State and Society at Teotihuacan, Mexico

Abstract

Between 100 BCE and 200 CE, the city of Teotihuacan grew rapidly, most of the Basin of Mexico population was relocated in the city, immense civicreligious structures were built, and symbolic and material evidence shows the early importance of war. Rulers were probably able and powerful. Subsequently the city did not grow, and government may have become more collective, with significant constraints on rulers' powers. A state religion centered on war and fertility deities presumably served elite interests, but civic consciousness may also have been encouraged. A female goddess was important but probably not as pervasive as has been suggested. Political control probably did not extend beyond central Mexico, except perhaps for some outposts, and the scale and significance of commerce are unclear. Teotihuacan's prestige, however, spread widely in Mesoamerica, manifested especially in symbols of sacred war, used for their own ends by local elites.

Advances in the Household Archaeology of Highland Mesoamerica

“…The most likely candidates are the Ciudadela, the Street of the Dead Complex, and the Xalla compound (see Cowgill 1997Cowgill , 2007Cowgill , 2008Evans 2004Evans , 2006Manzanilla 2001Manzanilla , 2002bManzanilla , 2006Manzanilla and López Luján 2001;Sanders and Evans 2006). All three are clearly large enough to have served as palaces; Yagul's Palace of the Six Patios could fit within any of their architectural footprints many times over.…”

The structure of Upper Mesopotamian cities: Insight from fluxgate gradiometer survey at Kazane Höyük, southeastern Turkey

“…Although our knowledge is limited to a few geophysics plans and excavated exposures of varying extent, current data indicate that third millennium Upper Mesopotamian cities lacked a rigid master plan such as the grid system at Teotihuacán (Cowgill, 2007). Instead these cities shared characteristics that adhered to general planning principles that emphasized multiple nuclei of social activities, such as neighbourhoods.…”

Bridging prehistory and history in the archaeology of cities

“…that Teotihuacan became urbanized (Cowgill 1997;Millon 1973). It was not the first city in central Mexico, a distinction usually bestowed on Cuicuilco during the last centuries B.C., but Teotihuacan grew to become the largest in the Americas, with a population of some 80,000-150,000 packed densely over 20-25 sq km (FIG.…”

“…The orderliness of Teotihuacan's urban settlement, the monumentality of its epicenter, and its large, multi-family apartment compounds, are three of the city's attributes that stand out in global archaeology (Cowgill 2007). The city's economic base included the following: a productive system of springs that permitted irrigation agriculture in an area to the southwest during much of the year; adjacent positioning to the Basin of Mexico lake system, its resources and transportation possibilities; proximate access to a number of obsidian sources that provided the primary cutting implements of the period and an easily exchangeable commodity; and a combination of intensive household craft production, and market and interregional exchange (Carballo 2013;Manzanilla 2009).…”