Small Community Analysis in the Casas Grandes Area, Chihuahua, Mexico

在美国国家科学基金会的支持下，迈克尔·E.惠伦将在墨西哥奇瓦瓦州的卡萨斯格兰德斯地区进行三季的考古发掘和数据分析。这延续了20多年来对墨西哥北部大卡萨斯中心的起源、运作和崩溃的研究。卡萨斯格兰德长期以来一直在考古学家中闻名，因为它融合了美国西南部的国内建筑和墨西哥南部的平顶寺庙土丘和球场等仪式建筑。在边境的两边都没有其他类似的东西。区域侦察显示，卡萨斯格兰德的邻居由几个大社区和许多小社区组成。然而，卡萨斯格兰德的小邻居估计至少占该地区住宅建筑总数的一半。这意味着在该地区史前的某个时期，大部分人口都生活在小的地点。有几种可能性可以解释小的“离群点”和主要中心之间的相互作用。一是小遗址居民太微不足道，在区域政治和经济生活中发挥了作用。然而，这是值得怀疑的，因为该地区人口的很大一部分因此会被中心忽视。第二种可能性是，人们曾经居住在分散的小村庄，然后被吸收到不断增长的中心，导致大多数小村庄被遗弃。在第三种情况下，中心迅速发展，繁荣了几个世纪，最后崩溃了。 像这样的崩溃通常伴随着两个过程：人口减少和人口分散到更小，更分散的社区，因为中央政府失败了。这里的小村落大多是后卡萨斯大村落，小遗址年表是选择备选村落的关键。目前的项目将在该地区最好的环境区卡萨斯格兰德河谷挖掘一个小型住宅区的样本。放射性碳测年法将用于确定场址的职业历史，这些数据将用于考虑上述三种备选办法。来自建筑，设施和文物的其他数据将用于模拟这些小社区如何相互连接以及与Casas Grandes中心的连接。无论这项测年和分析工作的结果如何，该项目都有可能从一个迄今为止尚未探索的角度，就大卡萨的起源、运作和崩溃等问题提供重要的新见解：该地区的许多小型住宅区。拟议的项目和其他类似项目通过增加北美和墨西哥之间的联系和合作，大大加强了墨西哥西北部的研究基础设施考古学家项目人员每年参加墨西哥考古会议，接受当地电台、电视台、报纸和民间团体的采访和介绍情况，并为从学生到政府官员的各种人进行现场图尔斯参观。NSF资助的项目一直是奇瓦瓦州的主要存在，所有相关活动都大大提高了墨西哥这一地区公民对国家遗产的可见度。

With support from the National Science Foundation, Dr. Michael E. Whalen will conduct three seasons of archaeological excavation and data analysis in the Casas Grandes area of Chihuahua, Mexico. This continues more than 20 years of research into the origin, operation, and collapse of the great north Mexican center of Casas Grandes. Casas Grandes long has been famous among archaeologists for its blend of domestic architecture from the southwestern US and such ceremonial constructions as flat-topped temple mounds and ball courts from farther south in Mexico. Nothing else like it is known on either side of the border. Regional reconnaissance shows that the neighbors of Casas Grandes consisted of a few large communities and many small ones. The small neighbors of Casas Grandes, however, are estimated to contain at least half of the region's total count of residential buildings. This means that most of the population lived in small sites at some point(s) in the prehistory of the region.There are several possibilities for explaining the interaction between small "outliers" and major centers. One is that small site residents were too insignificant to have played a role in regional political and economic life. This is doubtful, however, as a large fraction of the regional population thus would have been ignored by the center. A second possibility is that people once lived in small, scattered villages and then were absorbed into the growing center, resulting in the abandonment of most small villages. In a third scenario the center grew rapidly, flourished for several centuries, and finally collapsed. Collapses like this usually are accompanied by two processes: population reduction and population dispersal into smaller, more scattered communities as the central authority fails. Here, the small villages largely are post-Casas Grandes.Small site chronology is the key selecting among alternates. The present project will excavate a sample of small residential sites in the Casas Grandes river valley, the region's best environmental zone. Radiocarbon dating will be used to establish site occupational histories, and these data will be used to consider the three alternatives presented above. Other data from architecture, facilities and artifacts will be used to model how these small communities were connected to each other and to the center of Casas Grandes. Whatever the outcome of this dating and analytical work, the project has the potential to provide important new insights on questions of the origin, operation, and collapse of Casas Grandes from a heretofore unexplored perspective: the region's many small residential sites.The proposed project and others like it significantly enhance the infrastructure for research in northwest Mexico by increasing contact and collaboration between North American and Mexican archaeologists. Project personnel participate annually in Mexican archaeology conferences, give interviews and presentations for local radio, television, newspapers, and civic groups, and conduct site tours for a range of people, from school children to government officials. NSF funded projects have been a major presence in Chihuahua, and all of the related activity significantly raises the visibility of the national patrimony for the citizens of this part of Mexico.