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• The Gini index is used to measure differentiation in house size as a proxy to interpret inequality across a large environmental lidar dataset that documented a palimpsest of Maya archaeological settlement and landscapes. • We identify consistent patterns and Gini coefficients across the Maya lowlands, with notably lower values in peripheral areas, including coastal zones and the Western lowlands. • Despite the narrow lidar transects, the results of this study align with regional and site-based approaches across the Maya area. The emergence and expansion of inequality have been topics of household archaeology for decades. Traditionally, this question has been informed by ethnographic, ethnohistoric and/or comparative studies. Within sites and regions, comparative physical, spatial, and architectural studies of households offer an important baseline of information about status, wealth, and well-being, especially in the Maya lowlands where households are accessible in the archaeological record. Between sites, more research is necessary to assess how these physical measurements of household remains compare. This paper investigates the intersection of landscape, household, and community based on a multi-scalar analysis of households using the Gini index across southeastern Mexico, in the context of a broader study of land use, land management, and settlement patterns. Notably, this paper represents a region-wide analysis of nearly continuous LiDAR data within and outside of previously documented prehispanic Maya settlements. While we conclude that the Gini index is useful for establishing a comparative understanding of settlement, we also recognize that the index is a starting point to identify other ways to study how household to community-level social and economic variability intersects with diverse ecological patterns. Highlighting the opportunities and limitations with applying measures like the Gini index across culturally, temporally, and geographically heterogeneous areas, we illustrate how systematic studies of settlement can be coupled to broader studies of landscape archaeology to interpret changing patterns of land management and settlement across the Maya lowlands. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Mounting archaeological evidence suggests that floodplain resources, not maize (Zea mays) agriculture, were instrumental in the emergence of Early Formative (ca. 1500–900 uncal BC) complexity across Mesoamerica’s isthmian lowlands. The lion’s share of these data derives from the Pacific side of the isthmus; discussions of the Early Formative Olmec along Mexico’s southern Gulf lowlands have not kept pace. This paper presents settlement and subsistence data that highlight the role of floodplain resources in the development of Gulf Olmec politico-economic complexity. These data support a non-agricultural alternative to traditional models of Gulf Olmec emergence at San Lorenzo, the premier Early Formative Gulf lowlands center. Increased productivity of maize toward the end of the Early Formative period challenged San Lorenzo’s extant politico-economic basis, bringing about a short-term, hyper-acceleration of elite competitive displays. Ultimately, the adoption of maize agriculture generated a reorganized Middle Formative period (ca. 900–400uncal BC) landscape in and around San Lorenzo. This agrarian adjustment saw occupation move out of the floodplain and into the upland areas, a process sometimes characterized as a cataclysmic system collapse in the Coatzacoalcos basin. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The Postclassic site of Totógal in the western Tuxtla Mountains of Veracruz, Mexico contains rare examples of stone architectural features in the southern Gulf Lowlands. Today, the partial remains of one such structure are highly visible; however, the amount of wall fall, looters'' pit destruction and over-growth masks the extent and form of the feature. Local histories ascribe these ruins to early Colonial construction periods, however Postclassic Aztec-style artifacts recovered near this architecture question the occupational sequence of the site and its constructions. To better examine the extent of construction, as well as the occupation associated with them, we conducted a program of shovel testing, topographic mapping, electromagnetic induction survey and excavation. We discuss our findings in this paper and demonstrate the utility of geophysical surveys as complementary field strategies in the Tuxtla Mountains and other volcanic regions. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The reconstruction of polity boundaries is essential for the study of political evolution, but few enhancements to archaeological boundary estimation methods have been proposed in recent years. New techniques of terrain modeling and geographical analysis provide the means to augment traditional methods of boundary estimation. In this paper, I review archaeological methods for estimating the spatial location of boundaries between independent polities and ways to modify these methods to explore the processes of political expansion in the evolution of complex societies. I demonstrate several of these methods using data from Postclassic polities in the Yautepec valley, Morelos, Mexico. Through time, seven independent polities were founded, expanded, and were ultimately incorporated within two levels of regional political administration. I apply new quantitative methods for the estimation of polity territories and explore the processes that resulted in the formation of a regional polity. The resulting boundaries are objective estimates of the location of borders based on energetic efficiency that can be systematically tested against theoretical models. These estimated boundaries provide a basis for exploring the social meaning of territorial divisions. Additionally, energetic boundaries provide a means for delineating local zones for landscape utilization and comparative analyses. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The Huasteca of eastern Mexico is the northern extent of prehistoric Mesoamerican complex culture. In comparison to other major Mesoamerican culture regions, much less is known about the physical environment of the Huasteca. This paper examines the structure, scale, and dynamics of floodplain environments in the lower Pa´nuco basin, the major physical setting in which prehistoric Huastec resided. Data sources included total-station surveying, topographic and historic maps, particle size of floodplain deposits, and analysis of air photos and satellite imagery. Study results illustrate the geoarchaeological significance of spatial changes in floodplain environments. Valley profiles grade from concave to planar in the upper portions of the study area, where the Rio Moctezuma exits the mountains, and are characterized by low floodplain relief and active floodplain reworking. Thus, the narrow valley and dynamic fluvial environment would not have been suitable for sustained habitation. The lower Moctezuma and Pa´nuco valleys have a convex profile with low rates of floodplain reworking, relict meander belts, and floodplain environments that are more prone to flooding. The Pa´nuco valley would have represented a stable environment suitable for habitation along wide natural levees, which are perched above extensive flood prone backswamps with buried relict channels. The absence of multiple oxbow lakes coupled with the association of older Huastec material culture along the active channel suggests that low rates of floodplain reworking have persisted since the late-Holocene, and help to constrain the age of a meander belt for a major river system. Study results provide a framework for future geoarchaeological research within the Huasteca. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Mayapa´n, Yucatan, Mexico is the largest and best-known Late Postclassic archaeological site in the Maya lowlands. Ethnohistoric sources describe Mayapa´n as a cosmopolitan city with an extremely diverse population. This paper uses cluster and spatial analyses of ceremonial buildings called ‘oratorios’ to discern architectural analogues to the social complexity of Mayapa´n. Researchers supported by the Carnegie Institution of Washington in 1938 and from 1949 until 1955 collected the data evaluated in the present study. The cluster analysis revealed four major types of oratorio, two within the site's central ceremonial group and two outside the group. Each type within the ceremonial core is associated with a specific configuration of ritual buildings suggesting that the analysis has revealed ‘real’ sets of building types. Most of the oratorios in the two types of outside the core stood in residential groups. Variation between these two types appears to have been the result of varying investments of labor and materials in the construction of oratorios. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

• Late Prehispanic Highland Mexican test cases. • Test of correlation of inequality, stratification, and centralization. • Traditional oppression and co-option theories inadequate to explain variation. • Tlaxcallan presents low inequality, limited stratification, and high centralization. • Collective Action Theory helps explain variation in complex societies. Beginning in the last century, archaeologists became interested in the development of social complexity. Since that time, the basic concept of states and complex societies has been defined by rigid social stratification, extreme wealth inequality, and political centralization. However, recently, landscape approaches, household archaeology, city-states, and "alternative pathways to complexity" have begun to make inroads in developing a more robust approach to premodern states. Specifically, anthropological theory has advanced significantly with the incorporation of Collective Action, yet theoretical and empirically based studies of wealth inequality, social stratification, and the built environment in the archaeological literature are still limited. Therefore, in this paper, we seek to test the traditional definition of the state and complex societies using cases from Middle-Late Postclassic Highland Mexico (Central Mexico and Oaxaca), especially the case of Tlaxcallan. Using a comparative approach, we find that a stark division between public and private architecture and a compression of wealth inequality and social stratification, especially the absence of palaces, and a comparatively high degree of political centralization, marked the Tlaxcaltecan state. Accordingly, we conclude that theoretical approaches in archaeology must incorporate Collective Action Theory or other comparable approaches to effectively deal with real empirical variation in the past. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]