The Role of Production and Economic Exchange in Strengthening Social Bonds

Kenyon College, Gambier OH

Investigators

Abstract

Drs. Urban and Schortman of Kenyon College, together with specialists in material analyses, will study how people forged ancient social relations as they made, exchanged, and used ceramic containers. Students of the past tend to see interpersonal relations as organized within and across territorially nested units such as households, realms, and empires. Consequently, prehistory is populated with spatially defined entities that resemble those one is familiar with today. Archaeologists have contributed to this vision of the past and are uniquely positioned to challenge it. Focusing on who fabricated, exchanged, and used specific items, archaeologists can describe the overlapping social networks made tangible through these highlighted processes. This provides insight into how people employed objects to ally with, and differentiate themselves from, those living in a variety of locales. The past then emerges as a dynamic field of ever-changing social relations mediated through the use of diverse objects, all operating with a fine disregard for borders. These dealings constitute the roots of the present day globalizing world, a history of shifting social, economic, and political relations operating on multiple spatial scales that can only be understood through archaeology. The concepts developed through such studies can be fruitfully applied to understand social and spatial organization in many regions today. Urban and Schortman's research within three adjoining valleys in northwestern Honduras reveals that the basins' residents during the 7th through 10th centuries AD all used a distinctive form of jar decorated with the same red-painted designs. These are found everywhere, but are made with different pastes defined by variations in clay colors and textures. Such distinct vessel fabrics may point to their divergent origins within the ceramic workshops uncovered at three sites, one in each valley. Occupants of these basins might, therefore, have participated in an extensive social web expressed through the shared symbols that graced red-painted jars. Reconstructing such a web requires analyzing jar fragments with varied pastes recovered at the different manufacturing sites to determine if their chemical and mineral signatures are unique to those workshops. The research will generate new insights on regional prehistory, especially how people living in neighboring areas were variably united and divided through dealings involving the use of material objects. The work also provides opportunities for young Honduran archaeologists to learn the field and analytical techniques they will need to write their country's prehistory.