This site contains three major components. Mandeville I is a very Late Deptford culture, represented by sizable village deposits, the premound occupation under Mound A, the initial pyramidal mound building at Mound A, and most of the burial mound, Mound B. Significant contacts are seen with Copena and Ohio Valley Hopewell, and there are definite ties with the Crystal River complex. Mandeville II is a continuity with Mandeville I, but may be considered Early Swift Creek. New layers were added to Mound A, but there was little activity on Mound B. Village deposits of this component are extensive. Primary outside contact for the group is with the Crystal River complex, though some continuing Copena and Ohio Valley Hopewell influence is seen. Mandeville III, unrelated to the earlier components, is an expression of the Mississippian Rood focus 500 to 1000 years after Mandeville II. Village deposits of this component are not plentiful. Mound A was capped and presumably used for a temple base. Relationships lie with Macon Plateau and Lake Jackson, and ultimately to the northwest in the Tennessee and Mississippi valleys.

At its April 10, 1996, meeting the Society for American Archaeology Executive Board adopted the Principles of Archaeological Ethics, reproduced below, as proposed by the SAA Ethics in Archaeology Committee. The adoption of these principles represents the culmination of an effort begun in 1991 with the formation of the ad hoc Ethics in Archaeology Committee. The committee was charged with considering the need for revising the society's existing statements on ethics. A 1993 workshop on ethics, held in Reno, resulted in draft principles that were presented at a public forum at the 1994 annual meeting in Anaheim, California. SAA published the draft principles with position papers from the forum and historical commentaries in a special report distributed to all members, Ethics in American Archaeology: Challenges for the 1990s, edited by Mark J. Lynott and Alison Wylie (1995). Member comments were solicited in this special report, through a notice in SAA Bulletin, and at two sessions held at the SAA booth during the 1995 annual meeting in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The final principles presented here are revised from the original draft based on comments from members and the Executive Board.

Much attention has been paid to the role of increased food production in the development of social complexity. However, increased food production is only one kind of agricultural process, and some changes in agronomic practices were geared toward stabilizing production or counteracting periodic shortfalls. The intersection between these latter strategies and sociopolitical development are poorly understood, while the long-term value of risk management strategies is often hypothesized but empirically not well demonstrated. We address these issues using recent archaeological data from the Samoan Archipelago, Polynesia. We investigate variability in, and the development of, one type of agricultural infrastructure: ditch- and-parcel complexes. In the context of Samoa’s high-volume rainfall, recurrent cyclones, and steep topography, these novel risk management facilities offered production stability and, by extension, long-term selective benefits to both emergent elites and the general populace. Their effectiveness against known hazards is demonstrated by hydrologicai modeling, while their long-term success is indicated by increased distribution and size over time. Additionally, based on their morphologies, funetional properties, chronology, and spatial patterning, we argue that this infrastructure could have been effectively used by emergent elites to gain political advantage, particularly in conjunction with environmental perturbations that created production bottlenecks or shortfalls.

While investigating the archaeological background of early maize on the coast of Peru, I realized that several factors affect interpretation. The estimated date for the start of common use of maize there is close to the apparent dates of a large tsunami, the abandonment of many coastal sites, and the start of occupation at Chavin de Huantar in the highlands. While investigating the possible relations between the principal pre-tsunami coastal culture and Chavin, I discovered that depictions of a monstrous head link the two cultures. Dating of first millennium B.C. materials is complicated by changes in the atmospheric 14C level, so iconographic, stylistic, and material linkages are even more important in thinking about cultural development in this period. Inconsistencies between older inferences and newer observations can be resolved by a new model.

Geologic sources of obsidian are frequently treated in the archaeological literature as single, discrete flows, each being recognized as a different source as long as it can be geographically isolated. However, some recent studies show a tendency toward the correction of this misconception, and toward defining operationally the obsidian source concept on a regional basis. This work is intended to help achieve such definition for a number of obsidian sources in the central highlands of Guatemala. Geochemical characterization of samples from diverse source localities, attained by means of neutron activation analysis, is utilized for this purpose. The information thus obtained has importance to a number of fields of research in archaeology. To the now-routine studies on prehistoric trade routes, other lines of investigation can be added, namely the determination of source-specific obsidian hydration rates for dating purposes, and the reconstruction of structural features in sociocultural systems.

A new hydration rate is presented for the Government Mountain-Sitgreaves Peak obsidian source in Arizona. It is based on an analysis of hydration measurements from a series of independently dated obsidian artifacts from that source. Since obsidian obtained from Government Mountain-Sitgreaves Peak was widely traded in the prehistoric Southwest, the new hydration rate should provide archaeologists working in many parts of the Southwest with a reliable and inexpensive absolute dating technique.

Excavation in Largo-Gallina phase sites supports the interpretation that towers were primarily defensive structures. There is some evidence that towers also had a storage use. It is interesting to note that the use of defensive and specialized, village-wide storage structures coincides temporally with a period of environmental deterioration in the American Southwest.

Dating archaeological sites, cultures or phases by the obsidian method is still experimental, but shows promise provided the archaeologists understand the present limitations. Two categories of factors cause possible dating errors: the technical or geological aspect discussed by Friedman and Smith, and the archaeological context. For the establishment of valid rates of hydration and for the archaeological evaluation of the method, preferred samples are those datable by independent means, such as radiocarbon, dendrochronology, historical records, rates of refuse accumulation, contemporary calendars, or correlated positively with complexes or seriated sequences that are so dated. A few samples used in the preliminary part of the study do not meet these rigid standards and make the method look poorer than it is, but a table contains the raw data on all specimens tested to date. The principal source of potential error at our present state of knowledge is the frequency with which artifacts of older manufacture were re-used by a younger (more recent) culture. Evaluations of the data presented in the table and most of the results are discussed by geographical area. For the tropical region where the annual temperature range is minimal and where large obsidian samples from village refuse are available, the hydration rate appears to be a fairly accurate method of dating. Lack of conformity of obsidian dates with archaeological dates for the Maya region and the Southwest, however, emphasizes the need for further research using larger series of artifacts and for a continued examination of technical factors. Objects of modern manufacture can be identified with little difficulty, offering a simple means of detecting fakes or copies.

Using several methods to distinguish dart and arrow points, archaeologists have suggested that the bow and arrow appeared in various parts of the world between ˜65,000 and 1,000 years ago. Hildebrandt and King (2012) proposed a dart-arrow index (DAI) to help differentiate dart and arrow points, rejecting claims that the bow and arrow was introduced to western North America prior to the Late Holocene. We used the DAI and other methods to evaluate ˜11,700-year-old projectile points from Santa Rosa Island, obtaining mean values below the threshold for darts, comparable to several North American arrow point types. We have no direct evidence that these small points were used on darts, arrows, or hand-thrown spears, but faunal associations suggest that they may have served as harpoon tips used on atlatl darts to capture birds, fish, and marine mammals. The DAI and other methods for discriminating between dart and arrow points are based almost exclusively on ethnographic and archaeological specimens from interior regions. Our analysis suggests that such methods should not be applied universally, especially in coastal or other aquatic settings, and that archaeologists should continue to critically assess the antiquity of the bow and arrow and the function of projectile points worldwide.

The southern border of Mesoamerica is traditionally drawn at the Ulua river of western Honduras, before dipping southward to include El Salvador, Pacific Nicaragua, and northwest Costa Rica. Recent work in the Department of Colón, Honduras, provides the earliest evidence of aboriginal occupation in the region and extends the established chronological sequence back more than a thousand years. A preliminary examination of the ceramics, and a comparison to other Preclassic sites, indicates that eastern Honduras, despite its later affiliation with Lower Central American cultural patterns, was probably participating in the cultural development and long-distance trade network of Early and Middle Preclassic Mesoamerican neighbors. Using ethnohistoric analogy, the possibility of cacao as a Preclassic trade commodity is raised. Finally, it is suggested that the cultural frontier of Mesoamerica in the southeast be extended for the Preclassic time horizon.

Among the numerous problems still to be resolved in the archaeology of Mexico, one could not find a more captivating, more fundamental, and at the same time, less known one, than the early genesis of the native civilizations of Mesoamerica. Lack of knowledge of preceramic developments, which are the truly formative ones of the high prehispanic cultures, leaves the whole complicated sequence of better-studied civilizations without a real foundation. The investigation of this field requires collaborative research in the geological and paleontological sciences.

A comparison of the efficiency of a stone axe and steel axe showed that the stone axe takes over six times as long and requires over five times as much energy to accomplish the same work as does the steel axe.

The use of sascab as a substitute for sand in the preparation of ancient (and modern) mortars and plasters in Yucatán has been noted by many writers including Landa (Tozzer 1941: 171, 176), Morris, Chariot, and Morris (1931, Vol. 1: 220-4), E. H. Thompson (1887), and Villa R. (1934). R. H. Thompson (1958) details the use of sascab as temper for making pottery. Sascab is described by Villa R. (1934) as a soft limestone conglomerate; it has also been spoken of as an unconsolidated limestone. Sascab is a white to reddish, compacted powder, frequently containing rounded boulders or stones, and found in pockets in the limestone of Yucatán and possibly other areas with a similar geography.

As a step toward delineation of prehistoric urbanism on the North Coast of Peru, Royal Ontario Museum teams have conducted intensive structural-functional analysis of “urban context” at the site of Pampa Grande, much of which was last occupied by a Moche V population (ca. A.D. 600-700). Such analysis entails, among other requirements, rigorous temporal control and a systemic conception of archaeological sites, emphasizing interlinkage of various activity loci. The multistage excavation-sampling design devised for the task was based on codification of architectural forms in terms of access pattern and on the belief that ceramically defined “contemporaneity” is inadequate for functional analysis. Application of the method showed that the site contained dispersed loci of low-output craft production, with a labor force commuting from elsewhere and fed by spatially segregated kitchens. An extensive network of corridors and formal storage complexes further attests to a concern with the control of commodity and labor movement.

Obsidian artifacts from Edzna, Dzibilnocac, and Santa Rosa Xtampak in northern Campeche, Mexico, have been analyzed by means of X-ray fluorescence in order to determine their trace element composition. The results are compared to the trace element composition of obsidian sources in Guatemala and Mexico. It is postulated that the obsidian from the three sites in northern Campeche came from highland Guatemala, mostly from El Chayal. Our data are compared to the published data of other archaeological sites in Mesoamerica from which obsidian samples have been analyzed. Finally, obsidian transport routes are postulated between northern Campeche, Mexico, and highland Guatemala.

Radiocarbon dates from single-component prehistoric sites often span temporal sequences too long to be accounted for by spatial overlap in the patterning of features. One such example is the SunWatch site, which was long interpreted as a single-component occupation of relatively short duration (15–20 years), although the radiocarbon sequence comfortably spans a 500-year period (ca. A.D. 1000 to 1500). This study compares spatial contexts of the SunWatch radiocarbon dates with other temporal indicators, including architectural rebuilding, feature form and volume, and diagnostic artifact attributes. Two distinct portions of the radiocarbon sequence can be accounted for by reference to these other lines of evidence. Village growth is linked with internal and external processes, including the arrival of a small Mississippian group and the possibility of site reoccupation, common among shifting agricultural systems.

The use of lime mortar in the New World appears to be confined to the area of Mesoamerica. It is, in fact, one of the most important of the several traits charatceristic of this area which have given rise to the concept of Mesoamerica as a distinct cultural unit. The extensive use of lime mortar within Mesoamerica probably played a significant role in the development of more advanced forms of architecture within this area than in other parts of the New World, especially since it was employed ornamentally as well as functionally.

Since a large number of dog remains have been unearthed in the last few years in the Southwest, a review of the material is important. An attempt has been made to record dogs as to time and space as well as noting anatomical deviations such as the presence or absence of the first premolar on the lower jaw, and the presence or absence of large dogs and their distribution.

The results of seven months of archaeological reconnaissance in the Tzeltal-Tzotzil-speaking area of Chiapas are described. Occupation is found to have consisted only of a few, small, widely dispersed centers during the Preclassic period. During the latter part of the Early Classic period there is evidence of a considerable increase in population, and by Late Classic times nucleated ceremonial-dwelling centers were widely distributed on steep, easily defended headlands. Despite great variation in the size of individual settlements, it is argued that independent communities rather than regional coalitions were the prevailing form of socio-political organization. This pattern was replaced gradually during the Postclassic period by one in which more intensive use was made of the larger, more strategically located valleys. Closely spaced, functionally interdependent groups of communities emerged, and probably were increasingly subject to new and more coercive patterns of political, as well as religious, control. At the time of the Spanish conquest hostilities and trade with other Mesoamerican groups were increasing rapidly, but the region as a whole still remained relatively tarriant and isolated.

A semisubterranean cane and grass house was recently excavated at the site of Chilca on the central coast of Peru. The context in which it was found, as well as its associated radiocarbon date of 5370 ± 120 B.P., indicates that the house was made by early preceramic horticulturists. Seven burials were found inside. The remarkable state of preservation in which the house was found provided sufficient data for a full-scale reconstruction of the structure. This small, conical, beehive-type house is the earliest artificial shelter yet reported from Peru.