The Nature of Governance in Secondary Centers of the Classic Period, Mixteca Alta, México

Field Method

In order to obtain data to answer questions about the political and social organization at secondary centers, I intensively surveyed, mapped and collected five sites. First, each site was surveyed to delimit its boundaries based on architectural features. Once this was accomplished, a topographic map of each site was made using a Brunton compass, meter tape and stadia rod (Plate 1, shown above). Most of the time, a small crew of two worked in the field, one taking notes and holding the stadia rod, while the other shot points with the compass to obtain declination/slope and orientation. Since I had limited funding, the actual mapping on paper was done everyday after field work. After the mapping was complete, a grid of 50m by 50m squares was laid on each map and consequently each of the 50m by 50m squares divided into 100 5m² squares. Each 5m² was numbered from 00 to 100 and using a table of random numbers, one was selected for collection. An area of 25m² around each point was collected (Plate 2, shown below). All artifacts were systematically collected in each square. Once everything was collected, the artifacts were separated by type (lithics, figurines, ceramics, etc.) (Plate 3, shown below). The ceramics were separated into non-diagnostic and diagnostic. The diagnostic sherds were collected and taken to the lab, while the non-diagnostics were weighed (Plate 4) (and/or counted when few) and left in the field. A total of 210.5 hectares were mapped and 910 25m² areas were collected. The sites range from 30.25 ha to 62.5 ha.

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