Chapter 8: Mounds and Maize Flashcards
Teosinte
- a wild grass found in the highlands of Mexico
- the wild ancestor of maize (corn)
Tehuacán Valley
in the Mexican highlands where excavations by Richard MacNeish recovered some of the earliest evidence of domesticated plants in Mesoamerica
Guilá Naquitz
- in Oaxaca, Mexico, that has produced the earliest evidence of domesticated plants in Mesoamerica
- oldest squash and maize seeds recovered
Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (AMS) radiocarbon dating
a refined method of radiocarbon dating that makes it possible to date very small samples, including plant remains by the amount of carbon-14
Curcubita Pepo
- ancestor of squash
- earliest plant to be domesticated in Mexico
The only domesticated animal in Mesoamerica
turkeys
Cerro Juanaqueña
- an early agricultural site in northern Mexico with extensive evidence of terracing and other stone-built features
- 8km of terrace walls and 100 rock ring
Optimal Foraging Theory
- based on the assumption that the choices people make reflect rational self-interest in maximizing efficiency when collecting and processing resources
- Robert Hard and John Roney
Milagro
an early agricultural village located outside Tucson, Arizona
Las Capas
a site near Tucson, Arizona where an Archaic village and canal system have been discovered
Formative Period
pottery and domestication of beans
Poverty Point
a Late Archaic site in Louisiana with a series of six concentric embankments
Adena
- a period of intensive mound building in the Ohio River Valley
- corresponds to the EARLY Woodland culture
Hopewell
- a period of intensive mound building in the Ohio River Valley
- corresponds to the MIDDLE Woodland culture
James Griffin
suggested that there were Hopewell villages near the massive earthworks
