Kulubá Archaeological Project 2001 Field Season

The Kulubá Polity and Chichén Itzá

Returning to some of the original research questions that concerned the nature of Chichén Itzá’s presence in the Kulubá area, there certainly is no overt and obvious archaeological evidence of a strong Chichén presence here. Not a single column drum was found during the 2001 field season, a strong indictor that there was little or any colonnaded structures in Kulubá’s hinterland. The spread of this particular style of architecture apparently spread from Chichén Itzá to Kulubá but not further down the settlement hierarchy.

Re-visiting the models of political control outlined by Ross Hassig (1985, 1992), there is little reason to believe that Chichén employed a strategy of territorial control in the vicinity of Kulubá. Territorial control entails the removal of local elite and the installation of an administrative apparatus from the conquering capital. The fact that there is no Chichén-inspired architecture in the Kulubá hinterlands indicates that local elite had the ability to construct civic buildings in the local styles. The hegemonic model of political control appears to be more relevant for the case of Chichén Itzá and Kulubá. In the hegemonic format, the capital leaves local elite in place. Ties between the capital and hegemonically controlled areas come in the form of tribute payments and elite-level intermarriages. If Kulubá were controlled hegemonically by Chichén, one would expect to see evidence of interaction on the elite level and limited to just the site of Kulubá itself. This situation fits with the available archaeological evidence.

Based on the evidence gathered in 2001, it appears that the site of Kulubá had little in common with its hinterland. Instead, Kulubá seems to be more closely linked to distant Chichén Itzá than it was with settlements a half days’ walk away. This pattern can be interpreted using the theoretical framework presented by Richard Blanton and his colleagues (Blanton et al. 1996). In their view, there are two political-economic strategies that the elite may employ: corporate and network. One can critique the reduction of all political-economic strategies into two binary models. Nevertheless, Blanton et al.’s work can serve as a starting point for thinking about how the case of Kulubá can be viewed in these more general theoretical models. To briefly recap the two strategies, in the corporate mode rulers emphasize collective identity and rely on local connections and local production as their primary source of power. In the network strategy, leaders tend to emphasize individual glorification, extra-local connections, and prestige good systems. The apparent dissimilarity between Kulubá and its hinterland and its strong connection to Chichén Itzá points to the network strategy. This suggestion clearly deserves more detailed consideration in the future.

The lower-order sites in the Kulubá region would obviously benefit from further research. In addition to the sites we were unable to work at, clearly there are more sites in the area that have yet to be registered at all. More reconnaissance and mapping of these sites would allow for a more comprehensive comparison of Kulubá with its hinterland. Test excavations would be another logical step for further research to take. Basic ceramic chronologies could be established and more classes of data could be used to test some of the interpretations reached here. While the 2001 Kulubá Archaeological Project represents a major step forward in understanding the Kulubá region, much work remains to be done.

Previous Page  |  Table of Contents  |  Next Page

Return to top of page