In this dissertation, I argue on the basis of changes over time in earthen architecture, ground stone tools, and house construction that the community grew more sedentary over the course of site occupation. According to these dates, the site has produced some of the earliest ceramics and mounded earthen architecture known in Mesoamerica. Based on six radiocarbon dates (1947–1530 cal B.C.), La Consentida represents the earliest village site ever discovered in coastal Oaxaca, and likely in much of Pacific coastal Mexico. ![]() I approach these topics using evidence from the La Consentida Archaeological Project (LCAP), a multi-season field and laboratory investigation of the site of La Consentida on the Pacific coast of Oaxaca, Mexico. In this dissertation I address the timing of and interrelatedness between initial Early Formative period (2000–1500 BCE) transitions in residential mobility, subsistence, and social organization in Mesoamerica. Results suggest that datasets for different artifact classes, when viewed independently, introduce additional nuance into the questions of collapse and resilience of ancient societies. Results also indicate, however, that economic relationships may continue even in places where political affiliations have been severed. Patterns correspond with sociopolitical turmoil at the Guatemalan highland capital of Kaminaljuyú and the rise of the central Mexican city of Teotihuacan. Data indicate that residents of Izapa shifted trade from east to west over the Terminal Formative to Early Classic period transition. Obsidian results are compared to known shifts in sociopolitical relationships as observed through ceramics, burials, and art styles. X-Ray Fluorescence (XRF) analysis using a Bruker Tracer III–V was conducted for obsidian collected from Terminal Formative (100 BCE–250 CE) and initial Early Classic (250–400 CE) domestic contexts to evaluate how obsidian procurement patterns at the ancient city of Izapa were affected by events in neighboring regions. 100–250 CE, from the perspective of a surviving capital on the Pacific coast of Chiapas, Mexico. This study investigates changes in obsidian procurement during a period of widespread upheaval across southern Mesoamerica, ca. One question that results from these findings is how significant events such as sociopolitical decline or abandonment affect exchange networks. Relationships between peoples in different settlements and regions shift as social, political, and economic circumstances change. Recent research on Mesoamerican economies has demonstrated that Prehispanic trade networks were not static, but constantly evolving. We interpret the changes evident at 1000 cal BC in terms of both proximate historical factors as well as ultimate adaptive causes to produce a fuller understanding of changing Mesoamerican food production practices. Changes evident in the Soconusco at 1000 cal BC parallel transformations in both highland and lowland regions of Mesoamerica when ceramic-using villagers expanded into new environments, farther away from the permanent water sources favored by Late Archaic and Early Formative peoples. This was also when monumental architecture was first built to mark a regional hierarchy of political centers. Botanical evidence of increased maize consumption at this time occurred with evidence for changing groundstone use, intensified exploitation of dog and deer as well as iconography linking maize with rulership. Macrobotanical data from the long-occupied village of Cuauhtémoc document low-level maize production from 1900 to 1400 cal BC with a significant increase during the final centuries of the site’s occupation after 1000 cal BC. We argue that while maize had been cultivated for many millennia, this cereal grain assumed a markedly more important role in the political economy of the Soconusco (and elsewhere in Mexico, Guatemala and Belize) only after 1000 cal BC. The development of food production in Mesoamerica was a complex and protracted process.
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