Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-ndw9j Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-14T22:27:35.386Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Mines and Mining Techniques of the Chalchihuites Culture

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Phil C. Weigand
Phil C. Weigand*
Affiliation:
Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, Illinois
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The Chalchihuites culture of the Colorado-Suchil river drainage of western Zacatecas began about A.D. 100 as a somewhat evolved and belated Early Preclassic colonization of simple agriculturalists. By the Alta Vista phase (ca. A.D. 350-550) it had assumed the role of a much more complex society. A great expansion of population occurred. This transition was very rapid and present evidence supports the hypothesis that highly organized social groups colonized the area in order to exploit the mineral resources located there. Extensive mining operations, coupled with self-supporting agricultural patterns, characterize the zenith of the period. The extent of mining was much more than local consumption could possibly require and therefore points to the economic dependence of the exploitative organization upon the high cultures farther south and southeast. This paper reviews the 1963 and 1965 surveys of the Alta Vista mining operations and draws some conclusions about the character of the society which sponsored them.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 33 , Issue 1 , January 1968 , pp. 45 - 61
Copyright
Copyright © Society for American Archaeology 1968

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Acosta Saignes, Miguel 1945 Los Pochteca. Acta Antropologica, Vol. 1, No. 1. Mexico.Google Scholar
Albritton, Claude C Jr. 1958 Quaternary Stratigraphy of the Guadiana Valley, Durango, Mexico. Geological Society of America Bulletin, Vol. 69, pp. 1197–1216. New York.Google Scholar
Ball, Sydney H. 1941 The Mining of Gems and Ornamental Stones by American Indians. Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 128, pp. 1–77. Washington.Google Scholar
Chapman, Anne M. 1959 Puertos de intercambio en Mesoamerica prehispanica. Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Historia III. Mexico.Google Scholar
Foshao, William F. 1957 Mineralogical Studies on Guatemalan Jade. Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections, Vol. 135, No. 5. Washington.Google Scholar
Gamio, Manuel 1910 Los monumentos arqueológicos de las immediaciones de Chalchihuites, Zacatecas. Anales del Museo Nacional de Arclueología, Historia y Etnología, Tomo 2, pp. 469–92. Mexico.Google Scholar
Geografía Del Estado de Durango 1929 Geografía del Estado de Durango, Libro 1 y 2. Mexico.Google Scholar
Hendrichs, Pedro R. 1940a Datos sobre la técnica minera prehispáníca. El México Antiguo, Vol. 5, Nos. 3–5, pp. 148–60. Mexico.Google Scholar
Hendrichs, Pedro R. 1940b Datos sobre la técnica minera prehispánica, Continuatión. El México Antiguo, Vol. 5, No. 6, pp. 179–94. Mexico.Google Scholar
Hendrichs, Pedro R. 1941 Datos sobre la técnica minera prehispánica, Concluye. El México Antiguo, Vol. 5, Nos. 7–10, pp. 311–28 (with errata page between pp. 310 and 311). Mexico.Google Scholar
Katz, Friedrich 1966 EI papel del comercio en el imperio Azteca. XXXVI Congreso Internacional de Americanistas, Actas y Memorias, Vol. 2, pp. 9–13. Sevilla.Google Scholar
Kelley, J. Charles and Abbott, Ellen 1964 The Cultural Sequence on the North Central Frontier of Mesoamerica. Paper presented to the XXXVI International Congress of Americanists in Barcelona, Madrid, and Sevilla, Spain; to be published in the Reports of the Congress, Sevilla. Mimeograph edition, Southern Illinois University Museum, Carbondale.Google Scholar
Kunz, George F. 1890 Gems and Precious Stones of North America. Scientific Publishing Company, New York.Google Scholar
López-Portillo y Weber, José 1939 La rebelion de Nueva Galicia. Antigua imprenta de E. Murguia, Tacubaya, Mexico.Google Scholar
Lothrop, Samuel Kirkland 1937 Codé. An Archaeological Study of Central Panama. Part I. Historical Background. Excavations at the Sitio Conte. Artifacts and Ornaments. Memoirs of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University, Vol. 7. Cambridge.Google Scholar
Mason, J. Alden 1937 Late Archaeological Sites in Durango, Mexico from Chalchihuites to Zape. In “Twenty-fifth Anniversary Studies,” edited by D. S. Davidson, pp. 117–26. Publications of the Philadelphia Anthropological Society, Vol. 1. University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia.Google Scholar
Mecham, John 1927 Francisco de Ibarra and Nueva Vizcaya. Duke University Press, Durham.Google Scholar
Noguera, Eduardo 1930 Ruinas arqueológicas del norte de México, Casas Grandes (Chihuahua), La Quemada, Chalchihuites (Zacatecas). Publicaciones de la Secretaría de Educación Público. Mexico.Google Scholar
Riley, Carrol L. and Winters, Howard D. 1963 The Prehistoric Tepehuan of Northern Mexico. Southwestern Journal of Anthropology, Vol. 19, No. 2, pp. 177–85. Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Sahagún, Fray Bernardino de 1959 General History of the Things of New Spain, Book 9: The Merchants, Part X; translated by Charles E. Dibble and A. J. O. Anderson. Monographs of the School of American Research and the Museum of New Mexico, The School of American Research and the University of Utah. University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City.Google Scholar
Saravia, Atanasio G. 1943 La Nueva Vizcaya, Durango Oriental. EI norte de México y el sur de Estados Unidos, pp. 52–83. Tercera Reunión de Mesa Redonda, Sociedad Mexicana de Antropología, Mexico.Google Scholar
Taylor, Walter W. 1965 Project E. Work in the Gran Chichimeca Paralleling the Mesoamerican Frontier. Report of Work Conducted under National Science Foundation Grant G186586: Studies of the North-central Frontier of Mesoamerica, mimeographed, Southern Illinois University Museum, Carbondale.Google Scholar
Thornbury, William D. 1956 Principles of Geomorphology. Wiley and Sons, Inc., New York.Google Scholar
Velázquez, María del Carmen 1961 Colotlán. Doble frontera contra los bárbaros. Cuadernos del Instituto de Historia, Serie Histórica No. 3. Mexico.Google Scholar
Zalenski, Edward R. 1908 Turquoise in the Burro Mountains, New Mexico. Engineering and Mining Journal, Vol. 86. McGraw-Hill, Inc., New York.Google Scholar