Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jn8rn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T19:36:45.887Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Radiocarbon Chronology of the Tlatoani Site at Tlayacapan, Morelos, Mexico

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 February 2016

Alexander Cherkinsky  and
Raúl Francisco González Quezada
Alexander Cherkinsky*
Affiliation:
Center for Applied Isotope Studies, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia, USA
Raúl Francisco González Quezada
Affiliation:
Instituto Nacional de Antropologia e Historia, Cuernavaca, Morelos, Mexico
*
Corresponding author. Email: acherkin@uga.edu
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The archaeological site of Tlatoani at Tlayacapan is located in the Mexican Highlands, in the present-day state of Morelos. The site is an extant settlement located at the top of the Tepoztlan mountain range, and has been occupied since the Late Preclassic period (AD 150–500). At the height of its occupation in the Epiclassic and Early Postclassic periods (AD 600–1150), Tlayacapan was situated on the top of the hill. The radiocarbon investigations reported herein revealed some further distinct findings, although no clear absolute chronology was demonstrated. A dog skull was found inside the oldest foundation stage, and dated between cal AD 646 and 765, the middle of the Epiclassic period. Human remains found in the first grave belonged to three individuals. A male skeleton was dated to AD 1158–1227. Fragments of an incomplete skeleton of a child and an incomplete skeleton of a second male were placed on top of the first male skeleton and were dated in the range AD 1030–1156. A fourth skeleton found nearby in the second grave gave a similar date of AD 1164–1253. These burials were in accordance with the Middle America cosmovisional system, where bodies were buried beneath the household space. It is evident from the 14C dates of the skeletons that the burial sites beneath the household space had been reused by exhuming and reburying skeletons that had been previously buried there. A comparison of dates on fractions of collagen and bioapatite of the same bones was possible. Two of the samples were in good agreement between these fractions, whereas the other three samples are close but just outside the 2σ range.

Type
Chronology
Information
Radiocarbon , Volume 56 , Issue 2 , 2014 , pp. 501 - 510
Copyright
Copyright © 2014 by the Arizona Board of Regents on behalf of the University of Arizona 

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

Anzures Carrillo, E. 2008. Ocuituco: organización político-territorial en los siglos XVI y XVII [thesis]. Mexico City: Escuela National de Antropología e Historia.Google Scholar
Ávila López, R. 1999. Investigaciones arqueológicas en San Luis Tlaxialtemalco. Volumes I al VI [unpublished report]. Technical File. Mexico City: Archaeological Salvage Direction, INAH.Google Scholar
Ávila López, R. 2007. La región del sur durante el Posclásico. Excavaciones y estudios arqueológicos. In: López Wario, LA, coordinator. Ciudad excavada: veinte años de arqueología de salvamento en la Ciudad de México y su Área Metropolitana. Mexico City: Instituto National de Antropología e Historia (Colección Científica No. 510). p 101–23.Google Scholar
Bocherens, H. 2000. Preservation of isotopic signals in Pleistocene mammals. In: Ambrose, SH, Katzenberg, MA, editors. Biogeochemical Approaches to Paleodietary Analysis. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic. p 65–88.Google Scholar
Cherkinsky, A, Culp, RA, Dvoracek, DK, Noakes, JE. 2010. Status of the AMS facility at the University of Georgia. Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physical Research B 268(7–8):867–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davies, N. 1977. The Toltecs: Until the Fall of Tula (Civilization of the American Indian). Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.Google Scholar
Gonzalez Crespo, N, Garza Tarazona, S, Palavicini, B, Alvarado, C. 2008. La cronología de Xochicalco. Arqueología 37:122–39.Google Scholar
Jim, S, Ambrose, SH, Evershed, RP. 2004. Stable carbon isotope evidence for differences in the dietary origin of bone cholesterol, collagen and apatite: implications for their use in palaeodietary reconstruction. Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta 68(1):61–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lee-Thorp, JA. 2000. Preservation of biogenic carbon isotope signal in Plio-Pleistocene bone and tooth mineral. In: Ambrose, SH, Katzenberg, MA, editors. Biogeochemical Approaches to Paleodietary Analysis. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic. p 89–116.Google Scholar
Mastache, AG, Cobean, RH, Healan, DM. 2002. Ancient Tollan: Tula and the Toltec Heartland. Boulder: University Press of Colorado.Google Scholar
Reimer, PJ, Baillie, MGL, Bard, E, Bayliss, A, Beck, JW, Blackwell, PG, Bronk Ramsey, C, Buck, CE, Burr, GS, Edwards, RL, Friedrich, M, Grootes, PM, Guilderson, TP, Hajdas, I, Heaton, TJ, Hogg, AG, Hughen, KA, Kaiser, KF, Kromer, B, McCormac, FG, Manning, SW, Reimer, RW, Richards, DA, Southon, JR, Talamo, S, Turney, CSM, van der Plicht, J, Weyhenmeyer, CE. 2009. IntCal09 and Marine09 radiocarbon age calibration curves, 0–50,000 years cal BP. Radiocarbon 51(4):1111–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schoeninger, MJ, DeNiro, MJ. 1982. Carbon isotope ratio of apatite from fossil bone cannot be used to reconstruct diets of animals. Nature 297(5867):577–8.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sterpone Canuto, O. 2006. Coyotlatelco y los orígenes de Tula Grande. In: Solar Valverde, L, editor. El fenómeno Coyotlatelco en el centro de México: tiempo, espacio y significado. Memoria del Primer Seminario-Taller sobre Problemáticas Regionales. Mexico City: CONACULTA, INAH. p 257–79.Google Scholar
Séjourné, L. 1983. Arqueología e Historia del Valle de México. De Xochimilco a Amecameca. Mexico City: Siglo Veintiuno Editores.Google Scholar
Smith, ME. 1983. Postclassic culture change in western Morelos, Mexico: the development and correlation of archaeological and ethnohistorical chronologies [PhD thesis]. University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.Google Scholar
Smith, ME, Montiel, L. 2001. The archaeological study of empires and imperialism in Pre-Hispanic Central Mexico. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 20(3):245–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stuiver, M, Reimer, PJ. 1993. Extended 14C data base and revised CALIB 3.0 14C age calibration program. Radiocarbon 35(1):215–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zazzo, A, Lecuyer, C, Mariotti, A. 2004a. Experimentally-controlled carbon and oxygen isotope exchange between bioapatite inorganic and microbially-mediated conditions. Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta 68(1):1–12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zazzo, A, Lecuyer, C, Sheppard, SMF, Grandjean, P, Mariotti, A. 2004b. Diagenesis and the reconstruction of paleoenvironments: a method to restore original δ18O values of carbonate and phosphate from fossil tooth enamel. Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta 68(10):2245–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zazzo, A, Saliège, J-F, Person, A, Boucher, H. 2009. Radiocarbon dating of cremated bones: Where does the carbon come from? Radiocarbon 51(2):601–12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar