The Aztecs of Calixtlahuaca

I've blogged before about whether it makes sense to call Calixtlahuaca an Aztec city. My answer is yes, of course. My definition of "Aztec" is the peoples who lived in central Mexico in the final centuries before the Spanish conquest. This is a wider definition than many scholars are comfortable with. In my perspective, the "Aztecs" included:

• Speakers of Nahuatl, as well as speakers of some Oto-Pamean languages
• People living in Tenochtitlan (the Mexica).
• People living in other places in the Valley of Mexico (there is no good indigenous term for these people).
• People living in the surrounding valleys (Morelos, Puebla, Tlaxcala, Toluca, etc.) who interacted heavily with those in the Valley of Mexico and shared many social and cultural trains with them.

I am now working on revisions for the third edition of The Aztecs. I used this opportunity to re-visit my own thinking about terms and definitions, and decided that I am satisfied with the definition of "Aztec" that I have been using. Therefore I am adding some material to the book from our excavations at Calixtlahuaca. These were "Aztecs" just as they were the "Matlatzincas" and probably a series of other named categories as well.

I realize that some colleagues, who want to limit the term Aztec to the inhabitants of Tenochtitlan, will probably jump on me for my decision. But those of Tenochtitlan have TWO good names that they used themselves: Mexica, and Tenochca. But since the word "Aztec" was rarely used before the Spaniards arrived, and because there is no native term for the peoples of central Mexico at that time (although they clearly formed a significant social and cultural entity), and because no one has proposed a succinct alternative label, Aztec remains the term. Also, I doubt that Blackwell would want me to change the name of the book to "The peoples of central Mexico in the final centuries before AD 1519, including speakers and Nahuatl and other native languages."

Neighborhoods at Mesoamerican Hilltop Cities

How does Calixtlahuaca compare to other Mesoamerican hilltop cities? We have written about this in a couple of places. In a paper from the SAA meetings in 2010, I compared Calixtlahuaca, Xochicalco, and a few other examples Smith (2010). If you want a copy of the paper, email me. One interesting difference is in the configuration of the terraces, and houses on terraces. This schematic diagram is from that paper:

 (This drawing is by Miriam Cox, ASU student)

• Smith, Michael E.
  2010    Xochicalco and Calixtlahuaca as Mesoamerican Hilltop Political Capitals. Paper presented at the 75th Annual Meeting, Society for American Archaeology, St. Louis.

Julie and I have also make a very brief comparison of Calixtlahuaca to other hilltop cities in terms of their neighborhood organization. The passage below is from our book chapter, now under review:

• Smith, Michael E. and Juliana Novic
• n.d.    Neighborhoods and Districts in Ancient Mesoamerica. In Neighborhoods in Mesoamerican Archaeology: The Assessment of Intermediate Units of Spatial and Social Analysis, edited by Linda Manzanilla and Charlotte Arnauld, (book in preparation).

"The hilltop capital city was a common urban form in ancient Mesoamerica, and researchers have investigated neighborhoods and districts at several of these settlements. In one of the first studies of residential zones at a Mesoamerican city, Richard Blanton (1978:66-93) analyzed districts for both early and late periods at Monte Alban. In early Monte Alban three zones had subtle differences in the ceramic assemblage suggesting that neighborhoods or districts may have had distinctive patterns of shared material culture, possibly signaling some form of spatially based identity. Later periods saw an increase in urban division to fifteen architecturally visible districts. These areas were of mixed social class, with elite and commoners living near one another. Few craft activities were identified at the level of the district, although, Blanton (1978:95) did identify zones of obsidian and groundstone production. In a more recent study, González Licón (2009) discusses inequality among households at Monte Albán, with a consideration of the role of neighborhoods.

            At the Oaxaca site of El Palmillo in the Classic period, residential zones were topographically distinguished and shared some economic and ritual activities (Feinman and Nicholas, chapter 7). Residents of nearby houses most likely engaged in joint work activities on common facilities such as terraces and stairs, which Feinman and Nicholas interpret in terms of collective action.

            On the basis of a program of intensive surface collection and mapping at the Epiclassic period (AD 600-800) hilltop city of Xochicalco, Kenneth Hirth (2000:234-239) identified fourteen residential zones that he calls “wards” and “ward subdivisions” (figure 3). These were identified on the basis of features of the natural and built environments that impeded movement within the city, such as ravines, ditches, defensive walls, walled causeways, and steep terrace walls. When Hirth plotted the distribution of civic architecture outside of the hilltop epicenter, he found that all but one of his fourteen zones contained one or more temples or civic structures. These units correspond to districts as defined in this paper. In a recent paper, Hirth (2009) compared the distribution of obsidian tool workshops to his map of districts, and found a lack of spatial association between the two. This suggests to him that “(1) artisans did not collaborate in corporate craft activities outside the household, and (2) a craft guild did not exist at the barrio [ward or district] level” (Hirth 2009:58). In both of these works, Hirth compares the Xochicalco data to the Aztec calpolli as described in documentary sources.

            Fieldwork by the authors at the hilltop city of Calixtlahuaca (Smith et al. 2009) suggests a division of the city into two districts based on topological considerations. On the basis of surface artifact densities, Novic identified twenty-four smaller zones—most likely neighborhoods—at Calixtlahuaca. The nature and dynamics of these spatial units is the focus of ongoing research (Novic 2008)."

Blanton, Richard E.

1978    Monte Alban: Settlement Patterns at the Ancient Zapotec Capitol. Academic Press, New York.

González Licón, Ernesto

2009    Ritual and Social Stratification at Monte Albán, Oaxaca: Strategies from a Household Perspective. In Domestic Life in Prehispanic Capitals: A Study of Specialization, Hierarchy, and Ethnicity, edited by Linda Manzanilla and Claude Chapdelaine, pp. 7-20. Memoirs, vol. 46. University of Michigan, Museum of Anthropology, Ann Arbor.

Hirth, Kenneth G.

2000    Public Architecture, Site Planning, and Urban community Organization. In Archaeological Research at Xochicalco. Volume 1, Ancient Urbanism at Xochicalco: The Evolution and Organization of a Pre-Hispanic Society, edited by Kenneth G. Hirth, pp. 210-243. University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City.

2009    Household, Workshop, Guild, and Barrio: The Organization of Obsidian Craft Production in a Prehispanic Urban Center. In Domestic Life in Prehispanic Capitals: A Study of Specialization, Hierarchy, and Ethnicity, edited by Linda Manzanilla and Claude Chapdelaine, pp. 43-66. Memoirs, vol. 46. University of Michigan, Museum of Anthropology, Ann Arbor.

Novic, Juliana

2008    Reaching the City Limits: Identifying Settlement Boundaries at Calixtlahuaca, Toluca, Mexico. Paper presented at the 2008 Annual Meeting, Society for American Archaeology, Vancouver.

Smith, Michael E., Juliana Novic, Angela Huster, and Peter C. Kroefges

2009    Reconocimiento Superficial y Mapeo en Calixtlahuaca. Expresión Antropológica 36:39-55.

Old Xochimilco canal photo

This is an old photograph of women  harvesting crops  selling goods from a boat in a canal connected to  the chinampas south of Mexico City, probably in the 1920s. My daughter purchased it from a dealer in old photographs, who has no information about its origin. Does anyone have a clue about who might have taken the photo, when and where?  The name "Scott" is penciled in at the lower right.

Please contact me if you know anything about this. I am thinking about using this in the 3rd edition of my book, The Aztecs, but I'd like to know more about the photo before deciding to include it.  

I have found an alternate old photo, this one with a chinampero along the chinampas. Maybe I will post it at some point.

And what does this have to do with Calixtlahuaca, you might ask. Well, the lakes around Tenochtitlan, and in the southern part of the Basin of Mexico, were filled with chinampas in Aztec times. The high productivity of this form of agriculture is one reason why Tenochtitlan conquered Calixtlahuaca, rather than the other way around.

Ceramics from Teotenango

Anthropology major Anne Beyens is scanning some of the drawings of ceramics from Teotenango to use in our ceramic type guidebook. Teotenango (see photo) is a large site in the southern part of thToluca Valley.

The first pot shown here is an E-1 tripod bowl, a type whose decoration is similar to the Macana red-on-brown type from Tollan-phase Tula. The second bowl is a Malinalco import (type D-1). These drawings are nice - very clear, good reproduction in black-and-white. They are from:

Tommasi de Magrelli, Wanda
    1978    La cerámica funeraria de Teotenango. Biblioteca Enciclopédica del Estado de México, vol. 61. Estado de México, Toluca.


In 2002, I photographed the Teotenango vessels and recorded attributes, and some day I'll find time to work this material up for publication. Some preliminary information is found in:

Smith, Michael E., and Jennifer Wharton
    2003    Postclassic Funerary Ceramics from the Toluca Valley, Central Mexico. Paper presented at the 2003 Annual Conference, Society for American Archaeology, Milwaukee.

The Teotenango ceramics are from a series of burials in the plazas of the site. The plazas shown in the site photo at the top were filled with burials. The photo on the right is a reconstruction of a burial, in the museum at the site (which is a great museum, well worth a trip). The monumental architecture was probably built during the Epiclassic period, then perhaps abandoned during the Early Postclassic (this isn't clear), and then during the Middle/Late Postclassic period, people put in all these burials. The ceramics are very similar to Calixtlahuaca, although with different quantities (e.g., red-on-white, our grouop D, is common at Teotenango but rare at Calixtlahuaca).

New paper on political geography of the Toluca Valley

A new paper by Brian Tomaszewski and I on the political geography of the Toluca Valley is in press at the Journal of Historical Geography. The proof copy is now online.

Tomaszewski, Brian M. and Michael E. Smith
2010    Politics, Territory, and Historical Change in Postclassic Matlatzinco (Toluca Valley, central Mexico). Journal of Historical Geography (in press).

ABSTRACT:


Historical interpretation of political dynamics in pre-conquest central Mexico from indigenous records is fraught with difficulties. Beyond the basic challenges involved in interpreting fragmentary evidence is the fact that the majority of evidence comes from the dominant imperial polity (Tenochtitlan) and paints a biased and overly generalized view of political and social dynamics in provincial areas.We present a reconstruction of the political geography of the Toluca Valley of central Mexico in Aztec times that avoids these biases by focusing not on the events described in native histories, but on the individual towns and their spatial locations. We find that a theoretical perspective that defines political entities by networks and relations among people more adequately captures the historical situation than traditional models that define polities based on territory and boundaries.

2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserve

Our final two hectic weeks in the lab

Here I am in the pacific port city of Guaymas, Sinaloa. After a nice norrth Mexican arrachera steak and a margarita, I'm resting up for the final day of the drive home. Whew, that was a hectic final 2 weeks in the lab. The previous post, by Angela, describes our petrographic sherd sample, one of our three massive sampling programs, all carried out during the last 2 weeks. We also picked a couple of hundred sherds for INAA analysis, and Adrian Burke picked around 250 pieces of obsidian for XRF source analysis. Each sampling program involved numerous searching through bags and boxes, cross-checking, measuring, etc. We take sampling seriously on this project, since we want the results of our technical analyses to represent various contexts, time periods, and artifact categories as well as possible. Why the rush during these 2 weeks? We needed to complete the seriation, so that we could assign the excavated deposits to phases, so that we could pick intelligent samples to monitor change through time (and other things). The seriation was not completed till just recently (I think we were too busy to post a description of this; maybe Angela or I can do this from ASU in the next few weeks).

Also, Adrian ran around looking for obsidian sources (one trip with Brad and Akiko and I to Las Palomas; and one trip just Adrian). The above photo shows Akiko and I on the hill of obsidian at Las Palomas. Brad and Akiko worked on the technological analysis of obsidian. Brad found some time to knap some of the Las Palomas obsidian (the preliminary report is, ok for bifaces, but not for blades). We got a bunch of miscellaneous cataloging done. Charles and Maria Stapleton stopped by for a day to finalize their report on censers. Kristin Nado spent several days cleaning human bone. I picked some more charcoal samples for C14 dating. Two Mexican students from the new archaeology program at UAEM, Universidad Autónoma del Estado de México, in Tenancingo (Rosario Endañú and Ali Sarabia) stopped by to help us for a while, and ended up with thesis topics. AND we reboxed the gound stone (it had been stored by provenience, and now it is stored by functional type). AND we got a number of new ceramic bags sorted. AND we pulled out ALL of the Aztec black-on-orange (even from already-analyzed bags) and re-sorted it (which had to be done before we pulled the sherd samples). All in the final 2 weeks of lab work. Wow, I'm amazed that we got it all done. Well, actually we only got 1/2 of the petrographic sample pulled. Now we could say that we ran out of time, but I'd rather say that we decided on a two-stage sampling and analytical process, so that results from the first batch will affect how we sample for the second batch. I could even come up with a citation or two to support multi-stage sampling. That sounds much better, doesn't it?

Thin-Section Sampling – or – the Invasion of the Sherds

Now that we have a basic handle on the seriation, we are picking samples of sherds from each phase to export for thin-sectioning and petrographic analysis. This analysis, which will be done by Dr. Jennifer Meanwell, will hopefully tell us two things. First, it will let us know whether the variation we think we are seeing in ceramic pastes is real at a structural level. Second, we should be able to look at changes in the frequencies of the different paste types (provided that they exist!) over time, which could relate to changing patterns of trade.
Thin-sectioning and petrographic analysis is both expensive and time consuming, so we have developed a rather elaborated sampling strategy in an effort to get a representative sample of each phase. Julie Novic and I are taking rims sherds only, dividing them into categories based on vessel types (bowls, jars, and other vessels), and then dividing each of those categories into two groups, based on paste. (This has been a good opportunity for Julie to teach me how to recognize the various paste groups, but I clearly have a ways to go!) I then get a list of randomly generated numbers and use those to pick sherds from each of the six stratified groups. So far the random selections seem to be a pretty good representation of their parent groups. Since we also have a couple of specific ceramic types that we’re interested in, I go and pull out examples of them if they weren’t chosen during the randomized selection process.
Because we are sampling by phase, our sampling unit is the stratigraphic layer, rather than the excavated lot, which is how our material is stored. Since the former usually consists of several of the latter, we have to have several different lots open at the same time, which means that we are labeling every rim sherd to avoid confusion. The practical result is that all the ceramics tables in the lab are covered with neat lines of sherds, and we are starting to eye the patches of open space on the lithics table enviously!

The photos show Julie with her trusty pliers for checking paste types, and a portion of the bowl rims from a single group.

The Centro Ceremonial Otomi

While Brad, Adrian, Akiko, and I were driving around the wooded mountains northeast of Toluca, looking for an obsidian source (which we found! more on this later, I hope), we stopped in at the "Centro Ceremonial Otomi." This is one of the more bizarre built environments I have ever experienced. It is a huge monumental complex built of stone, located in the mountains northeast of Toluca (in the municipio of Temoaya) with a beautiful view down into the Toluca Valley.

The Centro was built in 1980, by Jorge Jiménez Cantú, governor of the State of Mexico. Its purpose was supposedly to provide a tribute to the Otomi peoples of the state. The design seems to have nothing to do with Otomi culture or history, from the pictorial mosaics to the architectural arrangement and elements To me, it looks like the modernist architectural monuments built by 20th century authoritarian regimes (huge monuments that dwarf human visitors, abstract decoration, large open area for ceremony, etc.).


This complex was  used in the James Bond flick "License to Kill" as the "Olympatec Meditation Institute" (see photo below).

Residents of Toluca said that at one time there was a museum featuring Otomi culture at the monument, but all we saw was a big empty room. There is a small market with traditional crafts. We didn't see much evidence of Otomi activity at the site, although the Wikipedia entry on Temoaya says that Otomi ceremonies are held regularly at the Centro.

The Centro Ceremonial Otomi is open to tourists, and it houses dormitories for athletes who come to train at the high altitude (more than 3,000 meters ASL).

If I were governor and wanted to do something for the Otomi residents of the state, I'd spend my money on education, health, and jobs. If you want to know more about the Otomi, see some of these sources:

Carrasco, Pedro  (1950)  Los Otomíes: cultura e historia prehispánica de los pueblos mesoamericanos de habla otomiana. Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City.

Fournier García, Patricia  (2007)  Los Hñähñü del Valle de Mezquital: maguey, pulque y alfarería. Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Mexico City.

Galinier, Jacques  (1987)  Pueblos de la Sierra Madre: Ethnografía de la comunidad otomí. INI, CEMCA (Centre d'études mexicaines et centraméricaines), Mexico City.

García Castro, René (editor)  (1999)  Códice Xiquipilco-Temoaya y títulos de tierras otomíes: edición facsimilar. El Colegio Mexiquense, Toluca.

Lagarriga Attias, Isabel and Juan Manuel Sandoval Palacios  (1978)  Otomies del norte del Estado de México: una contribución al estudio de la marginalidad. Serie de Antropología Social. Gobierno del Estado de México, Toluca.

Lastra de Suárez, Yolanda  (2006)  El Códice Huichapan (Compact Disk). Serie Códices de México vol. 4. Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Mexico City.

Lastra de Suárez, Yolanda  (2006)  Los otomies: su lengua y su historia. Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Instituto de Investigaciones Antropológicas, Mexico City.

Muñoz Samayoa, Fernando and Irma Ramírez González  (2008)  Artesanías mazahuas y otomíes en el Estado de México. In Homenaje a Noemí Quezada: VI Coloquio Internacional sobre Otopames, edited by Verónica Kugel and Ana María Salazar, pp. 335-348. Instituto de Investigaciones Antropológicas, Universidad Nacional de México, Mexico City.

Wright Carr, David Charles  (2005)  Lengua, cultura e historia de los otomíes. Arqueología Mexicana 13(73):26-29.

Wright Carr, David Charles  (2008)  La sociedad prehispánica en las lenguas Náhuatl y Otomí. Acta Universitaria (Universidad de Guanajuato) 18(especial):15-23.

Our lab is in the newspaper

The Mexican newspaper Milenio just ran a full-page spread of photos taken in our lab (at the Colegio Mexiquense). For a pdf of the article, click here.

The article is called: "Desentierran varias piezas arqueológicas en la entidad."  Milenio, July 15, 2010. Section: Milenio Edomex, page 8. It is a "fotoreportaje" with photos by Iván Carmona, and text by Caludia Hidalgo. They visited us July 14 (Bastille Day). The photos in this post were taken by Carmona, but not used in the article; they are reproduced here with his permission. A longer text piece by Ms. Hidalgo is scheduled to appear in the newspaper Tuesday July 20.

Dongu

Angela and I have isolated three ceramic phases for Calixtlahuaca through our seriation work. We'll post something soon on the new chronology. Here I want to talk about some linguistic research I've been doing. Our earliest period covers the Middle Postclassic period (ca. AD 1100-1300, but don't quote me yet), and the other two correspond to the Late Postclassic period. We have decided to use indigenous terms in the three local Oto-Pamean languages to name these phases. It is almost certain that the original builders and residents of Calixtlahuaca spoke one (or more) of these languages: Otomi, Mazahua, and Matlatzinca (see my previous post on this issue). The use of native terms for our time periods is one way of showing respect for the peoples of these groups. All three languages are still spoken today.

For the earliest phase, we will use the term "Dongu," which is an Otomi term for ancient or old house. This seems appropriate for the earliest occupation period at the site. Dongu is also a placename in the Otomi region in the north-western State of Mexico. The photo above was taken at the tiny hamlet of Dongu, located between the town of Acambay and the archaeological site of Huamango (thanks to Emily Root-Garey for taking the photo during our trip to Huamango a week ago).

René García Castro suggested to me yesterday that Dongu has another sense in Otomi native histories: it may refer to ancestral locations of the Otomi ruling families or ruling "houses" of the Postclassic period. This would make the term even more appropriate for Calixtlahuaca, the Middle- and Late-Postclassic capital of the Toluca Valley.


Speaking of Otomi toponyms, I just read an interesting new article on the topic (Lastra 2008). Two place names jumped out at me:


(1) Calixtlahuaca:  n-dahni,  "viento, pega el aire." This toponym was collected in 2002 from San Andrés Cuexcontitlán (just north of Toluca, and northeast of Calixtlahuaca). Could this be a clue to the ancient name of the city? As I started to get excited about this, it occurred to me that this could be merely a modern reference to the archaeological site, where it is well known that the main temple was dedicated to the wind god, Ehecatl. Interesting, though.....

(2) Huamango: karendó, gran escalera de piedra. This was also collected in 2002, in the town of Acambay (heading south from Huamango, past Dongu). This is another appropriate-sounding toponym. For information on the site of Huamango, see my previous post.


Lastra, Yolanda
    2008    Topónimos otmíes. Estudios de Cultura Otopame 6:381-314.


** PS - I apologize to the linguists out there for not including the proper diacritics for these Otomi words. Not only am I a linguistically-challenged researcher, but my computer cannot handle the necessary symbols and diacritics needed to properly render Otopamean terms.