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Local economies and household spacing in early chiefdom communities
- Source :
- PLoS ONE, Vol 16, Iss 5, p e0252532 (2021), PLoS ONE
- Publication Year :
- 2021
- Publisher :
- Public Library of Science (PLoS), 2021.
-
Abstract
- Archaeological research has by now revealed a great deal of variation in the way early complex societies, or chiefdoms, developed. This variation is widely recognized, but our understanding of the forces that produced it remains relatively undeveloped. This paper takes aim at such understanding by exploring variation in the local economies of six early chiefdoms; it considers what implications this variation had for trajectories of chiefdom development, as well as the source of that variation. Economic exchange is a primary form of local interaction in all societies. Because of distance-interaction principles, closer household spacing within local communities facilitated more frequent interaction and thus encouraged productive differentiation, economic interdependence, and the development of well-integrated local economies. Well-integrated local economies, in turn, provided ready opportunities for aspiring leaders to accumulate wealth and fund political economies, and pursuit of these opportunities led to societies with leaders whose power had a direct economic base. Wider household spacing, on the other hand, impeded interaction and the development of well-integrated local economies. In such contexts, aspiring leaders were able to turn to ritual and religion as a base of social power. Even when well-integrated local economies offered opportunities for wealth accumulation and a ready source of funding for political economies, these opportunities were not always taken advantage of. That variation in the shapes of early chiefdoms can be traced back to patterns of household spacing highlights the importance of settlement and interaction in explaining not just chiefdom development, but societal change more generally.
- Subjects :
- Topography
Science
Interaction Networks
Social Sciences
Stone Age
Power (social and political)
Politics
Population Metrics
Medicine and Health Sciences
Economics
Humans
Drug Interactions
Economic base analysis
Molecular Biology
History, Ancient
Population Density
Pharmacology
Landforms
Family Characteristics
Multidisciplinary
Population Biology
Physics
Social change
Commerce
Biology and Life Sciences
Geomorphology
Geology
Geologic Time
Agriculture
Condensed Matter Physics
Variation (linguistics)
Archaeology
Economy
Neolithic Period
Physical Sciences
Earth Sciences
Nucleation
Medicine
Settlement (trust)
Chiefdom
Economic interdependence
Research Article
Valleys
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 19326203
- Volume :
- 16
- Issue :
- 5
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- PLoS ONE
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....39fd85f2d3e8e3ce961f2a4dcef24d9d