This dissertation examines the relationship between intensive agriculture and the development of chiefly societies in the Lower Guayas Basin, coastal Ecuador. The Yaguachi chiefdom arose in the area at least during the Integration Period AD 700-Spanish contact. This social formation built intensive agriculture technology (raised fields) and large earth mounds. Two approaches, top-down and a bottom-up, are contrasted to identify where along a socio-political continuum the organization of the Yaguachi chiefdom lay. The research aimed to reconstruct regional settlement patterns using the spatial distribution of sites and their relationships to raised field zones. Data gathering included methods such as aerial photogrametry and subsurface testing. Excavation was conducted through shovel tests, auger probes and a limited number of excavation units. The surveyed area consisted of 428. 29 km², and survey results identified 622 mounds clustered into 16 settlements located along the borders of a large zone of raised fields. These settlements form a three-tiered hierarchy with three main regional centers, sub-centers, agricultural villages and isolated households. Raised fields were found in large tracts. Sites show a strong tendency to cluster, and, for the most part, large centers had large supporting populations. Those centers are located adjacent to raised field zones. Evidence at the core of one of the sites indicates that considerable feasting activities took place. Differences in access to resources among households correspond to their location within the three-tiered hierarchy. Raised field construction required large labor inputs, and they provided large outputs. Mound building activities, feasting and burial practices indicate strong sense of community in the local population. This evidence leads to the conclusions that local chiefs were engaged in the management of raised field production, and that public mound building and feasting activities served to make this possible.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:PITT/oai:PITTETD:etd-04262002-141659 |
| Date | 01 August 2002 |
| Creators | Delgado-Espinoza, Florencio German |
| Contributors | Marc Bermman, Robert D. Drennan, Olivier DeMontmmollin, Billie DeWalt |
| Publisher | University of Pittsburgh |
| Source Sets | University of Pittsburgh |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.library.pitt.edu:80/ETD/available/etd-04262002-141659/ |
| Rights | unrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to University of Pittsburgh or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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