Merchants, Markets, and Exchange in the Pre-Columbian World examines the structure, scale, and complexity of economic systems in the pre-Hispanic Americas, with a focus on the central highlands of Mexico, the Maya Lowlands, and the central Andes. Civilization in each region was characterized by complex political and religious institutions, highly skilled craft production, and the long-distance movement of finished goods. Scholars have long focused on the differences in economic organization between these civilizations. Societies in the Mexican highlands are recognized as having a highly commercial economy centered around one of the world's most complex market systems; those of the Maya region are characterized as having reciprocal exchange networks and periodic marketplaces that supplemented the dominant role of the palace; and those of the central Andes are recognized as having multiple forms of resource distribution, including household-to-household reciprocity, barter, environmental complementarity, and limited market exchange. Essays in this volume examine various dimensions of these ancient economies, including the presence of marketplaces, the operation of merchants (and other individuals) who exchanged and moved goods across space, the role of artisans who produced goods as part of their livelihood, and the trade and distribution networks through which goods were bought, sold, and exchanged.

A new perspective on early Andean civilization focused on emergent social complexity during the first and second millennia B.C. This Yale University Publications in Anthropology volume presents investigations of Peruvian archaeological sites, focusing on early developments in coastal, highland, and cloud forest environments. The contributors provide new perspectives on early Andean civilization by exploring patterns of interaction, authority, and socioeconomic organization during the first and second millennia B.C. in the Central Andes of Peru. Large-scale subjects such as architecture, organization, technology, and ideology are examined, in addition to fine-grained topics including animal bones, pottery style and technology, site orientation, and religious iconography. Distributed for the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History

Download a corrected version of the map of the Lake Titicaca region.

Until recently, little archaeological investigation has been dedicated to the Inka, the last great culture to flourish in Andean South America before the sixteenth-century arrival of the Spaniards. While the Inka have been traditionally viewed through the textual sources of early colonial histories, this volume draws on recent archaeological research to challenge theories on the chronology and development of the Inka Empire and how this culture spread across such a vast area. The volume demonstrates the great regional diversity of the Inka realm, with strategies of expansion that were shaped to meet a variety of local situations beyond the capital in Cusco. Using a range of theoretical and methodological approaches, scholars from the sciences, social sciences, and humanities provide a new understanding of Inka culture and history.

In this collection, prominent archaeologists explore the sophisticated political and logistical organizations that were required to plan and complete these architectural marvels. They discuss the long-term political, social, and military impacts these projects had on their respective civilizations, and illuminate the significance of monumentality among early complex societies in the Americas. Early New World Monumentality is ultimately a study of labor and its mobilization, as well as the long-term spiritual awe and political organization that motivated and were enhanced by such undertakings. Mounds and other impressive monuments left behind by earlier civilizations continue to reveal their secrets, offering profound insights into the development of complex societies throughout the New World.