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Architecture and Authority in the Casas Grandes Area, Chihuahua, Mexico

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Michael E. Whalen  and
Paul E. Minnis
Michael E. Whalen
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Tulsa, Tulsa, OK 74104
Paul E. Minnis
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK 73019
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Abstract

Architecture both reflects and emphasizes the distinctions upon which social and political organization are based. In particular, an "architecture of power" has been recognized in a number of hierarchical, prehistoric cultural contexts, from the Chacoans to the Mississippians. In these cases, the specific architectural style of a central place is replicated at points in the surrounding area, either as an imitative response by local populations or as a tangible reflection of control exerted from the major political center. The latter situation seems the most likely in the area close around the primate center of Casas Grandes, Chihuahua, Mexico. Here, architectural data from the authors' recent survey and excavation projects are used to recognize a local architecture of power, to trace its distribution, and to postulate several different types of control nodes in the area lying around the primate center. These nodes vary in type and level of elaboration, and it is argued that this variation reflects the nodes" different roles in the organization of Casas Grandes" hinterland.

Résumé

Résumé

Desde hace mucho tiempo se ha reconocido que la arquitectura tanto refleja como enfatiza las distinciones que forman la base de la organización de sociedades humanas. En particular se ha definido una “arquitectura depoder” en varios contextos jerárquicos y prehistóricos, por ejemplo el sistema regional de Chaco Canyon, ubicado en el suroeste de los E.U., o las sociedades misisippianas del sureste de los E. U. En ambos casos, el estilo arquitectónico de un centro poderoso fue replicado en la región circundante. Dichas réplias pueden ser entendidas, según sus contextos, como imitaciones por parte de poblaciones locales o como indicaciones del control por un centro político mayor. La última situatión nos parece más probable en la región alrededor del gran centro prehispánico de Casas Grandes, Chihuahua, México. El presente estudio examina este interrogante a través de datos arquitectónicos deproyectos de reconocimiento de superficie y de excavatión que recientemente han sido realizadospor los autores en el área de Casas Grandes. Estos datos permiten el reconocimiento preliminar de una versión local de la arquitectura de poder, un estudio de la distribución de esta arquitectura y una definitión de varios tipos de asentamientos que probablemente Servían como puntos de control en la región que rodea el centro de Casas Grandes. Se nota que estos asentamientos muestran diferentes niveles de elaboratión y se sostiene que dicha variación pueda ser una indicatión de las funciones diferentes que descargaban los puntos de control en el sistema de organización regional de Casas Grandes.

Type
Articles
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 66 , Issue 4 , October 2001 , pp. 651 - 668
Copyright
Copyright © Society for American Archaeology 2001

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