Charles S Spencer
Biographic Data
| ID | 3636400 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Charles S Spencer |
| GIVEN NAMES | Charles S |
| FAMILY NAME | Spencer |
| SIGNATURE | SPENCER C S |
| AFFILIATIONS | American Museum of Natural History |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 33 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 501 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 33 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1985 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2019 |
| H-INDEX | 12 |
Ceramic exchange and the shifting political landscape in the Valley of Oaxaca, Mexico, 700 BCE-200 CE
Ceramic provenance and the regional organization of pottery production during the later Formative periods in the Valley of Oaxaca, Mexico
Dual organization and social inequality in a Venezuelan chiefdom, AD 550-1000
A pre-Hispanic chiefdom in Barinas, Venezuela
Between 1983 and 1992, the authors conducted an archaeological project that involved five years of survey and excavation in a 450 km2 study region that included portions of the high llanos (savanna grasslands) and adjacent Andean piedmont in the state of Barinas, Venezuela. Fieldwork (in 1983–1988) was followed by four years of laboratory analysis in the Departamento de Antropología at the Instituto Venezolano de Investigaciones Científicas (IVIC…
Chiefdoms at the threshold
Expansionary dynamics of the nascent Monte Albán state
Testing the Morphogenesist Model of Primary State Formation
Ceramic Microtypology and the Territorial Expansion of the Early Monte Albán State in Oaxaca, Mexico
The Late and Terminal Formative (ca. 300 B.C. to A.D. 200) was the crucial period during which the early Monte Albán state came into being and began to extend its political influence over a wide area in what is now the Mexican state of Oaxaca. One of the most distinctive and frequent ceramic types of this period is the G.12, which is a grayware (gris) bowl with characteristic incising on the interior rim and base. Originally defined by Alfonso Ca…
Rituals of Sanctification and the Development of Standardized Temples in Oaxaca, Mexico
Archaeological investigations at three Formative period sites near San Martín Tilcajete in the Valley of Oaxaca, Mexico, have recovered a sequence of temples. The temples span the period when the Zapotec state emerged with its capital at Monte Albán during the Late Monte Albán I phase (300–100 bc), coinciding with Monte Albán's conquest of neighbouring regions. Zapotec rituals of sanctification practised in pre-state times may have been affected …
M Glow Blue’
The Ford Nuclear Reactor operated from 1957 to 2003 on the University of Michigan's North Campus in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Over its 45‐year lifespan, the facility played a key role in archaeometric research, fostering early methodological studies using INAA and supporting archaeological materials science investigations of lithics, ceramics, metals and bone. One small part of the FNR's abundant legacy was the initiation of trace‐element studies of O…
On the Logic of Archaeological Inference
The 2005 articles by Stoltman et al. and Flannery et al. to which Neff et al. (this issue) have responded are not an indictment of instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA) but, rather, of the way Blomster et al. (2005) misuse it and of the hyperbolic culture-historical claims they have made from their INAA results. It has long been acknowledged that INAA leads not to sources but to chemical composition groups. Based on composition groups d…
A Late Monte Albán I Phase (300–100 B.C.) Palace in the Valley of Oaxaca
A masonry and adobe construction called the “Area I Palace” was excavated by the authors at the site of El Palenque (SMT-llb), located near San Martín Tilcajete in the Ocotlán district of the Valley of Oaxaca, Mexico. The Area I Palace covered 850 m 2 and consisted of nine interconnected structures, one of which was an elaborate residence that measured 16 m by 16 m and had eight rooms arranged around an interior patio. Several additional platform…
Primary State Formation in Mesoamerica
In this review, we examine the earliest states in Mesoamerica and how they developed. We present a definition of the state and explain why first-generation or primary states have special significance in anthropology and archaeology; we also discuss how anthropological archaeologists can detect the emergence of state organization in the archaeological record. We review the archaeological data bearing on early state formation in Oaxaca, the Souther…
Multilevel Selection and Political Evolution in the Valley of Oaxaca, 500–100 B.C
The Chronology of Conquest
Recently obtained radiocarbon determinations from the Cañada de Cuicatlán, Oaxaca, Mexico, have made it possible to revise the chronological placement of the Perdido phase (from 600-200 B. C. to 750-300 B. C.) and the Lomas phase (from 200 B. C.-A. D. 200 to 300 B. C.-A. D. 200), the latter being the phase for which substantial evidence of a Zapotec conquest of the Cañada has been recovered. The revised chronology brings the Lomas phase into clos…
Food Scarcity, Rural Poverty, and Agricultural Development in Latin America
A Macroregional View of Cycling Chiefdoms in the Western Venezuelan Llanos
Complex chiefdoms are subject to oscillating cycles of regional political centralization under the domination of a paramount chief, followed by political dissolution, and frequently, the rise of a rival paramount chiefdom. A macroregional scale of investigation offers the best opportunity to examine the development of centralized, hierarchical leadership and the trajectories of such regional control at successive paramount centers. We present the…
Prehispanic Causeways and Regional Politics in the Llanos of Barinas, Venezuela
In this article we discuss the Prehispanic earthen causeways (calzadas) that traverse the llanos (humid savannas) of Barinas state, Venezuela. A salient question is why the calzadas in this area connect some archaeological sites but not others. Some scholars have proposed that the calzadas were constructed primarily as an adaptive response to seasonal flooding. We assess this proposition by examining Late Gaván phase (A. D. 550-1000) data from al…
A Mathematical Model of Primary State Formation
Primary state formation is when a first-generation state evolves in a context of pre-existing non-state societies. A dynamic model of this process is developed, drawing upon concepts from evolutionary anthropology and archaeology, as well as from evolutionary ecology, systems theory, and complexity theory. Differential equations are used to model: (1) the dynamics of political growth in chiefdoms (societies with centralized but not internally spe…
Evolutionary approaches in archaeology
Agricultura indígena
Semillas de Industria
Factional ascendance, dimensions of leadership, and the development of centralized authority
Introduction This paper focuses on the processes and conditions that promote the perpetuation of centralized, but nonbureaucratic, authority. Patterns of leadership variability in uncentralized tribal societies are first examined, using examples from South American ethnography. The growth of central leadership in such systems is seen to be closely linked to the internal forces of factional development as well as to the external dynamics of interf…
Factional Competition and Political Development in the New World
Factionalism is an important force of social transformation, and this volume examines how factional competition in the kinship and political structures in ancient New World societies led to the development of chiefdoms, states and empires. The case studies, from a range of New World societies, represent all levels of non-egalitarian societies and a wide variety of ecological settings in the New World. They document the effects of factionalism on …
Drained Fields at La Tigra, Venezuelan Llanos
This paper discusses drained-field studies in Venezuela, beginning with the first investigations two decades ago that focused on field systems themselves and proceeding to recent research by the authors that examined the drained fields of La Tigra as part of a regional-scale project in the state of Barinas. The La Tigra fields are dated to the Late Gaván phase (A.D. 550-1000), a time of extensive habitation in the region. An analysis of excavated…
Factional Competition and Political Development in the New World
Factionalism is an important force of social transformation, and this volume examines how factional competition in the kinship and political structures in ancient New World societies led to the development of chiefdoms, states and empires. The case studies, from a range of New World societies, represent all levels of non-egalitarian societies and a wide variety of ecological settings in the New World. They document the effects of factionalism on …
Practice and Political Centralisation
Primary State Formation in Mesoamerica
In this review, we examine the earliest states in Mesoamerica and how they developed. We present a definition of the state and explain why first-generation or primary states have special significance in anthropology and archaeology; we also discuss how anthropological archaeologists can detect the emergence of state organization in the archaeological record. We review the archaeological data bearing on early state formation in Oaxaca, the Souther…
Evolutionary approaches in archaeology
On the Logic of Archaeological Inference
The 2005 articles by Stoltman et al. and Flannery et al. to which Neff et al. (this issue) have responded are not an indictment of instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA) but, rather, of the way Blomster et al. (2005) misuse it and of the hyperbolic culture-historical claims they have made from their INAA results. It has long been acknowledged that INAA leads not to sources but to chemical composition groups. Based on composition groups d…
Multilevel Selection and Political Evolution in the Valley of Oaxaca, 500–100 B.C
Ecological Theory and Cultural Evolution in the Valley of Oaxaca [and Comments and Reply]
Prehispanic chiefdoms of the western VenezuelanIlanos
The western Venezuelan llanos hold great potential for investigations into the organization and development of prehispanic chiefdoms. Recent research has revealed that beginning c. AD 500–600 dramatic cultural developments include the emergence of three‐level settlement hierarchies according to site size and architecture, substantial population growth, the appearance of social differentiation in residential and burial patterns, systems of drained…
Drained Fields at La Tigra, Venezuelan Llanos
This paper discusses drained-field studies in Venezuela, beginning with the first investigations two decades ago that focused on field systems themselves and proceeding to recent research by the authors that examined the drained fields of La Tigra as part of a regional-scale project in the state of Barinas. The La Tigra fields are dated to the Late Gaván phase (A.D. 550-1000), a time of extensive habitation in the region. An analysis of excavated…
The Chronology of Conquest
Recently obtained radiocarbon determinations from the Cañada de Cuicatlán, Oaxaca, Mexico, have made it possible to revise the chronological placement of the Perdido phase (from 600-200 B. C. to 750-300 B. C.) and the Lomas phase (from 200 B. C.-A. D. 200 to 300 B. C.-A. D. 200), the latter being the phase for which substantial evidence of a Zapotec conquest of the Cañada has been recovered. The revised chronology brings the Lomas phase into clos…
A Mathematical Model of Primary State Formation
Primary state formation is when a first-generation state evolves in a context of pre-existing non-state societies. A dynamic model of this process is developed, drawing upon concepts from evolutionary anthropology and archaeology, as well as from evolutionary ecology, systems theory, and complexity theory. Differential equations are used to model: (1) the dynamics of political growth in chiefdoms (societies with centralized but not internally spe…
Prehispanic Causeways and Regional Politics in the Llanos of Barinas, Venezuela
In this article we discuss the Prehispanic earthen causeways (calzadas) that traverse the llanos (humid savannas) of Barinas state, Venezuela. A salient question is why the calzadas in this area connect some archaeological sites but not others. Some scholars have proposed that the calzadas were constructed primarily as an adaptive response to seasonal flooding. We assess this proposition by examining Late Gaván phase (A. D. 550-1000) data from al…
A Late Monte Albán I Phase (300–100 B.C.) Palace in the Valley of Oaxaca
A masonry and adobe construction called the “Area I Palace” was excavated by the authors at the site of El Palenque (SMT-llb), located near San Martín Tilcajete in the Ocotlán district of the Valley of Oaxaca, Mexico. The Area I Palace covered 850 m 2 and consisted of nine interconnected structures, one of which was an elaborate residence that measured 16 m by 16 m and had eight rooms arranged around an interior patio. Several additional platform…
Rituals of Sanctification and the Development of Standardized Temples in Oaxaca, Mexico
Archaeological investigations at three Formative period sites near San Martín Tilcajete in the Valley of Oaxaca, Mexico, have recovered a sequence of temples. The temples span the period when the Zapotec state emerged with its capital at Monte Albán during the Late Monte Albán I phase (300–100 bc), coinciding with Monte Albán's conquest of neighbouring regions. Zapotec rituals of sanctification practised in pre-state times may have been affected …
Ceramic Microtypology and the Territorial Expansion of the Early Monte Albán State in Oaxaca, Mexico
The Late and Terminal Formative (ca. 300 B.C. to A.D. 200) was the crucial period during which the early Monte Albán state came into being and began to extend its political influence over a wide area in what is now the Mexican state of Oaxaca. One of the most distinctive and frequent ceramic types of this period is the G.12, which is a grayware (gris) bowl with characteristic incising on the interior rim and base. Originally defined by Alfonso Ca…
M Glow Blue’
The Ford Nuclear Reactor operated from 1957 to 2003 on the University of Michigan's North Campus in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Over its 45‐year lifespan, the facility played a key role in archaeometric research, fostering early methodological studies using INAA and supporting archaeological materials science investigations of lithics, ceramics, metals and bone. One small part of the FNR's abundant legacy was the initiation of trace‐element studies of O…
Dual organization and social inequality in a Venezuelan chiefdom, AD 550-1000
A Macroregional View of Cycling Chiefdoms in the Western Venezuelan Llanos
Complex chiefdoms are subject to oscillating cycles of regional political centralization under the domination of a paramount chief, followed by political dissolution, and frequently, the rise of a rival paramount chiefdom. A macroregional scale of investigation offers the best opportunity to examine the development of centralized, hierarchical leadership and the trajectories of such regional control at successive paramount centers. We present the…
Ceramic provenance and the regional organization of pottery production during the later Formative periods in the Valley of Oaxaca, Mexico
A pre-Hispanic chiefdom in Barinas, Venezuela
Between 1983 and 1992, the authors conducted an archaeological project that involved five years of survey and excavation in a 450 km2 study region that included portions of the high llanos (savanna grasslands) and adjacent Andean piedmont in the state of Barinas, Venezuela. Fieldwork (in 1983–1988) was followed by four years of laboratory analysis in the Departamento de Antropología at the Instituto Venezolano de Investigaciones Científicas (IVIC…
Ceramic exchange and the shifting political landscape in the Valley of Oaxaca, Mexico, 700 BCE-200 CE
Homology, Analogy, and Comparative Research in Archaeology
Some postprocessual theorists have criticized the cross-cultural approach in archaeology, arguing that it reduces cultural variability to analytical sameness and neglects the role of historical contingency in human affairs Responding to these criticisms, this paper suggests how archaeologists can be sensitive to contextual variation and the forces of history while carrying out comparative analyses of developmental sequences
Supplement to the Handbook of Middle American Indians. Vol. 2. Linguistics
Supplement to the Handbook of Middle American Indians. Vol. 2. Linguistics
Ecological Theory and Cultural Evolution in the Valley of Oaxaca [and Comments and Reply]
On the tempo and mode of state formation
Homology, Analogy, and Comparative Research in Archaeology
Some postprocessual theorists have criticized the cross-cultural approach in archaeology, arguing that it reduces cultural variability to analytical sameness and neglects the role of historical contingency in human affairs Responding to these criticisms, this paper suggests how archaeologists can be sensitive to contextual variation and the forces of history while carrying out comparative analyses of developmental sequences
Prehispanic chiefdoms of the western VenezuelanIlanos
The western Venezuelan llanos hold great potential for investigations into the organization and development of prehispanic chiefdoms. Recent research has revealed that beginning c. AD 500–600 dramatic cultural developments include the emergence of three‐level settlement hierarchies according to site size and architecture, substantial population growth, the appearance of social differentiation in residential and burial patterns, systems of drained…
Human Agency, Biased Transmission, and the Cultural Evolution of Chiefly Authority
Practice and Political Centralisation
Factional ascendance, dimensions of leadership, and the development of centralized authority
Introduction This paper focuses on the processes and conditions that promote the perpetuation of centralized, but nonbureaucratic, authority. Patterns of leadership variability in uncentralized tribal societies are first examined, using examples from South American ethnography. The growth of central leadership in such systems is seen to be closely linked to the internal forces of factional development as well as to the external dynamics of interf…
Factional Competition and Political Development in the New World
Factionalism is an important force of social transformation, and this volume examines how factional competition in the kinship and political structures in ancient New World societies led to the development of chiefdoms, states and empires. The case studies, from a range of New World societies, represent all levels of non-egalitarian societies and a wide variety of ecological settings in the New World. They document the effects of factionalism on …
Drained Fields at La Tigra, Venezuelan Llanos
This paper discusses drained-field studies in Venezuela, beginning with the first investigations two decades ago that focused on field systems themselves and proceeding to recent research by the authors that examined the drained fields of La Tigra as part of a regional-scale project in the state of Barinas. The La Tigra fields are dated to the Late Gaván phase (A.D. 550-1000), a time of extensive habitation in the region. An analysis of excavated…
Agricultura indígena
Semillas de Industria
Evolutionary approaches in archaeology
Prehispanic Causeways and Regional Politics in the Llanos of Barinas, Venezuela
In this article we discuss the Prehispanic earthen causeways (calzadas) that traverse the llanos (humid savannas) of Barinas state, Venezuela. A salient question is why the calzadas in this area connect some archaeological sites but not others. Some scholars have proposed that the calzadas were constructed primarily as an adaptive response to seasonal flooding. We assess this proposition by examining Late Gaván phase (A. D. 550-1000) data from al…
A Mathematical Model of Primary State Formation
Primary state formation is when a first-generation state evolves in a context of pre-existing non-state societies. A dynamic model of this process is developed, drawing upon concepts from evolutionary anthropology and archaeology, as well as from evolutionary ecology, systems theory, and complexity theory. Differential equations are used to model: (1) the dynamics of political growth in chiefdoms (societies with centralized but not internally spe…
A Macroregional View of Cycling Chiefdoms in the Western Venezuelan Llanos
Complex chiefdoms are subject to oscillating cycles of regional political centralization under the domination of a paramount chief, followed by political dissolution, and frequently, the rise of a rival paramount chiefdom. A macroregional scale of investigation offers the best opportunity to examine the development of centralized, hierarchical leadership and the trajectories of such regional control at successive paramount centers. We present the…
Food Scarcity, Rural Poverty, and Agricultural Development in Latin America
Multilevel Selection and Political Evolution in the Valley of Oaxaca, 500–100 B.C
The Chronology of Conquest
Recently obtained radiocarbon determinations from the Cañada de Cuicatlán, Oaxaca, Mexico, have made it possible to revise the chronological placement of the Perdido phase (from 600-200 B. C. to 750-300 B. C.) and the Lomas phase (from 200 B. C.-A. D. 200 to 300 B. C.-A. D. 200), the latter being the phase for which substantial evidence of a Zapotec conquest of the Cañada has been recovered. The revised chronology brings the Lomas phase into clos…
A Late Monte Albán I Phase (300–100 B.C.) Palace in the Valley of Oaxaca
A masonry and adobe construction called the “Area I Palace” was excavated by the authors at the site of El Palenque (SMT-llb), located near San Martín Tilcajete in the Ocotlán district of the Valley of Oaxaca, Mexico. The Area I Palace covered 850 m 2 and consisted of nine interconnected structures, one of which was an elaborate residence that measured 16 m by 16 m and had eight rooms arranged around an interior patio. Several additional platform…
Primary State Formation in Mesoamerica
In this review, we examine the earliest states in Mesoamerica and how they developed. We present a definition of the state and explain why first-generation or primary states have special significance in anthropology and archaeology; we also discuss how anthropological archaeologists can detect the emergence of state organization in the archaeological record. We review the archaeological data bearing on early state formation in Oaxaca, the Souther…
On the Logic of Archaeological Inference
The 2005 articles by Stoltman et al. and Flannery et al. to which Neff et al. (this issue) have responded are not an indictment of instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA) but, rather, of the way Blomster et al. (2005) misuse it and of the hyperbolic culture-historical claims they have made from their INAA results. It has long been acknowledged that INAA leads not to sources but to chemical composition groups. Based on composition groups d…
M Glow Blue’
The Ford Nuclear Reactor operated from 1957 to 2003 on the University of Michigan's North Campus in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Over its 45‐year lifespan, the facility played a key role in archaeometric research, fostering early methodological studies using INAA and supporting archaeological materials science investigations of lithics, ceramics, metals and bone. One small part of the FNR's abundant legacy was the initiation of trace‐element studies of O…
Ceramic Microtypology and the Territorial Expansion of the Early Monte Albán State in Oaxaca, Mexico
The Late and Terminal Formative (ca. 300 B.C. to A.D. 200) was the crucial period during which the early Monte Albán state came into being and began to extend its political influence over a wide area in what is now the Mexican state of Oaxaca. One of the most distinctive and frequent ceramic types of this period is the G.12, which is a grayware (gris) bowl with characteristic incising on the interior rim and base. Originally defined by Alfonso Ca…
Archaeology and ancient environmental studies (21 works) · Geography (20 works) · Political science (19 works) · Sociology (19 works) · Archaeology (18 works) · History (17 works) · Politics (16 works) · Law (14 works) · History (12 works) · Chiefdom (9 works)