The Evolution of Ceramic Production Organization in a Maya Community

The Evolution of Ceramic Production Organization in a Maya Community

The Evolution of Ceramic Production Organization in a Maya Community

Dean E. Arnold

University Press of Colorado

Boulder

© 2015 by University Press of Colorado

Published by University Press of Colorado

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ISBN: 978-1-60732-313-6 (hardback)

ISBN: 978-1-60732-314-3 (ebook)

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Arnold, Dean E., 1942–

The evolution of ceramic production organization in a Maya community / Dean E. Arnold.

pages cm

ISBN 978-1-60732-313-6 (hardback) — ISBN 978-1-60732-314-3 (ebook)

1. Maya pottery—Mexico—Ticul. 2. Mayas—Mexico—Ticul—Social conditions. 3. Pottery industry—Mexico—Ticul. 4. Social change—Mexico—Ticul. 5. Ticul (Mexico)—Social conditions. I. Title.

F1435.3.P8A75 2014

738.0972'65—dc23

2014010473

24 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Cover photograph by Steve Wilderson

For

Michelle René and Andrea Celeste

Contents

List of Figures

List of Tables

Preface

Chapter 1. Introduction: Craft Specialization and Social Complexity

The Population of Craftsmen and Archaeology

The Social Organization of Pottery Production

Craft Production and Specialization

Scale

Intensity

The Context of Production

The Units of Production Organization

The Population of Potters

The Production Unit

Social Change and the Production and Distribution of Pottery

Changing Production Organization

Forces of Social Continuity

Processes of Personnel Acquisition

Forces of Social Change

Changes in the Organization of Production Space

The Structure of This Book

Chapter 2. Methodology: How Were the Data Collected?

Narrative and Science

The History of This Research

The Databases

The Genealogical Database

The Production Unit Database

The Potters’ Database

Ethics, Names, Faces, and Privacy

Final Comments on Fieldwork and Methodology

Chapter 3. Traditional Households I: The Tzum Family

History

The First Potter

Eusevio Tzum Dzul

The Descendants of Eusevio Tzum

Augustín Tzum Tuyup

Alfredo

Eusevio

Domitila

Elvia María

Summary

Emilio Tzum Tuyup

José Celestino

María Augusta

Ernesto

Rosa María

Miguel Antonio

Eusevio

Others who learned from Emilio Tzum Tuyup

Summary

Maxima Tzum Tuyup de Uc

Margarita

Eliodoro

José

Ademar

Guadalupe Tzum Tuyup

Manuel

Others who learned from Guadalupe Tzum Tuyup

Summary and Conclusion

Chapter 4. Traditional Households II: Six Families

The Descendants of Norberto Ucan

Norberto Ucan

María Ucan

Summary

The Descendants of Simón Pech

Summary

The Descendants of Timoteo Chan

Juan Bautista

Cesario Mex

Venancio Chan

Summary

The Descendants of Tiburcio Chan (The Calle 34 Chans)

Mariano Chan Chable

Luciano

María

Raimunda, Apolonia, and Secuntina

Tiburcio

Marcelina Chan Chable

Margarita Chan Chable

Summary

The Keh Family

Lorenzo Keh

José María Keh

Summary

The Descendants of José María Huicab

Celestino Huicab

Gonzalo

Ramón

Gregorio Huicab

Adrian

Anselmo

Cecilia Huicab

Other Children of José María Huicab

The Descendants of José Gernacio Huicab Ku

Summary

Chapter 5. Production Units Derived from Traditional Households: Cooking Pottery

The Xiu Family

Francisco Xiu

Santiago Xiu

Anastasia Xiu

Summary

Descendants of José Norberto Huicab

Sabino Huicab Pech

Pedro (Julio) Huicab Pech

Juan Julian Huicab Xix

Pedro Huicab Xix

Hector Huicab Xix

Daniel Huicab Xix

Emilia Huicab Pech

Summary

The Cruz Family

The Canul Family

Summary and Conclusion

Chapter 6. Entrepreneurial Production

Entrepreneurs from within Ticul

Enrique Garma

Technology and Personnel from outside Ticul

Wilbur Gonzalez and the Government Workshop

Jorge Bales

The Alfaro Brothers

Luis Pacheco

Andrés Mena

Manuel and Santiago Mena

Summary

Other Government Workshops

The Ceramics Factory

Entrepreneurial Production Units Established outside of Ticul

The Mérida Workshops

The Pisté Production Unit

The Valladolid Production Unit

Summary and Conclusion

Chapter 7. New Production Units: Nontraditional Potters

The Antonio Chan Family

Summary

The Ayala Family

Summary

Carlos Gonzalez

Basilio Ucan

Short-Lived Production Units

Conclusion

Chapter 8. Attached Workshops

The Workshop at Hacienda Uxmal

The Workshop at Hotel Príncipe

Conclusion

Chapter 9. Why Did the Spatial Footprint of Production Increase?

Engagement Theory and Feedback Loops

The Unique Feedback Loops of Pottery Production

Weather and Climate in Yucatán as Feedback

The Effects of Weather and Climate on Making Pottery

The Total Negative Feedback of Weather

A Case Study

Potters’ Adjustments to Adverse Weather and Climate

The Built Environment as Adaptation to Weather

Conclusion

Chapter 10. Conclusion

Archaeology and Evolution of Social Complexity

Intermittent Crafting

The Yearly Cycle

The Potter’s Life Cycle

Multi-Crafting

Risk Management

Changes in Production Space through Time

Application to Archaeology

Production Space in Antiquity

Bibliography

Index

Figures

1.1. Map of Yucatán showing major cities, towns, archaeological sites, and pottery-making communities between the late 1960s and 19948

1.2. Trend line for the total number of potters in each observation period from 1965 to 19979

1.3. Trend line showing the exponential growth of population in the municipio of Ticul, 1950 to 199016

1.4. Bar graph summarizing the changes of production units from 1970 to 1997 compared with their location in the previous survey18

1.5. The layout of the traditional Maya house lot in Yucatán in 196622

1.6. A traditional Maya house situated next to a street in 198422

1.7. The inside of a traditional Maya house in 2008 23

1.8. Making pottery outside in the shade during good weather at the Uc household in 198424

1.9. A thatched auxiliary structure in 1966 located behind a traditional Maya house25

3.1. Pottery drying in the sun in front of a pole and thatch structure located at the rear of Augustin Tzum’s house in 196564

3.2. Alfredo Tzum and his wife in his store in 1970 65

3.3. Alfredo Tzum’s pole and thatched structure that he built for making pottery in 198468

3.4. Alfredo Tzum’s property near the Plaza of San Enrique70

3.5. Alfredo Tzum in his workshop in 200271

3.6. The exterior of Alfredo Tzum’s house/workshop in 200872

3.7. South half of Alfredo Tzum’s workshop in 200873

3.8. Eusevio Tzum Camaal’s workshop in 1988 showing the varied use of space74

3.9. Floor plan of Eusevio Tzum Camaal’s auxiliary workshop in 199775

3.10. Wattle and daub thatched structure at the rear of Francisco Keh’s house used for making pottery in 196678

3.11. Floor plan of the area in José Celestino Tzum’s house where he made pottery in 199782

3.12. The structure behind Miguel Segura’s house that was used to make pottery in 196683

3.13. View of Miguel Segura’s production unit in 1984 from approximately the same position as the photo taken in 196684

3.14. Miguel Segura’s workshop in 199785

3.15. Floor plan of Jeni Segura’s workshop in 199786

3.16. View of Miguel Segura Tzum’s work area in 1997 looking south87

3.17. Floor plan of the house lot and production unit of Miguel Segura Tzum in 199788

3.18. Floor plan of Socorro Segura’s workshop in 199789

3.19. View of Socorro Segura’s production area in 1997 looking north90

3.20. View of Socorro Segura’s production unit and kiln in 200891

3.21. Floor plan of Humberto Segura’s production unit in 199792

3.22. View of Humberto Segura’s workshop in 1997 93

3.23. View of the production area of Humberto Segura’s workshop in 199794

3.24. Floor plan of Miguel Antonio Tzum’s workshop in 199796

3.25. Miguel Antonio Tzum and the author in Miguel’s workshop in 199796

3.26. Production area of Ademar Uc in 198899

3.27. Elio Uc’s house in 1984101

3.28. Elio’s house in 2008102

3.29. The front of Ademar Uc’s completed workshop in 1988105

3.30. Inside of Ademar Uc’s workshop in 1988106

3.31. East half of the late Ademar Uc’s workshop in 2008, managed by his widow107

3.32. West half of the late Ademar Uc’s workshop in 2008108

4.1. Interior of Norberto Ucan’s specialized structure for making, drying, and storing pottery in 1984122

4.2. Eusevio Yeh’s house lot and work area in 1965124

4.3. Arturo Yeh’s pottery workshop in 1984125

4.4. The back of Lorenzo Pech’s house and production unit in 1965127

4.5. Front of Lorenzo Pech’s house and production unit in January of 1966128

4.6. Front of Lorenzo Pech’s house in 1984129

4.7. Lorenzo’s household workshop in 1984130

4.8. View of the patio area in the rear of Lorenzo Pech’s highway workshop in 1984 looking northwest131

4.9. Floor plan of the workshop in Lorenzo Pech’s house in 1997132

4.10. Lorenzo’s house and the workshop behind it in 1997133

4.11. Floor plan of the first floor of Lorenzo Pech’s highway workshop in 1997134

4.12. The showroom of Lorenzo’s highway workshop in 1997135

4.13. The back portion of the east side of Lorenzo’s highway workshop in 1997135

4.14. Floor plan of the second floor of Lorenzo’s highway workshop in 1997136

4.15. West half of the rear of Lorenzo Pech’s highway workshop in 1997137

4.16. The front of Lorenzo Pech’s house and production unit in 2002138

4.17. The front of Lorenzo Pech’s house and production unit in 2008138

4.18. Rene Pech’s production unit in 2008139

4.19. Kiln area of Rene Pech in 2008140

4.20. A simple pole structure without walls to shelter pottery-making activities in the house lot of Diego Tzum in 1984145

4.21. Area used for preparing clay in Diego Tzum’s pole and thatch structure146

4.22. The production unit of Juaquín Dzul in 1965149

4.23. The bronze store in 2008151

4.24. Kitchen of Raul Martin’s house in 1988 used to dry pottery152

4.25. Raul Martin’s store for selling pottery in 2008153

4.26. Production area of Luis Huicab in 1997156

4.27. Floor plan of Venancio Huicab’s production area in 1997157

4.28. View of part of Venancio Huicab’s patio area in 1984158

4.29. The remains of Veronica Huicab’s abandoned workshop in 2008159

4.30. Production unit of Fidencio Huicab in 1997163

4.31. View of Fidencio Huicab’s production unit in 1997164

4.32. Covered fabrication area of Fidencio Huicab’s production unit in 1997165

5.1. Floor plan of the household production unit of Gonzalo Santa María in 1997181

5.2. Floor plan of the house and workshop of Julian Huicab in 1965–66183

5.3. Floor plan of the household production unit of Daniel Huicab and that of his daughter and her husband in 1997185

5.4. Floor plan of a specialized structure used for pottery production in the household of Antonio Cruz in 1997188

5.5. Interior of the structure used for pottery production behind the house of Antonio Cruz in 1997189

6.1. Floor plan of Enrique Garma’s production unit in 1997200

6.2. One of the covered working areas in Enrique Garma’s production unit in 1997201

6.3. Pottery painted with a copy of an ancient Maya design (1984)203

6.4. Ticul pottery painted with copies of ancient Maya designs and sold at the archaeological site of Sayil in 2008204

6.5. Floor plan of Manuel Alfaro’s production unit in 1997205

6.6. Floor plan of Andrés Mena’s workshop in 1997207

6.7. View of the workshop of Andrés Mena in 1997208

6.8. Part of the production area of Andrés Mena in 1997209

6.9. Floor plan of the workshop of Santiago Mena in 1997210

6.10. Exterior of the government-funded workshop along the highway west of Ticul in 2008211

6.11. Floor plan of the government-funded workshop in 1997212

6.12. Interior of the government workshop in 1997213

7.1. Floor plan of Juan Chan’s production area in 1997220

7.2. Floor plan of the production area of Lorenzo Vargas in 1997221

7.3. Floor plan of the production area of Diego Ayala in 1997222

7.4. Production area of Diego Ayala in 1997223

7.5. Production area of Diego Ayala in 2008224

7.6. Floor plan and spatial organization of the pottery-making area of Carlos Gonzalez in 1997225

7.7. Production unit of Juaquín Dzul in 1965227

7.8. Production unit of María Elide Gonzalez in 1984228

8.1. A mold-made crèche set made using techniques learned at the pottery workshop at Hacienda Uxmal between late 1956 and 1982233

8.2. A small traditional vessel shape painted in a style learned in the workshop at Hacienda Uxmal between late 1956 and 1982234

8.3. A small traditional water-carrying vessel painted in a style learned by potters in the workshop at Hacienda Uxmal between late 1956 and 1982235

9.1. Interior living space used for drying pottery in 1984244

9.2. Bar graph showing the number of potters in production units in Ticul in 1965–66, 1968, and 1970245

9.3. Bar graph showing the number of potters per production unit in Ticul in 1984, 1988, 1994, and 1997246

9.4. Trend lines showing the changes in the mean and median number of potters per production unit from 1965 to 1997247

9.5. Bar graph showing the mean monthly temperature in the town of Oxkutzcab250

9.6. Bar graph showing monthly precipitation in the town of Oxkutzcab252

9.7. Steel soccer stadium in the town of Muna, Yucatán, destroyed by Hurricane Isadore in September of 2002253

9.8. The carport of Ademar Uc’s house in 1984256

9.9. Breakage to an undried vessel that was not set down carefully to dry in 1984257

9.10. A Ticul potter examines two vessels broken because of uneven drying in 2008259

9.11. Clay being stored in the sleeping area of a traditional Maya house in 1984263

9.12. Clay being stored in generalized space in a Maya house in 1997264

9.13. Clay storage area in Jeni Segura’s workshop in 1997265

9.14. Vessels covered with plastic in the workshop of Julia Lopez de Uc in 2008266

9.15. Brick works near Phnom Penh, Cambodia, in August of 2005 showing plastic covering stacks of drying bricks during the rainy season267

9.16. Drying clay over a fire during the early rainy season in May of 2008268

9.17. Vessels drying in the workshop of Jeni Segura in 1984270

9.18. Racks used to dry pottery in the production unit of Manuel Mena in 1997271

9.19. Shelves used to store molds in Gonzalo Santa María’s production unit in 1997272

Tables

1.1. Summary of the principal changes in ceramic production and distribution from 1965 to 1997 by period of observation11

9.1. Weather data from Mérida, Yucatán251

9.2. Tropical storms that passed within two degrees latitude and longitude of Ticul between 1965 and 2008254

Preface

From its nascent beginnings in the late 1960s,¹ ceramic ethnoarchaeology has come of age with scholars studying contemporary societies in Mexico,² Andean South America,³ the Philippines,⁴ Africa,⁵ Lowland South America,⁶ South Asia,⁷ and the US Southwest.⁸ Although this literature is diverse, a number of syntheses encompass ethnoarchaeological studies in general,⁹ summarize recent research,¹⁰ or utilize a more general focus.¹¹

Some have argued that ethnoarchaeology should be done by archaeologists,¹² whereas others¹³ believe that the kind of investigator who does the research is less significant than the focus on archaeological questions. In many respects, I am an archaeologist. I was trained by an archaeologist (Donald W. Lathrap), but I was one of only two of his twenty-six PhD students who did not write a dissertation on South American archaeology. I learned basic archaeology in an archaeological field school near Yellow Jacket, Colorado, under the supervision of Arthur H. Rohn. Since that time, I have been involved in a number of small archaeological projects. I worked with Peru’s National Institute of Culture’s excavations of an Inca site (Cata-Casa-Llaqta) near Cuzco during my Fulbright Lectureship at the university there during the academic year 1972–73. In addition, I have done archaeological reconnaissance near Acos, Peru,¹⁴ excavated and surveyed a site in northeastern Bolivia,¹⁵ and engaged in another small archaeological reconnaissance.¹⁶

I enjoy learning, reading, and teaching archaeology, and I am drawn to the big questions that archaeology asks. I am fascinated by the epistemological and hermeneutical issues of the discipline, and some of my publications deliberately engage those issues.¹⁷ Even with a background in archaeology, I prefer to do ethnoarchaeology. The kind of ethnoarchaeology that I do, however, is different from that of the more classical and widely known ethnoarchaeologists¹⁸ because of my background in ethnography and linguistics. My work is also different because I started my research studying potters in 1965 before much of ethnoarchaeology began. As a result, I began to see pottery production from the potters’ perspective and from that of their language; my first publications reflect that perspective.¹⁹ With my meager credentials in archaeology, I hesitate to call myself an archaeologist at this stage of my life, or even an ethnoarchaeologist, in a way that others have practiced it.

This book is a second volume about the continuity and change among contemporary potters in Ticul, Yucatán, Mexico, but with a different perspective. Between 1965 and 1997, I made ten trips to Ticul to study pottery production and its social, religious, and linguistic context. A brief visit to Ticul occurred in 2002 as a side trip from a conference I was attending in Campeche. I returned for two weeks in 2008 to collect data for a different project,²⁰ but I also collected more data for this book. My study of Ticul potters described here thus spans forty-three and a half years.

The relationships established with Ticul potters during this period were a major contribution to the success of my research, and data obtained from them were repeatedly validated during my twelve visits. Such relationships reflect a good deal of rapport that I had with my informants. Knowing most informants personally involved knowledge of their residences, their relatives, and their activities. I knew when they were fudging, lying, or trying to deceive me. Most important, my rapport with them and their families was a source of great personal satisfaction for me. Unfortunately, most of them have now passed away.

One source of rapport was learning the Yucatecan folk dance, the jarana, during my initial field session. It was one way of expressing respect and appreciation for Maya culture, and learning it endeared me to my informants. The jarana is also a musical genre that is accompanied by unique musical style played by a local orchestra in three-quarter or six-eight time. Although I did master the jarana in three-quarter time, I was never able to learn the steps in six-eight time. The jarana, however, involves more than music and dance, but also symbolizes traditional Maya culture, expresses poise and grace, and is a channel of verbal play. During a typical jarana musical number, the orchestra stops, the musicians yell "¡bomba!," and the male dancer recites a bomba in Yucatec Maya to his female partner. These bombas could best be translated as jokes, but they were also verbal art forms, often recited in a poetic genre with rhyme. I fondly remember dancing the jarana at fiestas and impromptu gatherings, but I was never able to utter a bomba. Even with that limitation, learning the jarana still created and sustained great rapport with Yucatecos.

In 1965 dances at fiestas were separated into two distinct categories: the baile and the vaquería. The baile consisted of nonlocal dances like the waltz and the cumbia whereas the vaquería consisted of Yucatecan jarana music and dance. Almost every fiesta involved a vaquería, and friends and acquaintances often encouraged me to dance the jarana. When they told me about a town that was having a fiesta, they punctuated their narrative with a deliberately persuasive exclamation: "¡Hay vaquería! " (There’s a vaquería!), implying that I should go and participate.

The years between 1965 and 1997, however, witnessed the demise of the jarana. This decline paralleled the great social changes that occurred in Yucatán and the loss of much of the Maya language and culture. The festivities for the potters’ religious brotherhood (called a gremio) in October of 1984 had no vaquería associated with the event, and I do not recall any advertised in Ticul between June and December of that year. In July of 1997, during the festivities commemorating the establishment of Ticul as a city, one evening’s event consisted of a vaquería complete with dancers dressed in traditional mestizo finery. This performance, however, revealed that the jarana was no longer performed by Yucatecan peasants, but was the domain of hobbyists who learned the dance in clubs established to save it from extinction. During that late evening in July 1997, I watched with a degree of great nostalgia and sadness as one club after another (from towns such as Peto, Oxkutzcab, Muna, Chaksikin) was introduced, entered the dance floor, and performed the jarana.

I had a passion to dance the jarana, and it led to surprising results. In 1965 I asked a local tailor to create a mestizo costume for me of white denim trousers, shirt, hat, and sandals, and I wore it to local fiestas. In April of that year, I traveled to a fiesta in the village of Tekit with my principal informant, Alfredo, in order to dance the jarana. At the vaquería during the first evening, I donned my traditional Yucatecan costume and danced with a young Maya woman dressed in her huipil. Several days later, Alfredo arrived at my house clutching one of the daily newspapers in Yucatán (El Diario de Yucatán) and enthusiastically directed me to the News from the Villages column: a North American had appeared at the Tekit fiesta several days previously dressed in the traditional mestizo attire and danced the jarana! My brief appearance even eclipsed the news of the fiesta itself that day!

Just as my fieldwork in Peru provided unforgettable images,²¹ my experiences in Yucatán left other vivid memories. I savored Yucatecan-style cooking, and the Yucatecan meal called buul yeetel k’ek’en (beans with pork) became a favorite of mine. In the late 1960s I was often invited to potters’ houses for a midday meal when they served buul yeetel k’ek’en. In 1997 one family invited me for the midday comida and asked me what kind of Yucatecan food I would like. My response was "buul yeetel k’ek’en," and my friends laughed and expressed appreciation that I not only liked their food but also could use their language. Again, in 2008, another family invited me for lunch, but they did not ask what I wanted to eat. They knew. Sure enough, they prepared buul yeetel k’ek’en.

One measure of my rapport with my informants was graphically demonstrated when I returned to Ticul in 1984 after an absence of fourteen years. Because of my young family (daughters aged four and seven) and preparations for a year-long sabbatical in Yucatan and England, I did not have time to inform my Ticul friends that I was returning. During my first day in Ticul, I walked down Calle 17, paused in front of Alfredo’s house, and looked over the fence into his house lot. He was firing pottery in the rear, and he turned toward me and yelled: Dean, why are you standing in the street? Come on in! I was stunned. Not only did he remember me, but our relationship remained cordial.

During that same field session, our daughters were always a big hit with informants and were sources of instant rapport. On the days that I took them to potters’ houses, we would come back laden with fruit and pottery. On one of those days, I had taken Michelle on my rounds. At the Casa Bronce (figure 4.23), I was talking with Marcelina Keh, the matriarch of the family, and the young girls in the family asked if they could take Michelle with them to their house across the street. About a half an hour later, the girls returned with Michelle in tow, decked out in a Maya huipil, with her hair secured behind her in a large red bow. She was weighed down with gold jewelry and completely made up in the style of a Yucatecan girl. I was stunned. Her dark blond hair and blue eyes betrayed her status as a gringita, but when her brown-haired, brown-eyed, four-year-old sister received the same treatment several days later, she was largely indistinguishable from a Yucatecan mesticita.

Another cherished memory occurred during the potters’ gremio in October of 1984. The gremio is an occupational and religious brotherhood that honors the patron saint of Yucatán,²² the Holy Christ of the Blisters (Nuestro Señor de las Ampollas). It was only one of several such brotherhoods and the only organization of potters above the level of the household.

Part of the gremio festivities involved naming an ambassador to represent the potters to the community. In 1984 the ambassador was Socorro Segura, the daughter of Miguel Segura (see chap. 3). During the planning session on the night before the gremio began, the potters asked me to formally crown the gremio’s ambassador on the next night. The coronation was to be followed by a dance, and my responsibility also involved an initial dance with her. So I accepted the invitation and regarded it as a great honor.

I borrowed a guayabera (which the Yucatecans regard as semiformal attire) and showed up at the dance with my potter friends. After a formal introduction by a master of ceremonies, I placed the crown on Socorro’s head, gave her the scepter, and placed a sash around her that read "Ambassador of the Potters’ Gremio." Then I accompanied her to the dance floor and led her in a waltz to begin the evening of dancing. Sadly, there was no vaquería, and thus no jarana, but after the initial waltz, I had to abandon my charge because the skill required by subsequent dances exceeded my expertise.

Rapport requires reciprocal responsibilities. During my very brief 2002 visit, I arrived six weeks after Hurricane Isadore had swept through the peninsula. On my way to Ticul, I saw flattened maize fields and many damaged structures. In Ticul, however, the workshop, store, and thatched-roof house of my informant, Alfredo, had suffered no major damage. His only loss was a large uprooted avocado tree. His brother, Eusevio, however, had not fared as well. He lost the roof from both of the rooms of his house. He had replaced one, but the kitchen was still without protection. I was deeply touched by his loss, took Eusevio aside, and told him I wanted to help. I opened my billfold and gave him everything I had except fifty pesos, which I thought I would need for my return to Campeche. After I was on my way back to Campeche, I kicked myself that I had not gone to an ATM in Ticul and given him more money for his roof.

This work thus reflects not just a longitudinal study across more than four decades but also personal knowledge of the potters as well as rapport honed and cultivated by repeated visits. These anecdotes thus reveal a rapport with my potter friends whom I not only cherish, value, and respect but who demonstrate the validity and reality, I believe, of what is described in this work.

Finally, this volume is ethnography. It is not always possible to verify every observation in a way that clearly distinguishes between potters’ statements, my own observations, and my own anthropological reflections on the patterns that I see. In many cases, potters’ statements have become such a part of me that I accept them as real as long as they conform to my observations.

While this volume is ethnography, it is also ethnoarchaeology because it is my intention to describe the changing production units through more than four decades. Like my last book on Ticul, this work shows that in spite of the many great social changes in Yucatán during the last fifty years, those factors affected by modern society can be sorted out of the evolutionary process to discover those aspects of production most relevant to the past.

The research for this volume was funded by a variety of organizations, and I am very grateful for their support. The late Fred Strodtbeck, formerly of the Social Psychology Laboratory of the University of Chicago, provided some of the original funds for this research in 1965 from the Ford Foundation. This funding was part of a larger package for establishing a research institute in Yucatán that greatly facilitated fieldwork between 1965 and 1970. The late Asael Hans Hansen and the late Herman Konrad, who were its directors during those years, provided logistical support and helped make my short research trips extremely productive.

In 1966 my field research was funded by the University of Illinois, Department of Anthropology. My brief visit upon my return from Peru in 1967 was supported by a NDFL Title VI Fellowship. In 1968 the University of Illinois Research Board funded a trip to Yucatán with B. F. Bohor of the Illinois State Geological Survey. In 1970 stopovers to and from Guatemala were funded by a grant from the Pennsylvania State University College of Liberal Arts. An American Republics Research Grant awarded under the Fulbright Program supported my research in Yucatán in 1984. In 1988 funds for field research were provided by the Human Needs and Global Resources Program and the Norris Aldeen Fund of Wheaton College. In 1994 fieldwork was funded by a grant from the Wheaton College Alumni Association.

The National Endowment for the Humanities (grant no. RK 20191-95) provided for a two-year grant that supported the analysis and write-up of many of these data. These funds released me from two-thirds of my teaching load between 1995 and 1997 and made the preparation of the early stages of this book possible. This grant also funded field research in 1997 with support from the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research (grant no. 6163) and the Wheaton College Alumni Association.

Funds from a Senior Scholarship Award from Wheaton College funded a trip to Yucatán in 2002, and in 2008 a National Geographic Society Grant (no. 7433-08) supported research in Yucatán that contributed much to the enrichment of this book, although the primary research goal was different.²³

I am particularly grateful to the administrators of Wheaton College—Ward Kriegbaum, Stanton Jones, Patricia Ward, Dorothy Chappell, and Jeff Moshier—for their support of this research and the preparation of this manuscript by means of many awards from the Wheaton College Norris Aldeen Fund and Wheaton College Faculty Development funds.

My study of contemporary pottery began in 1965 when the late Duane Metzger sent me to Yucatán. He had prepared us well and then largely left us on our own. He gave me total freedom to do my research and to go wherever my research took me. My academic advisor at the University of Illinois, the late Donald W. Lathrap, encouraged me immeasurably to continue my research on these and related topics and reinforced this freedom, but I never went into the field with Don. Rather, he encouraged me with what I had already done in the field on my own.

I also wish to thank Margaret Hardin, who, after being asked whether I should return to Mexico, Peru, Bolivia, or Guatemala for my sabbatical in 1984, recognized the importance of long-term ethnoarchaeological restudy of pottery making and encouraged me to return to Ticul after an absence of fourteen years.

Licenciado José Luis Sierra Villarreal, the former director of the Centro Regional del Sureste del Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Professor Salvador Rodriguez, director of the Escuela de Ciencias Antropologicas, Universidad de Yucatán, and the entire staff of the Centro Regional del INAH and the Escuela de Ciencias Antropologicas provided collaboration and cooperation in facilitating and supporting this research. In 1987, and again in 1989, a small grant from the Alumni Association of Wheaton College allowed me to hire a student (Delores Ralph Yaccino) to put all of the field notes, surveys, and linguistic texts from this project into electronic form. Elise Waychoff searched microfilmed records of marriages in Ticul for the first three decades of the twentieth century to find precise data for many of the individuals mentioned here. Other teaching and research assistants over many years have helped me immeasurably in analyzing these data, finding bibliographic sources, and preparing the illustrations for publication: Heidi Biddle, Helen Woodey, Charlie Shrack, Lindsay Wiersma, Christy Reed, Sara Sywulka, Matt Wistrand, Susan Crickmore, Becky Seifried, Danae Mullison Lauffer, Christa Thorpe, Hilary Mulhern, Masako Kawate, Joellah Lutz, Wendy Jennings, Valerie Davenport, and Hayley Schumacher. Hayley faithfully edited and critiqued the typescript for flow and initially checked the text references against the bibliography. Meghan Gegner helped with correcting the initial proofs. They and others whose names I may have forgotten have helped in many ways, providing library assistance and preparing photos, charts, graphs, and tables.

Finally, several artists and draftsmen worked on the maps and photos. George Pierce, Mike Anderson, and Michelle Arnold Paine (www.michellepaine.com) prepared the finished diagrams of the floor plans of the potters’ work areas. Bill Koechling created some of the digital images from some of the less than ideal transparencies and black-and-white negatives.

My daughters have helped immeasurably with this book. They, along with my wife, went into the field with me in 1984. Our youngest daughter, Andrea, accompanied me to Yucatán in 1994, and she served as a general assistant. When I returned to the field in 1997, our oldest daughter, Michelle, a college junior art major, accompanied me and under my supervision took photographs and made floor plans of the production units illustrated here.

To my parents and to my wife, June, and my daughters, Michelle and Andrea, I am grateful, for without them, their patience, assistance, and encouragement, this work could not have come to fruition.

Finally, students in my Ceramics and Culture class in the fall of 2009 (Nikki Berns, Darlene Campos, Benjamin Felker, Kristen Gillette, Masako Kawate, Larry Largent, and Erik Lindemann) were required to comment upon, and critique, this manuscript as an exercise in critical thinking. I am grateful for their comments and criticism, which improved the manuscript greatly.

Having worked with several book publishers, I am particularly appreciative of the care, workmanship, and patience of the staff of the University Press of Colorado. In both this work and the previous, Darrin Pratt has been encouraging and helpful with the initial stages of this manuscript, answered questions, and was patient with my many concerns. Dan Pratt managed to produce excellent black-and-white published images from less than ideal aged color transparencies and old black-and-white negatives. These individuals and Jessica d’Arbonne, Laura Furney, and Beth Svinarich patiently answered my questions, responded to my complaints and concerns with grace and patience, and were very easy to work with, in spite of my tedious questioning.

This book would not have been possible without the kindness, help, and cooperation of all my potter friends in Ticul. I trust that this publication will provide increased visibility of their craft and will ultimately benefit their economic well-being.

Notes

1. Arnold, Maya Blue: A New Perspective; Arnold, Sak lu’um in Maya Culture; Foster, Life Expectancy of Utilitarian Pottery; Foster, Archaeological Implications of the Modern Pottery; Foster, The Sociology of Pottery; Foster, Tzintzuntzan;