According to historical sources, the Inka relocated groups of craft specialists to provincial centers to manufacture goods for the state. Recent fieldwork in the Leche Valley on the north coast of Peru provides insights into the organization and technology of pottery production at these centers. While Inka style jars were added to their repertories, potters continued to manufacture vessels in local styles using local techniques. These results caution against a reliance on style in identifying products made in administered contexts, and question the equivalence of style with polity in the Inka provinces. They also highlight a need to critically evaluate Inka cultural policies and the significance of subject styles in the empire.

Recent archaeological investigations along the lower Negro and upper Xingu Rivers in the Brazilian Amazon provide important new evidence bearing on long-standing debates about the size and permanence of Amerindian settlements in the region. Preliminary regional surveys and more in-depth study of selected large (30-50 ha) sites, particularly analyses of the associations between structural features, anthropogenically altered soils, and artifact distributions, lead us to conclude that large, permanent settlements, likely associated with fairly dense regional populations, existed prehistorically in both areas. These findings cast doubt on the view that environmental limitations prevented sedentism and demographic growth among Amerindian populations throughout much or all of the region. Specifically, we conclude that fully sedentary and relatively large populations emerged in a variety of Amazonian settings prehistorically, not necessarily correlated with the distribution of one or another narrowly defined ecological variable (e. g., high fertility soils). Thus, a critical evaluation of core concepts in Amazonian anthropology, such as the várzea/terra firme dichotomy or tropical forest culture, is advised.

The internal structure of Maya governing elites has been much debated over the last decade. In the perspective of that debate, I propose a model of political organization at Copán at the end of the Late Classic (A. D. 750-800) based on a reinterpretation of two monuments that depict members of the governing elite, each one wearing a pectoral. The analysis of the pectorals leads to the identification of two functional groups, priests and warriors. Sovereignty incorporates both functions and is embodied in a diarchy where a coruler is adjoined to the ruler. Rulers and corulers come from the two opposing groups who, with each succession to power, exchange these roles. The executive branch, which comprises the ruler and his coruler, four ministers and four war captains, is counterbalanced by a council of nine lords. Furthermore, there are some indications that each functional group was a corporate descent group that had its own territory in the valley and its own traditions. The relations between the two groups conditioned the history of the royal dynasty, from its foundation in A. D. 426 until its collapse in A. D. 822.

Salt has always been a strategic resource of primary importance. In Prehispanic times, salt was used mainly for human consumption, and after the Spanish conquest it became, in addition, an important commodity for silver processing and cattle raising. Salt production and trade in the Lake Cuitzeo basin are analyzed from the perspective of ethnography, archaeology, and ethnohistory. We know that salt from Araró, one of the towns where this research is focused, was paid as tribute in the early colonial era. Ethnohistorical sources concerning salt production in the Lake Cuitzeo basin are discussed, including information on the quantity of salt paid by each town in the first half of the sixteenth century. Contemporary salt-producing sites and methods are described, including the amount of brine and earth used, and the average yield of each finca, or salt-producing unit. Modern and ancient techniques and processes are compared, and found to be similar. The “archaeological visibility” of these activities is assessed, using examples from several areas of Mesoamerica to illustrate the archaeological features and artifacts (e. g., mounds, canals, and specialized pottery types) connected with salt making.

The significance of a microlithic assemblage composed of imported, nonlocal materials is discussed for the Three Dog site, an early Lucayan site located on San Salvador, Bahamas. The Bahama archipelago is an interesting area in which to examine the organization of technology because the islands lack cherts and other suitable materials for chipped stone manufacture, suggesting that economizing strategies may have been practiced. The artifacts were manufactured by bipolar production and a few show evidence of recycling and reuse. Microwear analysis, undertaken to determine function, was inconclusive due to heavy weathering from the depositional environment. Traces of an organic adhesive suggest that some of the objects were used as hafted or composite tools. The presence of starch grains, most likely Xanthosoma sp., and other plant residues on some artifacts suggests they were used in plant processing. The morphological similarities of the flakes produced through bipolar reduction with those from ethnographic sources suggest that most of them probably were used as grater chips to process root or tuber foods. The assemblage was compared to other bipolarly-produced microlithic assemblages from nearby islands.