉出生和长大，他将带头开展这项工作，并为当地学校的孩子们树立一个梦想的榜样。奥尔巴尼大学的另外两名研究生将根据该项目收集的数据进行学位论文研究，两名哥斯达黎加学生将参与这项研究。

With National Science Foundation support, Dr. Robert Rosenswig will investigate the history of the Izapa state by collecting regional settlement data from the Soconusco region of Chiapas, Mexico. The resulting data will help document the emergence of hierarchical society centered at Izapa by at least the Late Formative period (350-100 BCE), and determine the political nature of the polity's persistence until the Early Postclassic period (CE 1000-1350). The research will contribute theoretically to an understanding of the origins and development of state-level society by documenting the important and poorly understood Izapa polity during its rise, florescence and eventual collapse. The project will implement a survey strategy that compares changes between three environmental zones in the Soconusco. Survey efforts will be complemented with limited test excavations from a site dating to each the Formative, Classic and Postclassic periods. At its most basic level, the proposed research asks: how did our stratified world evolve from the egalitarian hunter-gatherers that constitute most of human history? After over 100,000 years of the existence of modern humans on earth, hierarchical forms of political organization emerged around the world less than ten millennia ago. Power and hierarchy are fundamental issues addressed by many social sciences and archaeologists are in a unique position to explore the origins and development of the institutionalized hierarchy that permeates modern life. In contrast to most regions of Mesoamerica where Classic period states are the primary focus of study, the Soconusco provides a case where early political innovations are currently far better understood than the subsequent rise of the Izapa state. Izapa is surprisingly poorly understood considering that it is one of the largest sites on the Pacific coast of Mesoamerica and it has been well-known since the 1940s when its mounds and sculptures appeared in the pages of the National Geographic Magazine. Despite the high-quality maps of monumental architecture at its core, the full extent of Izapa is unknown. Further, the overall demographic patterns of Izapa's sustaining area are unknown as are the number and distribution of lower-tier centers from any time in the site's long occupation. This project will document these demographic and political patterns, and how they changed over time. The broader impact of this research is to document the political history of Izapa, and thereby increasing awareness of archaeological resources in the region. Izapa is the only site in the Soconusco open for tourism and expanding what is known of its political history will contribute to local as well as Mexican national cultural heritage. One of the most enduring ways in which this will be done is by initiating a program of outreach to local schools through the development of teaching materials. University of Albany graduate student Marx Navarro was born and raised in Tapachula and he will spearhead this endeavor and provide an example of what local school children could aspire to. Two other University of Albany gradate students will base their dissertations research on data collected by this project and two Costa Rican students will participate in the research.