The Olmec who anciently inhabited Mexico's southern Gulf Coast
organized their once-egalitarian society into chiefdoms during the
Formative period (1400 BC to AD 300). This increase in political
complexity coincided with the development of village agriculture,
which has led scholars to theorize that agricultural surpluses gave
aspiring Olmec leaders control over vital resources and thus a
power base on which to build authority and exact tribute. In this
book, Amber VanDerwarker conducts the first multidisciplinary
analysis of subsistence patterns at two Olmec settlements to offer
a fuller understanding of how the development of political
complexity was tied to both agricultural practices and
environmental factors. She uses plant and animal remains, as well
as isotopic data, to trace the intensification of maize agriculture
during the Late Formative period. She also examines how volcanic
eruptions in the region affected subsistence practices and
settlement patterns. Through these multiple sets of data,
VanDerwarker presents convincing evidence that Olmec and epi-Olmec
lifeways of farming, hunting, and fishing were driven by both
political and environmental pressures and that the rise of
institutionalized leadership must be understood within the
ecological context in which it occurred.
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