Earliest examples of investigations into the history of the Mixteca include the studies of 9th
century historian Manuel Martínez Gracida (847-924). Among his many writings, he com- piled an extensive description of the Mixteca in collaboration with Manuel López Ruiz, in- cluding geomorphologic features as well as cosmological perceptions in Santiago Tilantongo and several other communities (Martínez Gracida 90). He also recorded local oral tradition that placed a Postclassic period site under, around and near the present-day Tilantongo in the municipal centre, as mentioned in his Cuadros sinópticos de los pueblos, haciendas y ranchos del Estado libre y soberano de Oaxaca (883):
‘Tilantongo, pues, fué la capital del imperio, y de ahí salieron los que fundaron los otros pueblos de esa Nación Mixteca tan valiente é ilustrada en otros tiempos. El Rey de Tilantongo tenía su morada en un pequeño plano hácia el Sur de la iglesia antigua, donde estuvo el palacio de aquel señor, de cuya habitación solo se conservan pequeños cimientos. Todo está conforme con la tradición de los habitantes del pueblo, quienes aseguran que fue fundada esta población donde se halla hasta la fecha, la cual estaba dividida en cinco pueblos pequeños que tenian por nombres Santa Catarina, San Pedro Tiahun y Yucunduchi, los que se hallaban situados en la montaña que pasa de Poniente á Sur…, y el último, San Juan Martín, que se hallaba situado entre Poniente y Sur, en otra montaña más distante de esta población pendiente de la misma cordillera; y por petición del párroco que tenia a cargo esta parroquia, cuyo nombre se ignora, fué reducida a una sola de cuyos pueblos solo uno quedó conforme que fue Yucunduchi y los otros tres tomaron distinto rumbo. Todavía existen ruinas de antiguos templos en aquellos lugares y se encuentran edificios y sepulcros [...].’2
Besides collecting pre-colonial objects, he also embraced oral history which he recorded whilst adding his own personal romantic elements. These were later printed and distributed through- out the region.3 Besides information regarding the natural environment and the social struc-
tures, Gracida also included an exploration of a number of archaeological sites. In the mu- nicipalities of Tilantongo (San Juan Martín), Peñoles (Pueblo Viejo), Taltepec (Jaltepec), and Yucuíta he recorded the sites with monumental architecture. The descriptions, with some detail, provide the bases of the encountered structures from different sides as well as a plan drawing. He describes the surrounding areas and the ruins, noting the exact localities and their names in Mixtec.4
Eduard Seler (849-922) and Caecilie Seler-Sachs (855-935), contemporaries of Mar- tínez Gracida, visited several towns and archaeological sites in the Mixteca Alta during their travels in Mexico between 895 and 897 en route to the Oaxaca Valley. These included the Postclassic settlement Pueblo Viejo near present Teposcolula among several other sites in the Nochixtlán Valley. Presidential permits, however, did not allow Seler to excavate at any of the sites, and restricted him to purchasing previously encountered vessels in the towns and picking up surface materials in a haphazard fashion (Seler 960a [904]:26-27, 960b [908]:522- 53).5
The initial studies by Martinez Gracida and Seler were followed by archaeological explora- tions led by Alfonso Caso. Although Caso is commonly associated with the investigation and reconstruction of the site of Monte Albán, an additional objective for his explorations was to define the material cultures present beyond the Oaxaca Valley; to amplify data gathered on the Zapotec culture and to connect to Eduardo Noguera’s parallel project in the Puebla area (Noguera 954, 960). Within this framework, particular attention was awarded to the Mixteca to which a number of expeditions were mounted. In doing so, Caso stressed the im- portance of the mobility and exchange of these cultures within a greater supra regional cultural scheme, that would later be defined as Mesoamerica. Caso argued for more research in Oaxaca by arguing an imbalance in archaeological advances between Oaxaca as opposed to the Maya region as well as the Valley of Mexico:
3 The information contained in these leaflets can still today be heard in oral history, for example through the popular culture-hero of the ‘Flechador del Sol’. The investigation into the material remains resulted in a study packed with architectural drawings and notes regarding the status of structures over a century ago, on the one hand, and reflections of indigenous perception of these structures and their locations, on the other. 4 Together with other contemporaneous investigations, undertaken by Manuel López Ruiz and Abraham Cas-
tellanos, this type of description is unique in its kind. Unfortunately, integral studies of Martínez Gracida’s work are still lacking as well as any detailed publications of his writings.
5 Upon reaching Oaxaca City, Seler took active part in the scene of local collectors, whose primary representa- tives, other than Martinez Gracida and Castellanos, were Fernando Sologuren, and Francisco Belmar, all of which counted substantial private collections in their possessions (see Van Doesburg 998 and Sellen 2006 for more detailed historical information on Seler, Belmar and Sologuren).
Pero si bien es cierto que abundan las descripciones de los viajeros entusiastas, arqueólogos o amateurs, muy pocos estudios se han emprendido con el objeto de poder penetrar en los misterios de esas civilizaciones, y averiguar sus puntos de contacto con las culturas Maya y Nahuatl. [...] Aun cuando la literatura sobre la arqueología de Oaxaca, no es escasa, nos damos cuenta después de conocerla, que los autores generalmente han repetido lo que otros habían dicho, sin añadir, en la mayoría de los casos, ninguna investigación personal o dato nuevo que hiciera avanzár la ciencia (Caso 928:7).
The archaeological tradition in Oaxaca is thus rooted in the comparison of cultures in the central Mexican highlands to the northwest and the Maya to the east and northeast. The pio- neering work was conducted by Alfonso Caso and several of his students and assistants, but he was preceded in the Mixteca by Juan Valenzuela. In 933, Valenzuela toured the Nochixtlán Valley with a number of his students, taking photographs of archaeological sites, including Yucuíta, Chachoapan, Pueblo Viejo, and Tinducarrada. In 934, Eulalia Guzmán, who was also a member of the Monte Albán project, returned to the sites explored by Valenzuela, and made preliminary maps of the sites Yucuíta, Yucuñudahui (near Chachoapan), Yanhuitlán, Pueblo Viejo (near Teposcolula), Yatachío (near Tamazulapan), and Tejupan. She also made some observations regarding ceramic types and general location of the visited sites (Guzmán 934). This study was extended by two of Caso’s assistants; Martín Bazán and Daniel de la Borbolla, who created an unpublished report regarding several sites in the Mixteca (see Caso 938: 4). These short expeditions would serve as preparation for the Caso exploration of 935.
The 935 Caso expedition focused mainly on Yucuñudahui and had the threefold objective of registering structures, locating tombs, and determining the stratigraphy of the site (Caso 938:43). Among other things, Caso, Bazán, Acosta, and Romero registered a ball court, a tomb with several incised slabs, and gathered considerable quantities of ceramic material. No archaeological activities would follow at Yucuñudahui until the excavations under direction of Spores in 970 (see below).
Following the exploratory trips to the area, archaeological investigation of the Mixteca Alta remained incidental and largely focussed on excavation protocols that favoured the outlining of monumental structures and the registering of tomb architecture and their contents. Also, test pits for gathering data on ceramic typology formed a primary research objective. All of these emphases favoured the objective to discern relationships of the Mixteca to the surround- ing areas, in particular the Oaxaca Valley (reflected in Bernal 965. Single-site investigations were undertaken at Monte Negro by Caso during the late 30s (see below for a more detailed description); at the Inguiteria site near Coixtlahuaca (Bernal 948) during the late 40s; at the Yatachío site near Tamazulapan in 952 (Paddock 953); and at the Huamelulpan site in 957 (Gamio 957) and 96 (Caso and Gamio 96). In the mid 50s, José Luis Lorenzo excavated
Yuzanú, the first pre-ceramic site registered in the Mixteca Alta (Lorenzo 958), which received a tentative dating between 5000 and 2500 BC.
Archaeological activities received a significant impetus by means of a survey that charted the Nochixtlán Valley in the late 60s. Directed by Ronald Spores, the survey yielded sufficient data from systematic surface collections and controlled excavation to propose the first chrono- logical sequence for the Mixteca Alta (Spores 972, 974a).6 Since its initial proposition, the
ceramic typology, the basis for the chronology, has been revised and updated periodically, but has remained the keystone to understanding continuity and change in the region. Since the 970s, numerous regional surveys have connected to the Nochixtlán Valley survey, for example in 977 for the Tamazulapan-Tejupan area (Byland 980); the Yucuíta area (Plunket 983); the Tilantongo-Jaltepec area (Byland and Pohl 994); in 990 for the Peñoles area (Finsten 996); between 993 and 995 for the area around Tlaxiaco (Spores 996); in 996 en 997 for the Teposcolula area (Stiver 200); and most recently in 999 by means of the Central Mixteca Alta Settlement Pattern Project more extensively for the Tlaxiaco and Achiutla Valleys (Balkansky et al. 2000). At present, the Mixteca Alta is known archaeologically through a number of regional survey projects that cover an estimated total of 2.000 km²; an amount large by any means of comparison to other areas of Mesoamerica.
Excavation projects in the Mixteca Alta have also steadily increased in number over time, although the density of projects has not been able to keep track with the surge in survey- ing activity. Following the excavation of houses at Yucuíta, Yucuñudahui and Chachoapan by Michael Lind (977, 979) subsequent projects were initiated at the early urban centres of Huamelulpan (Balkansky 998b; Gaxiola 984) and Yucuita (Winter 982; Robles 988); the formative centre of Etlatongo (Blomster 998, 2004; Zárate 987), as well as occasional salvage archaeology projects (e.g. Matadamas 992; Paddock 970). Thus, the excavation of Postclas- sic contexts has remained largely absent; a trend that recently was broken by the excavation of Postclassic period two houses and several terraces in the Teposcolula Valley by Veronica Pérez Rodríguez (2003).
Archaeological projects in the Mixteca Baja and Mixteca de la Costa were undertaken early on by Brockington et al. (974); Fernández and Gómez (988), and Winter et al. (989), and more recently by Rivera (999) and Winter (996) in the Baja; and by Joyce (99a, 99b, 993, 994); Joyce et al. (995); King (2003); O’Mack (990); Workinger (2002); Levine (in prep), and Heijting (2006) in the Río Verde Basin on the Mixtec coastal strip. Beyond the Oaxacan state border, the Mixtec region of Guerrero was investigated by Gutierrez Mendoza (2002).
6 The Nochixtlán Valley Archaeological Project pioneered a multidisciplinary approach to the Mixtec past, whereby archaeology and ethnohistory were applied in conjunction in order to shed light on the Postclassic, but possibly also on earlier periods of history in the Mixteca Alta (Spores 967, 974b, 983a,b,c, 984). This approach echoes the so-called direct historical approach that was frequently applied in archaeological studies in the US during the first half of the 20th century (Steward 942; Lymann and O’Brien 200).
2.2.2.1 Monte Negro
Due to its high historical profile, Santiago Tilantongo was visited and studied by a number of early explorers. Manuel Martinez Gracida provides the first report on archaeological remains in the area, together with his collaborator Manuel López Ruiz (Martinez Gracida 90). The initiation of archaeological investigations at Monte Negro was a direct result of the abovemen- tioned visit by Alfonso Caso to Santiago Tilantongo in 935.
In the village itself, a structure was encountered to the west of the church, which in turn was noted to be constructed partly on top of a number of pre-Hispanic mounds and had a codex-style glyph of a man seated in an opening mountain built into one of its walls. The structure was interpreted by Caso as a ‘palace’, because of its patio type build-up, and presence of polychrome ceramics. Other structures in the direct vicinity revealed a calcareous slab with a codex-style representation of a personage named 5 Death, which is elaborately described by Caso:
La lapida de “Oon Diyi” es en mi concepto la mejor muestra que conocemos de la escultura mix- teca. […] se ve la figura de un guerrero, hombre o dios que tiene su nombre jeroglífico “5 Muerte”, representado por cinco puntos y un cráneo humano con oreja y voluta que sale de la nariz. […] El pelo lo tiene detenido con una venda y por detrás aparece un penacho muy elaborado, en el que además de las largas plumas de quetzal, tan characterísticas de las representaciones de dioses en los códices poblano-tlaxcaltecas y mixtecos, […] (Caso 938:57).
Interesting in the above citation of Caso is that the name given for the carved stone is provided in Mixtec and also reported by Caso as such. This practice is not a unique example for this period and is illustrative of the value placed on description in the indigenous language during this pioneering period of archaeological research in the Mixteca Alta. By the time Caso decided to visit Tilantongo, it had not yet been correlated to the place glyph of origin for the doings of Lord 8 Deer; perhaps the most prominent and exhaustively studied individual mentioned in a number of the Postclassic pictorial manuscripts originating in the region. A number of pioneering studies into these manuscripts had looked at this matter (Castellanos 90; Clark 92; Spinden 935), but the definite identification was established by Jiménez Moreno in 944, based on his work at the Mapa de Teozacualco for a conference in Guadalajara (mentioned in Caso 949).
Caso registered and mapped an elite residential structure located to the south of the church, but was also drawn to monumental remains of Monte Negro on top of the Cerro Negro, over- looking Tilantongo. The ensuing activities resulted in a first inventory of the ceramics; princi- pally achieved through the locating and excavating of a number of mortuary tombs. Helped by what was known about chronology at the time, Caso encountered ceramics indicating an occupation synchronous to the first ceramic period of occupation at Monte Albán, period I
(500 – 200 BC). Monte Negro’s Late Formative single component occupation history was of particular interest to Caso, since it provided a possibility to understand the contemporaneous occupation period of Monte Albán, which is largely inaccessible due to building activities in subsequent periods (Acosta & Romero 992: Figure 9; Caso 938: Plan 8; Guzmán 934). A preliminary map of the site area was drawn, noticing a ball court, sunken patio, and several staircases (Figure 2.0). Further investigations were limited to the following season.7
In addition to data on the Monte Negro ceramics, several maps were produced in order to provide an overview of the architectural lay-out of a) the Postclassic elite residence in the cen- tre of Tilantongo and b) the Late Formative Monte Negro settlement. At Monte Negro, Caso mapped what he considered the central architectural part of the site and excavated, besides the above mentioned tombs, several monumental structures. The data published by Caso did thus not provide information on the extensions of the site, nor did it reflect on the positioning of 7 With respect to its location, Monte Negro posed considerable logistical problems for Caso. Situated at an approximate height of 2600 meters above sea level, on one of the higher ridges of the Cerro Negro, this location did not permit staying in the municipal centre of Tilantongo. Caso was required to hire an architect for constructing a base-camp adjacent to the monumental core of the site (Caso 939:6). Remnants of this encampment still remain visible today and initiatives have been proposed to replace logs for the walls and restore the roof. Other than the pouring of a cement floor and the constructing of cement poles for roof support, no action has been taken.
Monte Negro in relation to other settlement in the surrounding landscape. This apparent la- cuna in Caso’s Monte Negro reports can be adequately explained by the emphases placed within archaeology in general at the time, and in particular, by the specific interests regarding Monte Negro’s possible relation to Monte Albán set forth by Caso. This first archaeological activity at Monte Negro immediately exposed a large segment of the monumental architectural features and defined the contemporary image of the site, well known to archaeologists who have been active in Oaxaca ever since.8
The investigations undertaken by Caso in Monte Negro during the 937-38 season focused on the group of structures situated roughly at a west – east axis, and a considerably smaller group located to the northeast, with a north – south axis. Major attention was given to the southernmost structure of the smaller section, named Temple T-S. This structure drew Caso’s attention because of the presence of six columns on top of the elevated platform. This platform is reached through stairs consisting of four steps. In the western part of the platform floor, Caso discovered two tombs, which yielded the first ceramic material useable for Caso’s objective of establishing a chronology for the Mixteca. With respect to this, Caso observes:
Toda la cerámica de la tumba y del entierro, así como la que encontramos en la 7a. temporada, es semejante por sus formas a la que encontramos en Monte Albán I, y podemos afirmar que hasta ahora no se ha encontrado en Monte Negro cerámica que parezca posterior a esta época antigua (Caso 939:63).
Furthermore, he states:
Sin embargo, el barro es completamente diferente y la técnica también, demonstrando esto que fueron fabricadas en el lugar y no importadas del Valle de Oaxaca (Caso 939:63).9
In summary, the ceramics encountered during Caso’s excavation point to a combination of influence from the productive Valley of Oaxaca, and a simultaneous reformulation of forms 8 Excavation activities have produced substantial and numerous refuse heaps consisting of excavated material. This currently makes an analysis of the stratigraphy particularly difficult, and will cause future archaeological activities to consider an ‘archaeology of archaeology’.
9 Kent Flannery has later criticized these statements, in one of his contributions to the Cloud People volume. Flannery clearly prefers the model in which, during the Rosario phase, Monte Albán and the population residing in the Valley are described as looking for expansion into other regions (Flannery 983b). Although Flannery points to the distance between Huitzo and Tilantongo as being ‘only’ 50 km (ibid.: 02), it would be more telling to look at this question, not from looking down at a cartographic map, but rather from the perspective of distance in hours foot travel. This could in fact turn out to be well over 20 hours of walking distance. Influence from the Valley may thus have to be formulated somewhat more tentatively. When taking into account Caso’s observations regarding the distinctive character of the ceramics encountered in Temple T-S, Flannery’s clarification remains limited to a comparison of the relative occurrence of grey ware at Monte Negro, compared to those at Yucuita and Huamelulpan.
and slips pointing to the maintenance of an autonomous character of Monte Negro and the surrounding region of the Mixteca.0
Ever since those first archaeological activities, Monte Negro has played a prominent part