Early State Development at San Martín Tilcajete
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The San Martín Tilcajete Project Selected Archaeological Evidence: El Mogote El Palenque's 'Palatial Digs' Bibliography Additional Reading |
Authors:
Jennifer Beckmann, American Museum of Natural History
Charles S. Spencer, American Museum of Natural History
Elsa M. Redmond, American Museum of Natural History
Over the past three decades, Dr. Charles Spencer and Dr. Elsa Redmond have completed archaeological field projects in the Tehuacán Valley and Cañada de Cuicatlán in Oaxaca, Mexico, and the western Venezuelan state of Barinas. Their research interests have covered such topics as the development of ancient Mesoamerican chiefdoms and early states, militarism and resistance, and water-management techniques and strategies. Having published extensively on these projects and research topics, Spencer and Redmond have since turned to a relatively unexplored area of the Oaxaca Valley.
The San Martín Tilcajete Project
 Valley of Oaxaca with key archaeological sites |
 Map of San Martín Tilcajete |
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San Martín Tilcajete has a long history, with its first occupation pre-dating 750 B.C. Spencer and Redmond have chosen to focus on the Early to Late Monte Albán I periods (500-300 B.C. and 300-100 B.C., respectively), while Elson's work focuses on the Monte Alban II period (100 B.C.-A.D. 200).
It was during MAI that the Zapotec state developed in the Oaxaca Valley. Based in the Etla/Central subregion of the Oaxaca Valley at the urban center of Monte Albán, its rulers attempted to expand the territory of the state throughout the Valley, conquering and subjugating lesser-developed areas in a sporadic manner. The Ocotlán/Zimatlán subregion of the Oaxaca Valley, however, resisted subjugation by the state until the Monte Albán II period. The AMNH researchers thus seek to further understand how the Ocotlán/Zimatlán subregion stood up to Monte Albán's militaristic aggressions for centuries and what happened to Tilcajete once it finally was conquered.
The archaeological evidence, from which some preliminary conclusions have been drawn, provides information regarding the development of the Ocotlán/Zimatlán subregion as a rival polity, as well as its strategies of resistance against the expansion of Monte Albán.
Selected Archaeological Evidence: El Mogote
Excavations at the 52.8-ha Early Monte Albán I settlement of El Mogote found a variety of informative structural remains. The large 2.2-ha plaza identifies the site as a key subregional center for the Ocotlán/Zimatlán area and a rival to Monte Albán. The plaza layout and the ceramic remains are distinct from Monte Albán's. El Mogote's plaza and buildings are oriented 17 degrees east of magnetic north. Its ceramic remains largely consist of locally-made wares, not the cremas made at Monte Albán. Thus it appears that El Mogote was the center of an independent polity.
 Schematic map of El Palenque |
 Schematic plan of the palace |
 Schematic plan of the temple |
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The remains have been radiocarbon dated to 300-100 B.C. and are the earliest of their kind to be excavated in the Oaxaca Valley thus far. The layout of the palace is similar to later palaces, with eight rooms surrounding an interior patio. The palace and multi-room temple are both made with stone foundations and adobe bricks. The temple consists of two large rectangular rooms, with a smaller room at each end. In addition to these outstanding structural remains, an informative array of ceramic artifacts, lithics, and ecofacts were collected.
El Palenque, too, was attacked and burned circa 100 B.C. The occupation then moved to Cerro Tilcajete. There, research uncovered that the MAII occupation shrunk to 24.5ha and was centered around a plaza much smaller than its predecessors. The palaces and temples found at Cerro Tilcajete conform to types known from Monte Albán. It is clear that by this time, the Ocotlán/Zimatlán subregion was under Monte Albán's control and served as a secondary center of the Monte Albán II state.
| Lawrence, Jenny (Ed.) | |
| 2000-2001 | An Expedition Notebook, 1900-200. A Supplement to Natural History Magazine 12/00 - 1/01:21. |
| Redmond, Elsa M. and Charles S. Spencer | |
| 1992 | The Prehistoric City and State of Monte Albán: A View from its Frontier. In La ciudad y el campo en la historia de México: memoria de la VII reunion de historiadores mexicanos y norteamericanos, Tomo I, edited by R. Sánchez, E. Van young, and G. von Wobeser, pp. 3-24. Instituto de Investigationes Históricas, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, México, D.F. |
| Spencer, Charles S. | |
| 1999 | Palatial Digs. Natural History 108(2):94-95. |
| 2003 | War and Early State Formation in Oaxaca, Mexico. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 100(20):11185-11187. |
| Spencer, Charles S. and Elsa M. Redmond | |
| 2001 | Mutilevel Selection and Political Evolution in the Valley of Oaxaca, 500-100 B.C. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 20:195-229. |
| 2003 | Militarism, Resistance, and Early State Development in Oaxaca, Mexico. Social Evolution & History 2(1):25-70. |
| 2004 | Primary State Formation in Mesoamerica. Annual Review of Anthropology 33:173-199. |
| A Late Monte Albán I Phase (300-100 B.C.) Palace in the Valley of Oaxaca. Latin American Antiquity 15:441-455. | |
| 2005 | Institutional Development in Late Formative Oaxaca: The View from San Martín Tilcajete. In New Perspectives on Formative Mesoamerican Cultures, ed. by Terry G. Powis, pp. 171-182. British Archaeological Reports, International Series 1377. Archaeopress, Oxford, UK. |
| 2006 | Resistance Strategies and Early State Formation in Oaxaca, Mexico. In Intermediate Elites in Precolumbian States and Empires, ed. by Christina Elson and R. Alan Covey, pp. 21-43. Univ. of Arizona Press, Tucson. |
| Blanton, Richard E. | |
| 1978 | Monte Albán: Settlement patterns at the ancient Zapotec capital. New York: Academic Press. |
| Marcus, Joyce (Ed.) | |
| 1990 | Debating Oaxaca Archaeology. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Museum of Anthropology, Anthropological Papers 84. |