Emergence and Change in Early Urban Societies: (Fundamental Issues in Archaeology)

This book gives an overview of different factors involved in the emergence and change in early urban societies in fourth-millennium Mesopotamia and Egypt; pre-Shang China; Classie horizon Central Mexico, Oaxaca, and the Maya Area; and Middle Horizon societies in the Andean Region. These factors range from centralized storage and redistributive econo­ mies, agromanagerial models, mercantile network control, confliet and conquest, conversion of military commanders into administrators, political power through monumental cosmic reproduction, and elite power through ideological change. It discusses specific archaeological data useful in theoretieal construction. In the Introduction, a discussion of different developmental processes of urban societies is made. The Eastern Anatolian example emphasizes the role played by interregional exchange networks linking the Mesopotamian plains with the Syro-Anatolian regions. The emergence of an elite is related with the control of the movement of craft goods and raw materials, more than with the appropriation of subsistence goods. The Chinese example stresses the importance of conflict provoked by demographie pressures on resources. The Mesoamerican cases relate to vast urban developments and manu­ facturing centers, ideological importance of monumental planning, and changing behavior of elites. The Andean cases are related either to the transformation of theocratie leadership into military administrators oe to the agricultural intensification model.

Table of Contents:
I. Introduction.- 1 · Early Urban Societies: Challenges and Perspectives.- II. Old world.- 2 · Arslantepe-Malatya: External Factors and Local Components in the Development of an Early State Society.- 3 · Urbanism and the Rise of Complex Society and the Early State in Egypt.- 4 · China’s First Cities: The Walled Site of Wangchenggang in the Central Plain Region of North China.- III. New world.- 5 · Teotihuacan: Urban Archetype, Cosmic Model.- 6 · Ideology, Power, and State Formation in the Valley of Oaxaca.- 7 · Clues to the System of Power in the City of Oxkintok.- 8 · Reconstructing Huari: A Cultural Chronology for the Capital City.- 9 · Political Institutional Factors Contributing to the Integration of the Tiwanaku State.- 10 · Population and Agriculture in the Emergence of Complex Society in the Bolivian Altiplano: The Case of Tiwanaku.- IV. Conclusion.- 11 · Recapitulation and Concluding Remarks.