Population estimates, houses, and household networks in the Late Formative to Classic Period Tequila Valleys, Jalisco

Most archaeologists have at some point sought to assign population sizes to the communities they study. Analysts have drawn upon cross-cultural (Brown 1987; Cook 1972; Naroll 1962) and context-specific research (Casselberry 1974; De Roche 1983; Kardulias 1992; Kolb 1985; LeBlanc 1971; Wiessner 1974) to calculate populations from material remains (see also Chamberlain 2006). Among the possible proxies (comprehensively discussed in Sbonias 1999) are residential architecture, space devoted to food storage, site area, burials, artifact densities and use-lives, or ideally some combination of the above (e.g., Dorison and Siebe 2023; Pereira et al. 2021). All are attempts to extract numbers of people from the most direct material measures of their presence—food and shelter requirements, consumption of materials, and even their physical remains. Calculations of carrying capacity, plaza space, or labor organization are used to evaluate the proportions of the population that might have been involved in particular activities, and in bracketing direct estimates (e.g., Dorison and Siebe 2023; Liendo Stuardo, López Mejía, and Campani 2014; McCurdy and Abrams [eds.] 2019; Morehart 2016). Within Mesoamerica, the traditional modes are to evaluate the number of people per house or to measure intensity of occupation as represented by surface artifacts. Poor surface visibility coupled with the late introduction of destructive mechanized agriculture have encouraged the use of architecture in the Maya lowlands, particularly in concert with ethnographic accounts of family size (Culbert and Rice [eds.] 1990). Plowing and high visibility have led to a greater reliance on surface artifact densities in the highland valleys and lake basins (Blanton et al. 1982; Novic 2015; Sanders, Parsons, and Santley 1979; Santley and Hirth [eds.] 1993a), often calibrated by reference to Spanish Colonial accounts of community size. There are obvious exceptions in well-preserved and/or protected settlements in the highlands (Pereira et al. 2021; Smith et al. 2019) and the destruction associated with expanding deforestation will ultimately cause a shift in methods in the lowlands. Like some other areas of the Mexican highlands, the Tequila Valleys of central highland Jalisco offered both lacustrine resources and relatively wide expanses of farmland that together could have supported concentrations of population. Unfortunately, the urban expansion of nearby Guadalajara, the use of mechanized agriculture (especially for sugar cane), and the ongoing expansion of agave production for the tequila market (Ojeda Gastélum, Benz, and López Mestas C. 2008) have all contributed to the destruction of architectural remains. Simultaneously, researchers have noted the seemingly low density of surface artifacts prior to the Late Postclassic (Table 1), which may be attributable to low population densities, but may alternately indicate greater reliance upon gourds for containers (Cabrero 1989: 206; Weigand 1996b: 192), differing rates of material consumption (Beekman 1998), higher residential mobility and shorter occupations due to shifting cultivation (Beekman and Baden 2011), or even lower firing temperatures for pottery (and hence shorter survival times once exposed on the surface). Spanish Colonial era documentation of Indigenous lifeways in western Mexico is comparatively limited, and little of the regional ethnographic research has addressed such mundane issues as demography. More distant sources of ethnographic data exist in the neighboring state of Michoacán, but these are geographically, temporally, and culturally distant from groups from far western Mexico. Table 1 – The archaeological sequence for the Tequila Valleys. All dates are on a calibrated timescale. This paper exclusively addresses phases Tequila II, III, and IV

Period names for Mesoamerica	Phase names in the Tequila Valleys, Jalisco	Proposed Dates
Late Postclassic and Early Colonial	Atemajac III	1500-1600 CE
Late Postclassic	Atemajac II	1350-1500 CE
Early and Middle Postclassic	Atemajac I	850-1350 CE
Epiclassic/Late Classic	El Grillo	450/500-850 CE
Early Classic	Tequila IV	200-450/500 CE
Terminal Formative	Tequila III	50 BCE-200 CE
Late Formative	Tequila II	350-50 BCE
Middle Formative	Tequila I	ca. 1000-350 BCE
Early Formative	Magdalena	ca. 1500-1000 BCE

Population estimation in the Pre-Columbian Tequila Valleys therefore presents multiple problems of preservation and limited analogies to better known periods. A previous valley-wide estimate (Weigand 1996b) relied on the density of “residential compounds” identified by survey across the most thickly occupied portions of the valleys. It has become increasingly apparent however that the absence of a developed ceramic chronology during Weigand’s surveys did not allow him to reliably date vernacular architecture. We do not seek to recalculate the valley-wide population here but will instead develop a more local perspective on houses, households, and their associated occupation. We briefly discuss comparative methods of population estimation, and their modifications for archaeological contexts in Mesoamerica. These studies support a mean allocation of about 6 m²/person within a dwelling, albeit with high standard deviations. A more complex issue is distinguishing between dwellings (where people actually reside) and those buildings associated with other domestic activities. We address this problem by conceptualizing the household as a network of practices based within the dwelling but extending throughout a settlement (see Branting 2016; Thurston 1999 from time-geography). Just as the distribution of practices will vary across cultures, periods, and contexts, so will the archaeological remains used for population counts. Instead, we review excavation data for the activities that took place within residential groups to progressively narrow down those structures that can be used for population calculations. We then integrate these strands of evidence—space/person, the activities specific to the residential group, status differences—in our analysis of four settlements of varying sizes in the Tequila Valleys. We then assess surface artifact density as a secondary method in this area, and while we find that the approach suffers significant limitations, the evidence does correspond tolerably well with the residential settlement data. We conclude with proposed figures for residential space per person, persons per structure, persons per formal patio group, and persons per hectare, as well as a model of households as networks, that future researchers can refine and apply to differentially preserved archaeological remains.

Background on population estimates

Naroll’s (1962) well-known cross-cultural study is the obligatory starting point for archaeological population estimates. He identified a figure of 10 m² of roofed area/person for the largest communities from a sample of 18 societies. Brown’s (1987) comprehensive review of Naroll’s data combined with a new cross-cultural sample totaling 38 societies resulted in a largely linear formula of 6 m²/person.[1] Porčić (2012) further expanded Brown’s sample to 46 groups and distinguished between mobile and sedentary societies, concluding that a mean figure of 7 m²/person was more accurate for the latter. Other studies (Kolb 1985; LeBlanc 1971; Wiessner 1974) insisted on a better understanding of room function and family organization to make accurate estimates, and that culturally distinct residential buildings (e.g., Iroquoian longhouses, Teotihuacan apartment compounds) require independent assessments (e.g., Casselberry 1974; Smith et al. 2019). These comparative studies generally did not address differences in use of space associated with social status nor what activities comprise a “residence” in any given sociocultural context. All the resulting figures had relatively high standard deviations. Some of these efforts further lacked basic clarity in their definitions. For example, does the measured floor area include the entire structure footprint, or were walls, stairs, and other unusable space subtracted out to give floorspace (a problem noted in Kolb 1985: 585)? The usual reference to “roofed area” in so many of these publications could refer to either. Several of these issues were addressed by Kolb (1985) in his study of Mesoamerican peasant households. He defined a dwelling as bedrooms, kitchen, and storage rooms, but not specialized spaces associated with animals in an effort to weed out post-Contact changes. Although widely cited, his data and analysis are not ideal. Kolb reviewed discordant samples reported variously by town or ethnolinguistic group, and expressed using specific houses or means based on unreported sample sizes (Table 2). Kolb (1985: 585-588) concluded that the mean nuclear household size across 20th century Mesoamerica is about 5.5 persons and structures have a mean of 6.12 m²/person, though standard deviations remain very large, and the two numbers are not based on the same samples. Some scholars working in western Mexico supplement these estimates with other sources (Trombold 2005: 244 and Forest 2023: 9). Setting aside Kolb’s extreme outliers, it is possible to discern a more typical pattern in his data that generally 4-6 people lived in dwellings from 20-35 m² (probably floorspace). Kolb further cites a highly illustrative contrast between a “typical” and an “elite” house from early 20th century Atlatongo in central Mexico (based on Marquina 1922: figs. 12, 13). The typical house included 110.4 m² of covered floorspace defined by a bedroom, a kitchen, two storage rooms, a butchering area, and a patio. The elite house comprised 514.9 m² of floorspace with four bedrooms, multiple kitchens and storage rooms, and other specialized rooms.[2] The number of inhabitants is unfortunately not provided in the original source, limiting its usefulness. Bedrooms were of similar size in both houses, but those from the “elite” house may have allowed more privacy rather than accommodating more people (as predicted by Kvamme 1997). Kitchen and storage space were expanded. Most importantly, activities that might have taken place outside the “typical” house or in ancillary structures were incorporated into the body of the elite dwelling. This included space for entertaining, leisure, and ritual, such as living rooms, a much larger patio, and a sweat bath. This corresponds to the findings of Smith et al. (2019: 408, 411, tabl. 3) in Teotihuacan apartment compounds, in which higher status groups incorporated larger open and communal spaces. The example underlines how an elite dwelling may differ by allocating more space to individuals through sleeping space, but also by bringing additional activities into the privacy and control of the home. Members of the “typical” household certainly engaged in some of the same activities, but they had to travel outside of the house or neighborhood to do them. Table 2 – Selected Mesoamerican ethnographic data on household size, dwelling size, and space/person, distinguished by nuclear vs. extended families (data from Kolb 1985: tabl. 2, 4, 7, including some case studies from the state of Michoacán. These figures should only be used for a general orientation to the problem of quantification. Each variable drew upon a different mix of case studies, and Kolb only used a selection of these cases to derive his mean figures cited in the text)

Variable	Number of cases	Range
Household size, in persons	31 nuclear	4.0-9.3 people
	4 extended	4.4-8.8 people
Dwelling size (Floorspace?), in m2	10 nuclear	9.0-40.0 m2
	4 extended	20.3-40.0 m2
Dwelling area, in m2/person	10 nuclear	3.92-23.68 m2
	3 extended	4.55-14.04 m2

We conclude from this literature that population estimation should be considered in tandem with the activities that took place within household spaces. Residential areas may be dedicated to specific activities or space may be quite generalized (Gonlin 2004). Furthermore, many researchers have pointed out that a house (a physical setting) and a household (a social concept defined by habitual interaction or cooperation) are not coterminous. Residential groups in pre- and post-Conquest Mesoamerica could be the locus for sleeping, food production (gardens), preparation (kitchens), and consumption, discard, storage, craft production, reproduction, raising children, feasting, sweat baths, burial, ancestral or other ritual, and entertaining (Blanton 1994; Santley and Hirth [eds.] 1993a), but many of these took place in open patios, ancillary buildings, or beyond the immediate residential group. In a sense, the only indispensable activity for defining a “house” is sleeping area. All the other potential activities listed above may be incorporated within or displaced from the house or immediate residential group depending on whether an activity is organized at the household or the community level (e.g., food processing, storage, burial), carried out far from the house (e.g., agricultural work, communal labor), is co-opted by the elite (e.g., ritual, craft production), or whether risk is shared across residential groups (e.g., storage). While people may sleep elsewhere temporarily, such as a field hut during busy times in the agricultural season, these locales supplement rather than replace the sleeping space in the house. To pursue these issues further, we address three points. First, we provide a set of definitions to clarify our approach and the data required. Second, we describe and assess a large sample of residential structures taken from four mapped archaeological sites in the Tequila Valleys. Third, we detail the results of existing residential excavations to define household activities and develop the qualitative features that guide the quantitative analysis of the sample.

Definitions

We conceptualize the household as a network of practices with sleeping area as the spatial anchor for primary activities and hence the most relevant for population estimation. We do not take other activities for granted, and they may vary between households. Our discussion addresses the habitual repeated actions carried out by household members, and the terms practices and activities will be used interchangeably here. We use structure in a general sense to refer to all constructions, and patio to refer to a level uncovered outdoor space facing one or more residential structures and clearly shared by them. Patios may be built up or earth may be subtracted to achieve the same result of a level surface. These general terms apply to domestic, ceremonial, or other architecture.[3] Domestic architecture is initially distinguished by its relative frequency, and vernacular design and construction. Excavations, mapping, and surveys (Beekman 1996a, 2001, 2002; Heredia Espinoza 2017; Heredia Espinoza, Beekman, and Anderson 2018; Heredia Espinoza et al. 2023; Herrejón Villicaña 2008a, 2008b) have defined Late Formative and Classic period domestic structures by the presence of foundations with walls of one or more rows of stone, totaling approximately 0.2-0.5 m in height and commonly 0.3-0.6 m in thickness (Figure 1). Foundations are built of unworked but often carefully placed stones set into a clay mixture that served as mortar—deflation can remove this mixture entirely when structures are exposed on the surface, giving the appearance of dry masonry. Sometimes these foundations are further enclosed by another row or more of stones (at the same or lower height) that forms a porch (Spanish banqueta) around the structure. The stone foundations were the base for perishable walls made of a native bamboo (probably Otatea acuminata, Ruiz-Sanchez, García-Martínez, and Heredia Espinoza 2023) whose impressions are commonly preserved in daub that had been layered over the walls and subsequently heated into low-fired ceramic. It is not clear whether the preserved daub found in excavations was fired deliberately during the construction process or whether it burned at the time of the structure’s demise. Fired daub varies from copious to absent in its occurrence, which may indicate that not all perishable walls were covered with daub or even that some sides were left open. An unpublished experiment by Jorge Herrejón Villicaña (pers. comm. 2015) found that unfired layers of daub would have to be reapplied after every rainy season, a considerable labor investment. Interior floors are of a packed earth mixture up to 3 cm in thickness, but typically survive only in patches atop the underlying subfloor. While the original interior floor of a domestic structure was generally at the same level as the surrounding ground surface, at least one excavated structure at La Joyita B (Herrejón Villicaña 2008a: 67, see below) had its floors later raised to the height of the enclosing stone foundations (see also Figure 1). Particularly large structures may have had their floor built to that height from the beginning (thus forming a platform), but this may be difficult to ascertain even with excavation. Figure 1 – Photograph of an unexcavated domestic structure from Llano Grande. Structure 9-3 is 47.1 m² in area. Three other structures from the residential group can be seen in the background (photo by C. S. Beekman from the Tequila Valley Regional Archaeological Project, 2000) Weigand’s (1996b: figs. 13, 14) estimate of population for the Late Formative to Classic period Tequila Valleys was based upon the quantification of “compounds” of domestic structures recorded during his surveys of the southern valleys (using thresholds of one compound per 1, 4, or 9 hectares). He never defined the group in print but offered this definition when queried. A compound is an aggregate of platforms usually facing a patio, with or, much more frequently, without an altar. We have classified individual platforms as compounds […]. The compounds usually have anywhere from 2 to 6 platforms, though these can vary somewhat in structure size and area covered per se […] All of these are, to use your term, “interacting cluster(s)”, in the sense that they face a common patio, and are coeval in-so-far as the artifact cover […] allows a judgment. Individual, or isolated, compounds, while they certainly occur, are pretty rare. […] certainly the compounds with 2 to 4 platforms are the most common by far (which include associated features, such as agricultural terraces, “workshop” debris, etc.). (Weigand, pers. comm. 2001) Weigand (1996b: figs. 13, 14) assigned populations of 15 persons to each compound, probably with the assumptions of a mean of 3 inhabited structures/compound and 5 people/structure. These are viable estimates, but it is now apparent that Weigand pooled residential architecture from all time periods and so his population and density estimates often aggregated evidence from the Formative through the Postclassic periods. We use the synonyms domestic group or residential group for what Weigand called compounds. The group refers to one or more such structures in proximity (Figure 1). We find Ashmore’s (1981: 49-51) distinction between informal groups and formal patio groups to be highly relevant. Informal groups may be mere units of convenience constructed by the archaeologist, in that the member structures are grouped more by proximity than by evidence for habitual interaction. Formal patio groups are instead defined by a degree of symmetry in their arrangement, a shared orientation, and/or by shared use of a central open patio, all of which imply that the group was consciously defined around some consistently interacting group, such as an extended family, and that the components shared a significant degree of contemporaneity (Tourtellot 1990: 91-92). Formal groups are also documented elsewhere in the Mexican highlands, where they can be the anchor for house lots surrounded by infield agriculture (Killion 1992; Santley and Hirth 1993b: 6-8). All the structures that are part of a residential group are considered domestic in that they define whatever constituted household activity in this area. At least one of the structures must be large enough to provide sleeping space for one or more occupants, and we refer to these by the synonyms dwelling, house, or residence. Residential groups commonly include ancillary structures and/or terraces. Ancillary structures are domestic structures (or interior rooms) that served purposes other than as dwellings, such as storage, shrines, or food preparation. For example, Gonlin (2004: 228-232) suggests based on well-preserved contexts at rural Cerén that storage structures were smaller than habitations and usually in peripheral positions just off the shared patio of a residential group. In our experience, this describes our examples as well, in that dwellings are larger and located directly on the patio, while ancillary structures are smaller and can be either on the patio or somewhat removed from it. While the open patio spaces were shared and certainly served for domestic activities, we cannot know whether other activities (ritual, storage, kitchens) were shared by the families living in a group unless the entire group is excavated. Domestic structures that are too small to have housed a single person (6 m² of floorspace or greater) must have served ancillary purposes, but excavation data may provide evidence that some larger buildings were ancillary structures as well. Formal groups may have been planned and constructed as a unit and following some idealized template, while informal groups may have grown more through accretion. These considerations are complicated further when multiple residential groups form larger residential clusters (Ashmore 1981: 51-53). An informal group may comprise specialized ancillary buildings when affixed to a formal group of dwellings. Furthermore, many structures are what we call isolates. These are solitary structures of any kind without an association with any other buildings. Finally, we come to the category of terraces, which often formed a part of residential groups. These are a special type of structure built on gradients and generally lacking foundation walls on one or more sides where they terminate against the slope (Figure 2). They may be wide or narrow, and they may support structures, walkways, palisades, agriculture, patios, or entire residential groups, or they may lack surface indications of any of these. Although we consider them an important category for habitation, it is difficult to ascertain their function without excavation. Due to uncertainty about terrace function, we will be clear in how we assess them and isolate their relative contribution to population estimates below. In the sections that follow, we will detail our procedures for reducing the sample to domestic structures (DS) and domestic terraces (DT), and then subdivide the former into dwellings (Categories 1 and 2) and ancillaries. Figure 2 – Photograph of a stack of three terraces from site Etz-Raf-41 in the Magdalena Basin, western Tequila Valleys. Each is approximately 0.2 m high (photo by C. S. Beekman, Proyecto Arqueológico ex-Laguna de Magdalena, 2013) The residential group thus formed the core of household activities, but not the limits of them. Some activities were displaced outwards into the community because they required pooled labor or enacted shared experiences (Hendon 2010), and residents would always have met some household needs through interaction with others in the community.

Assessing the variables at four settlements

Our analysis draws upon four settlements from different parts of the Tequila Valleys (Figure 3). They were selected because they represent a range of sizes, have preserved residential areas, and have been mapped in some detail. We introduce each site, discuss the mapping and measurement techniques used, and where possible assess the accuracy of our mapping by comparing measurements of structure areas made before and after excavations. An initial quantitative summary of structures and structure density can be found in Table 3. The descriptions of domestic structures given above apply to all four of the test sites. All structures were mapped by walking directly over them on the ground and assessing the location and orientation of their wall lines. Even a 5 cm error in measurement in each dimension on a 5 m x 5 m structure can produce a deviation of 0.5 m in area. We therefore present all measurements with just one significant digit. The use of more than one significant digit would imply a false precision that probably cannot be obtained even with a fully excavated structure. Figure 3 – Map of the Tequila Valleys, showing our four test sites and other important locales (map by V. Y. Heredia Espinoza, background map credits Esri, USGS, NOAA. World Terrain Base) Table 3 – Summary of Tequila II, III, or IV phase structure data for the four settlements, including unmeasurable structures. The reduction of the sample to domestic structures (DS), terraces, and other structures removes all those structures that could not be measured (data derived from Figures 4-7)

	Peñol de Tepopote	Llano Grande	Navajas	Los Guachimontones
Structures within mapped area	128	80	315	3258
Mapped site area in hectares	7.5	20.0	64.0	375.0
Density of structures/ha	17.1	4.0	4.9	8.7
Domestic structures (DS)	38	48	72	743
Total footprint in m2 (graphed in Figure 13)	1085.6	1881.7	4294.9	16587.8
Terraces	45	13	115	1401
Total footprint in m2	1375.5	1069.9	13675.6	18149.5
Other structures not used for population estimates	45	19	128	1114

Site descriptions and data collection

Peñol de Tepopote

The Peñol de Tepopote is a hilltop center of 7.5 ha built atop Cerro Tepopote, along the corridor linking the Tequila and Atemajac Valleys (Beekman 1996a: 258-268). It was mapped using compass and tape as part of a survey of the corridor in 1993-1994, and these measurements were inked onto mylar at a scale of 1:1000 (Figure 4, Table 3). Measurements of structure footprints were taken directly off this map, with an estimated precision of 0.5 m. We cannot assess the accuracy of these measurements, as test excavations did not expose any of the architecture further (Beekman 1996a: 351-386), but soils were thin (typically 0.2 m and no more than 1.0 m), and many internal room details were visible on the surface. The ceramic assemblage places major occupation of the site during Tequila III-IV phases (100 BCE-450/500 CE). There was post-Tequila phase occupation of the site, but those residential structures have a very different morphology, and we consider them straightforward to separate from our Tequila III-IV sample.[4] Figure 4 – Map of Peñol de Tepopote (digitized by V. Y. Heredia Espinoza and Jesús Medina Rodríguez from the original map by Beekman [1996b: fig. 5])

Llano Grande

Llano Grande is a fortified 20 ha single component site blocking a strategic pass and dominating a small valley on the west side of the Laguna Magdalena, on the western edge of the Tequila Valleys. The site has suffered notable erosion and deflation, allowing high visibility of architectural detail. Weigand and Ron originally used a transit to map the site in 1981, including detailed plans of two unexcavated structures (unpublished). A more extensive and detailed total station map was made in 2000 by Beekman (Figure 5, Table 3) and structure footprints for the current study were measured from polygons in ArcGIS. Our excavations in the guachimontón encountered shallow deposits and limited material, suggesting a short period of occupation. Calibrated radiocarbon dates from Circle 1 at Llano Grande place its occupation from 200-300 CE while ceramics indicate Tequila II-IV phases (Beekman 2001). Figure 5 – Map of Llano Grande (modified by Jesús Medina Rodríguez from the original by Beekman, Beekman, and Cárdenas, Tequila Valley Regional Archaeological Project)

Santa María de las Navajas

Santa María de las Navajas was the dominant center of the Mazatepec Valley along a strategic route from the Tequila Valleys to the southeast towards Lake Chapala (Beekman 2008b). The central part of Navajas was mapped in 1993 by Weigand using compass and tape (1996a: fig. 1), and remapped and expanded to 64 ha by Beekman using a total station in 2002 (Figure 6, Table 3). Structure footprints for the current study were measured from the polygons in ArcGIS. The site’s full extent is approximately double that in the 2002 map, with another five circular ceremonial groups and many residential groups still to be mapped. Calibrated radiocarbon dates from Circles 1 and 5 indicate an occupation from 50 BCE-200 CE, and surface and excavated ceramics were exclusively of the Tequila III phase. Deposits were deeper than in the preceding sites, but always less than a meter in depth. Beekman (2000) proposes elsewhere that Peñol de Tepopote, Llano Grande, and Navajas were strategic sites because of their positions on corridors connecting the Tequila Valleys with their neighbors, but they were also the largest centers in their immediate areas during their respective occupations and may have been politically autonomous despite their wide variation in size. Figure 6 – Map of Santa María de las Navajas, Jalisco (modified by Jesús Medina Rodríguez from the original by Beekman and Tyndall, Tequila Valley Regional Archaeological Project) Horizontal excavations of Navajas Circles 1 and 5 in 2003 allow for an assessment of the accuracy of our mapping, by comparing structure footprints before and after excavations (Table 4). Deviations by individual structure were as much as nearly 17% in one case, but the errors are both higher and lower than the post-excavation measurements and are non-systematic errors (as opposed to the systematic bias found in LiDAR data by Forest [2023]). There is therefore no way to correct the measurements. At the level of the population rather than individual structures, our mapped structure footprints are 98% of those assessed through excavation and provide higher confidence at that scale of analysis (based on a regression analysis, p-value = 0.0001). Excavations at Llano Grande did not expose complete structure footprints and cannot be directly evaluated, but the same total station and equipment were used, and the same person selected all points for mapping. Surface visibility was also better at Llano Grande. Table 4 – Assessment of accuracy of map at Navajas using pre- and post-excavation measurements of structures (pre-excavation measurements were taken with a total station, while post-excavation measurements were taken from hand-drawn excavation plans)

Group and structure designation	Structure footprint measured pre- excavation, in m2	Structure footprint measured post- excavation, in m2
Circle 5-2	45.1	51.0
5-3	56.1	58.1
5-4	52.3	56.2
5-5	56.5	48.3
5-6	32.1	33.7
5-7	53.8	56.2
Circle 1-7	253.0	259.0
	Estimated total area 548.9 (98%)	Actual total area 562.5 (100%)

Los Guachimontones

Los Guachimontones is the largest and most complex site of the Teuchitlán culture. From its position in the southern foothills of the Tequila Volcano, it dominated the Tequila Valleys in the Late Formative and Early Classic periods. Although the site was occupied from the Middle Formative until Spanish Contact, with near depopulation in the Early Postclassic, calibrated radiocarbon dates place the specifically Tequila II, III, and IV phase construction from 350 BC-AD 350 (Beekman 2020; Beekman and Weigand 2008). The site has been mapped multiple times, most recently by Heredia Espinoza in 2013, 2014, and 2018 using Trimble XT and XM GPS units (Heredia Espinoza 2021; Table 3). The Tequila II-IV phase occupation covers 3.75 km² but includes some lightly occupied zones, and the site overall has been significantly impacted by mechanized maize and agave agriculture. The best preserved structures are within the monumental zone in the south-central part of the site, and on unplowed slopes and hillocks (Figure 7). The Tequila II-IV phase structures were distinguished from other periods through structure morphology and surface materials, while structure areas were calculated from their polygons in ArcGIS. Earlier excavation projects did not evaluate their maps, and they were in any case produced using different equipment. However, our recent horizontal excavation of Group 39 (Heredia Espinoza et al. 2023) allows for a limited assessment of the use of GPS for intrasite mapping (Table 5). The GPS-based areas deviated notably (based on a regression analysis, p-value = 0.6247) from the actual structure areas, with both positive and negative deviations that cannot be corrected. The measurements from Los Guachimontones will still be used for the analysis but with greater recognition of their limitations. Figure 7 – Map of Los Guachimontones, with the Tequila II, III, and IV phase occupation shaded in green (modified by Jesús Medina Rodríguez from the original by V. Y. Heredia Espinoza) Table 5 – Assessment of accuracy of map at Los Guachimontones using pre- and post-excavation measurements of structures (pre-excavation measurements were taken with GPS, while post-excavation measurements were taken from hand-drawn excavation plans [refer to Figure 11])

Group and structure designation	Structure footprint measured pre-excavation, in m2	Structure footprint measured post-excavation, in m2
39-1	10.4	17.8
39-2	28.4	10.2
39-3	40.8	11.9
39-4	23.3	32.8
Total	Estimated total area 102.9 (142%)	Actual total area 72.7 (100%)

Calculating usable floorspace and area/person

We next use high quality data from Los Guachimontones and Llano Grande to reduce domestic structure footprint to usable floorspace. Better insulation and greater load bearing strength in modern structures mean that floorspace is generally 80-90% of the footprint, while ancient structures can be expected to show a greater distinction. This can be illustrated by two unexcavated domestic structures from Llano Grande with excellent surface visibility (Figure 8). We add measurements of excavated domestic structures from Groups 1, 2, 3 (forming the larger La Joyita A residential cluster), 4 (La Joyita B), and 39 from Los Guachimontones to calculate the portion of the total footprint that is taken up by walls or other unusable area. The tabulated results (Table 6) indicate that floorspace is a mean of 66.9% of the total footprint. We use a reduction of 2/3 or 66.7% for ease of calculation in all subsequent discussions of the settlement data from the four sites. Figure 8 – Structure 5-3 and Structure 9-4, Llano Grande (digitized by Martha Alicia Soto López from the unpublished Weigand/Ron map of 1981. Structure designations reflect the comprehensive re-mapping and labeling of Llano Grande by the Tequila Valley Regional Archaeological Project in 2000) Table 6 – Area measurements for domestic structures that have been excavated or which show sufficient surface detail to measure interior floorspace and rooms. N = 17 structures, 33 rooms

Group-structure		Footprint area in m2	Floorspace in m2	Floorspace as% of footprint	Floorspace for individual rooms in m2. n = 33 rooms
Llano Grande	5-3	55.2	26.5	48.0	13.9, 9.1, 3.5
	9-4	41.6	23.9	57.4	6.5, 6.0, 5.9, 5.5
Los Guachimontones	1-1	22.4	16.3	72.8	8.7, 7.6
	1-2	59.5	37.2	62.5	24.5, 12.7
	2-1	39.4	29.1	73.9	19.8, 6.3, 3.0
	2-2	36.3	25.4	70.0	9.0, 6.8, 5.7, 3.9
	2-3	40.3	22.0	54.6	8.9, 7.2, 5.9
	3-2	40.2	29.6	73.6	29.6
	3-3	32.4	25.0	77.2	25.0
	3-4	39.8	30.4	76.4	30.4
	4-1	40.4	29.4	72.8	29.4
	4-2	45.5	33.3	73.2	17.7, 10.4, 5.2
	4-3	47.9	33.2	69.3	33.2
	39-1	17.8	13.0	73.0	13.0
	39-2	10.2	6.0	58.8	6.0
	39-3	11.9	8.1	68.1	8.1
	39-4	32.8	21.9	66.8	21.9
Total		613.6	410.3		Range 3.0-33.2
Mean		36.1	24.1	66.9	12.4

The domestic structures in Table 6 also provide information on structure and room size that can be used to revisit the allocation of space per person. The cross-cultural and Mesoamerican studies discussed previously found a mean dwelling space of 6-7 m²/person. The smallest excavated structure in this table has 6 m² of floorspace, and about one quarter of our rooms are below that size, with several right at the boundary of about 6 m². This is particularly apparent in Llano Grande Structure 9-4 (Figure 8, right) with four rooms from 5.5-6.5 m² in floorspace. We propose that common divisions within the excavated domestic structures around the predicted size provides support for this figure in the Tequila Valleys. Smaller domestic structures or rooms within dwellings must have served for storage or other purposes, which does not preclude the possibility that larger structures or rooms may have been used for ancillary activities as well. Referring once again to Table 6, the mean room floorspace of 12.4 m² in our excavated sample would thus correspond to two inhabitants, and the mean dwelling floorspace of 24.1 m² corresponds to four inhabitants.[5] We find that a figure of 6 m² floorspace/person continues to receive support as a working estimate. Since floorspace is equivalent to 2/3 of the total structure footprint, we conclude that a dwelling or residence must have a minimum footprint of 9 m², or larger if divided into multiple rooms. Archaeological or ethnographic surveys rarely present data on minimum house size, but Ashmore (1981: 47) defined a minimum dwelling size in the lowland Maya region as 20 m² of roofed space (probably structure footprint in our terms). Either the personal allocation of space was twice as large in that region, or she considered a minimum dwelling to have housed two people, i.e., a family, rather than a single person. We consider solitary individuals (young adults, widows, widowers, social isolates) to be entirely plausible in our estimates, however.

Defining the network of practices model using three domestic excavations from Los Guachimontones

There have been three Tequila II, III, or IV phase domestic excavations—La Joyita A, La Joyita B (Herrejón Villicaña 2008a, b), and Group 39 from Los Guachimontones (Heredia Espinoza et al. 2023).[6] We will present quantitative data on excavated structure footprints, floorspace, and room sizes. More importantly however, we use these examples to qualitatively define domestic activities that define a household for this time period and region.

La Joyita A

La Joyita A consists of nine excavated structures that show variation in morphology and organization (Figure 9; Herrejón Villicaña 2008a, b). The current project at Los Guachimontones has divided the La Joyita A residential cluster into three groups, which are arranged east to west along one side of a seasonal arroyo. Structures 1-1 and 1-2 face a shared patio in the east while Structures 3-1, 3-2, 3-3, and 3-4 share a patio in the west. Structures 2-1, 2-2, and 2-3 form a loose line between the two more formal groups. La Joyita A was interpreted as an elite household by Herrejón, whose analysis (Herrejón Villicaña 2008b: 84-96) sought primarily to identify domestic activities. He noted evidence for intensive food production in the form of two oval rock-lined hearths from 1.7-2.8 m in diameter in the patio of the eastern Group 1 and between Structures 1-2 and 2-1. These are reminiscent of proposed agave-roasting pits elsewhere (Winter 1976: 29; Zizumbo-Villareal et al. 2009: fig. 2) but the soil was not analyzed. Occupational layers were 0.3-0.8 m deep throughout the excavations. Trash disposal took place in middens located closest to Structures 2-1 and 2-3, which were also the most morphologically irregular structures of the group with multiple room additions. Since the only reported middens were adjacent to Group 2, we conclude that this group was functionally rather than temporally distinct from the other two groups in the residential cluster. No pits for storage such as those proposed in some other regions were identified, and above ground storage (possibly of perishable materials) are more likely (Smyth 1989: 104). Figure 9 – Map of the La Joyita A residential cluster following excavation. Structures 1-1 and 1-2 form the eastern formal group, and Structures 3-1, 3-2, 3-3, and 3-4 form the western formal group. Structures 2-1, 2-2, and 2-3 comprise the informal middle group (digitized by Gabriela García Ayala based on original by Jorge Herrejón Villicaña, provided by the Proyecto Arqueológico Teuchitlán) Ritual was a significant activity in La Joyita A (Herrejón Villicaña 2008b: 90-91). Light accumulations of figure and figurine fragments were found throughout the group. Structure 3-4 housed a large Ameca-Etzatlán style hollow figure and likely combined household ritual with residence. A stone sculpture resembling a rattlesnake rattle was found on the surface near the same structure (Herrejón Villicaña 2008b: fig. 41, 42). Remains of a human infant were buried beneath a vertically placed metate next to Structure 1-2, and human bone was found in association with Structure 2-1, but in a disturbed context that may have been structure fill. Tomb 1 was found under the northern part of the round Structure 2-2, with at least three secondarily deposited individuals and modest offerings. The informal Group 2 is most convincingly devoted to ancillary activities serving Groups 1 and 3, with Structure 2-2 as a shrine housing ancestral remains and ritual objects in its interior rooms, and Structures 2-1 and 2-3 involved in food preparation. These points underline how even a formal patio group might be functionally interdigitated with neighboring groups forming a larger cluster. A single calibrated radiocarbon date of 350 BCE predates any of the surrounding monumental construction by two centuries (Beekman and Weigand 2008), and we now suspect this date may be too early.

La Joyita B

La Joyita B (now designated Group 4) comprises three structures in a line along a natural ridge (Herrejón Villicaña 2008b: 97-115), and more recent mapping at Los Guachimontones suggests one additional structure that was not noted previously. Excavations defined the easternmost Structures 4-1 and 4-2 as rectangular, while Structure 4-3 is circular (Figure 10). The excavator noted that the interior floor of Structure 4-1 had suffered burning and interpreted this as its destruction followed by rebuilding a second, higher floor. However, our excavations in both the central altar and a platform at Circle 5 of Navajas (Beekman [ed.] 2007: 55, 80, fig. 2.46, 2.77, 2.79) suggest that the use of fire may have been a deliberate ritual act taking place prior to the initial construction of some structures, and La Joyita B Structure 4-1 suggests that the practice extended to domestic groups. Detailed analysis of phosphates, carbonates, pH levels, fatty acids, and protein residues found elevated levels of phosphates and proteins, which Herrejón suggested related to ritual activities in the center of the structure where a pit had been excavated or cleared out in ancient times. The empty pit was interpreted as the removal of an offering. Structure 4-2 resembled La Joyita A Structures 2-1 and 2-3 in that its irregular form derived from the addition of rectangular rooms. Utilitarian ceramics predominated in both Structures 4-1 and 4-2, and they are most likely dwellings combined with food preparation and perhaps storage. Structure 4-3 was round like the proposed shrine in La Joyita A, and even had a similar slab-covered chamber in the north part of the interior. No burials were found, and the excavator suggested they may have been removed like the proposed offering from Structure 4-1. No evidence for middens, pits, large-scale food production, or craft production was identified, though occupational debris was substantial. La Joyita B seems lower status or at least more limited in its activities than La Joyita A, and this would have been difficult to determine without excavation. Figure 10 – Map of La Joyita B following excavation (map by Gabriela García Ayala based on original by Jorge Herrejón Villicaña, provided by the Proyecto Arqueológico Teuchitlán) Although our interpretations differ in some particulars from those of the excavator, we agree that both La Joyita A and B were likely founded with the deposition of secondary ancestral remains beneath a circular shrine, which also occurred in the nearby guachimontón known as Circle 6 (Cach 2008). In the case of La Joyita B, these remains were removed at the abandonment of the group, which also appears to have occurred in other groups to judge from an empty pit within the central circular altar of Circle 5 at the site of Navajas (Beekman [ed.] 2007: 88, fig. 2.711). These examples suggest continuity between the ritual acts associated with domestic and ceremonial structures.

Group 39

Group 39 is the first in a planned series of new excavations to elucidate residential organization at Los Guachimontones. The group is a formal arrangement of four structures in the Loma Alta sector (Heredia Espinoza et al. 2023; Figure 11). This sector is thought to have served elite residential purposes, but Group 39 does not reflect this. The structures are notably smaller than those at La Joyita A or B (Table 6) and may have housed a lower-class household attached to an elite family. Like other residential groups throughout this sector, the group is situated atop a natural hillock. Materials are still under analysis, but calibrated AMS dates indicate that the group was occupied around 200 CE. No burials were encountered, and occupational layers were generally a modest 0.1-0.2 m in depth. Burnt ritual offerings were found in pits in the center of the patio and inside Structure 39-4. Fragments of figures and figurines were found in multiple locations, without the same evidence of display seen in La Joyita A Structure 3-4. The small Structure 39-2 had unusually large and vertically set stones flanking the west entrance and a cobble floor directly in front of the structure. Cobble floors are unusual to date, but one previously excavated example was Structure 1-1 at Llano Grande (Beekman 2001: Appendix, 30-31). That was a simple low-walled foundation with two rooms and a footprint of just 12 m² adjacent to a guachimontón. The lack of artifacts and the cobble floor in the larger room of Structure 1-1 both suggest something other than residential functions, and Structure 39-2 shares these features. Structure 39-3 was partly built into a natural rock outcrop and appeared physically larger than it was prior to excavation. We did not recover artifacts in its interior that could be attributed to residential occupation, apart from a metate fragment found on the patio floor between Structures 39-3 and 39-4. We do not consider either Structures 39-2 or 39-3 likely dwellings due to their limited assemblage, cobblestone porch, small footprint, and unusual construction features. Neither do they correspond to expectations for core activities such as storage or kitchens. The two most likely dwellings are Structures 39-1 and 39-4, and each is associated with a clear midden. Whereas refuse disposal occurred closest to dwellings in this small low-status group, the middens at La Joyita A were near buildings unlikely to be residences, suggesting that sleeping and food preparation were more clearly separated there, but were combined in Group 39. Figure 11 – Map of Group 39, Los Guachimontones (map by Gabriela García Ayala, Proyecto Arqueológico Hogares Tempranos)

A proposed network of practices model

The activities within and beyond these five excavated groups are tentatively summarized in Table 7. La Joyita A has evidence for a wider array of activities, and more specialized use of space in Group 2. The remaining structures have over 138.5 m² of floorspace (Structure 3-1 was not measured), with a resulting population of 23+ people in two groups. La Joyita B is a single group and not as high status, with 62.7 m² of floorspace if we leave out the circular shrine. This equates to 10 occupants in two structures. Two of the structures from Group 39 are unlikely as dwellings and reduce the floorspace for the group to just 34.9 m² and five persons in the two remaining structures. Status differences are well represented across the sample and are most evident between domestic groups rather than between individual dwellings. Craft production remains undocumented, unless that is how we should interpret the evidence for food (agave?) production in La Joyita A. Dwellings constituted 10/16 (or 62.5%) of the domestic structures, while six are classified as ancillary structures associated with food preparation, ancestral ritual, storage, or other activities yet unrecognized. Two of these were distinctive circular shrines, which have surprisingly not been mapped anywhere else at our test sites. Setting those aside, the remaining four ancillary structures suggest that 25% of the excavated sample reflects non-residential activities. Their large sizes in La Joyita A may relate to status differences. A good question is whether there is an inverse relationship between the presence of ancillary structures and multiroomed dwellings, suggesting that activities might be moved into more private settings where they would no longer be easily shared. The excavated sample does not support this, since the ancillary structures in Group 2 are themselves multiroomed. But this suggestion could explain the small number of ancillary structures and the high number of multiroomed dwellings at Llano Grande (discussed below). Table 7 – A schematic presentation of the activities present in the excavated sample, and where they took place

Group(s)	Activities within dwellings	Additional activities outside of dwellings but within the domestic group	Activities that were absent and probably displaced elsewhere
La Joyita A	Sleeping, ancestral ritual	Ritual, burial of infant, transported ancestors, storage, food preparation, consumption, discard	Most burial, agricultural work
La Joyita B	Sleeping, ritual, food preparation?	Transported ancestors?	Burial, agricultural work
Group 39	Sleeping, ritual	Ritual, consumption, discard	Burial, agricultural work

One of the most widely represented activities across all the excavated groups is ritual, whether in the form of subfloor offerings, dedicated shrines, ancestral ritual using hollow figures, or the manipulation of small figurines. While secondary “founder” burials are present and one special infant burial was found, ordinary burials were not encountered. This coincides with the region’s widespread practice of interment in cemeteries of pit burials and shaft tombs (e.g., Beekman 2016; Galván Villegas 1991). Both low and high-status households participated in this practice, and the concordance between household and tomb excavations underlines that households are networks, and constituent practices such as burial were not physically circumscribed by the residential group. Residential excavations provide a wealth of qualitative data on domestic practices and the spatial overlap or separation of activities. Even the limited quantitative data presented so far provide preliminary evidence for 38 people across four groups (La Joyita A Group 2 had no occupants), and that 25% of domestic buildings may have been ancillary structures inappropriate for population estimates. We now turn to the much larger dataset of mapped but unexcavated structures across our four test sites guided by the excavation findings.

Analysis of mapped residential architecture from the four settlements

We have to this point developed the quantitative basis for calculating population from mapped architecture, and the qualitative framework to separate the sample of domestic structures (the loci for household practices) into dwellings (where people slept and resided) and ancillary structures (where other domestic activities took place). Our analysis begins by measuring the area of each site map and counting all structures within that area attributed to the Tequila II, III, and IV phases (Figures 4-7). These figures populate the uppermost lines of Table 3 and allow us to calculate a mean of 8.1 structures/ha (range 4.0-17.1) across the four sites. The low density at Navajas suggests that infield agriculture was interspersed among the habitation, but this interpretation does not work very well at Llano Grande, where the very poor, thin, and rocky soil would have driven farming to the valley floor to the east. Peñol de Tepopote is a crowded hilltop settlement with a very high density of structures, and farming must have taken place primarily on the lands below the settlement. Los Guachimontones lies between these extremes, suggesting that some infield agriculture took place within the settlement but away from the ceremonial core. We next divide the total number of structures into three categories: domestic structures (DS), terraces, and other structures (Table 3, Figure 12). Separating out this last category is the most important operation, by subtracting all those constructions that are not domestic in nature or lack internal space that could have been used for domestic activities. We therefore remove any altars, stairs, ceremonial buildings, platforms already supporting other structures, and a substantial number of structures described as alignments or otherwise unmeasurable. Many of the latter were surely domestic, but their inclusion would only distort our calculations of means at this stage, so our estimates are ultimately conservative. After removing other structures, the remainder of the sample is divided into domestic structures or terraces depending on whether the construction is complete or blends into a slope. Figure 12 – Schematic representation of the categories of architecture used in this study

Dividing domestic structures into dwellings and ancillary structures

Subsequent operations focus on the domestic structures (Table 8). We divide DS into three categories based on their footprint—Category 1 dwellings, Category 2 dwellings, and ancillary structures (also graphed in Figure 13). Ancillary Structures are the easiest to separate out, as they have a footprint under 9 m², too small to have served as dwellings. We suggest that they were used for storage, food preparation, ritual, or other domestic activities. Ancillary structures account for 2.2-28.1% of domestic structures (mean 25.4%) across the mapping data, remarkably similar to the consensus of 5-30% in the Maya lowlands (Rice and Culbert 1990: 15). We suspect that the variability between our sites speaks to an important difference in how ancillary activities are organized. Llano Grande for instance has numerous dwellings organized into formal groups, but ancillary structures make up only 2.1% of the total, so support activities like storage and food preparation are not evidenced by dedicated domestic structures. These tasks might have been moved into the dwellings where they took place alongside other activities, or they were carried out elsewhere and food was brought in. This is an intriguing notion, given Llano Grande’s predominance of formal groups, its strategic location, and its potentially military nature. Table 8 – Breakdown of domestic structures (DS) into Category 1 and 2 dwellings, and ancillary structures, across the four test sites

	Tepopote	Llano Grande	Navajas	Los Guachimontones
Category 1 dwellings (DS > 75.0 m2 footprint)	3	4	13	26
Total footprint in m2	374.0	403.1	2930.0	3754.4
Average footprint in m2	124.7	100.8	225.4	144.4
Total floorspace in m2 (footprint x 0.667)	249.5	268.9	1954.3	2504.2
Average floorspace in m2	83.2	67.2	150.3	96.3
Range of floorspace in m2	53.4-130.1	56.5-77.5	52.8-491.1	52.6-209.1
Average number of occupants (mean floorspace ÷ 6 m2)	13.9	11.2	25.1	16.1
Total occupants (total floorspace ÷ 6 m2)	41.6	44.8	325.7	417.4
Category 2 dwellings (DS with footprints 9.0-75.0 m2)	27	43	48	508
Total footprint in m2	677.5	1472.6	1307.6	11531.4
Average footprint in m2	25.1	34.2	27.2	22.7
Total floorspace in m2 (footprint x 0.667)	451.9	982.2	872.2	7691.4
Average floorspace in m2	16.7	22.8	18.2	15.1
Range of floorspace in m2	6.0-44.4	6.7-42.4	6.0-44.2	6.1-47.1
Average number of occupants (mean floorspace ÷ 6 m2)	2.8	3.8	3.0	2.5
Total occupants (total floorspace ÷ 6 m2)	75.3	163.7	145.4	1281.9
Ancillary structures (DS < 9.0 m2) and their frequency out of the total DS	8/38 or 21.1%	1/48 or 2.1%	11/72 or 15.3%	209/743 or 28.1%
Total footprint in m2	34.1	6.0	57.3	1302.0
Total uninhabited floorspace in m2 usable for storage, kitchen, etc.	22.7	4.0	38.2	868.4

Figure 13 – Rank-size scatterplot of structure footprints for the four settlements. This method of visualization shows the great differences in structure sizes across sites and shows the jumps in structure footprint after 75 m². Los Guachimontones is presented in an inset plot because its sample size would overwhelm that of the other settlements (plot by V. Y. Heredia Espinoza) Those domestic structures with footprints 9 m² and larger are considered dwellings and are included in our calculations of population, since this was the minimum area determined to be sufficient for a single individual. Dwellings are divided into a larger Category 1 and a smaller Category 2 (Table 8). Category 2 is defined as 9-75 m² in footprint, and they include all the excavated dwellings from La Joyita A, La Joyita B, and Group 39 (Table 5). Our proposed figure of 9 m² footprint/person indicates a range of 1-8.3 persons/Category 2 dwelling. Across our combined sample of 624 cases, the mean Category 2 dwelling has a 23.9 m² footprint, or 2.7 occupants. The mean and range of footprints compares favorably with those considered obvious residences from Maya lowland (Tourtellot 1990: 93—mean 50 m²) or highland Mexican centers (Santley 1990: 336—mean 35 m²), and Kolb’s ethnographic accounts (Table 3, 9.0-40.0 m²), keeping in mind that some of these comparative figures do not specify footprint or floorspace. Our estimates of people/structure are also similar, though we base our figures on dwelling area rather than ethnographic or ethnohistoric analogies. Category 2 could be sub-divided further in the future (Category 2a, b, etc.) to capture the clear distinctions between the dwellings at high status La Joyita A vs. lower status Group 39. It was noted during analysis that larger dwellings occurred in strategic or privileged positions, leading to our separation of Category 1 and 2 (Table 8). A size break at 75 m² occurs in the rank-size curve for individual structures for both Tepopote and Llano Grande, while the break appears after 100 m² for Los Guachimontones and about 175 m² at Navajas (Figure 13). Dwellings above this break at Peñol de Tepopote and Llano Grande are in special locations on the edge of the settlement with views of the approach to the site. Even larger dwellings at Navajas and Los Guachimontones are close to ceremonial architecture and particularly concentrated in the monumental Group 7 and Group 40, respectively. While their settlement context is special, these large structures retain the morphology and often formal patio group arrangements of domestic structures. There is limited documentation of the excavations at Group 40 (Esparza López and Weigand 2008; Proyecto Arqueológico Teuchitlán 2005), but our subsequent ceramic analysis found that the assemblage includes very similar percentages of utilitarian wares to those found at La Joyita A and B (Beekman 2018: tabl. 8; Beekman 2020: tabl. 2.5). Given that they are organized into residential groups, these dwellings present a strong argument for being the residences of the highest elite. A previous analysis found their distribution to suggest political capitals (Beekman 2016). Returning to our current problem, Category 1 dwellings also present interpretive difficulties for population estimation. Their size and context could suggest this category to include both elite residences and military posts, which could be more or less generous with space/person, respectively (Kardulias 1992). Formulae for our typical house structures therefore may not apply, but it is not immediately clear whether we should revise our formulae upwards or downwards. We are unable to resolve these issues without new excavations to elucidate their functions, and for now we find these structures to be domestic in nature and we use our same formulae for population estimation.

Terraces

Terraces are a different form of built space intended to create level surfaces on a slope, and they may serve many purposes (see Pérez Rodríguez and Anderson 2013). Terraces grow dramatically in importance across our four settlements, but no excavations exist from this region to help distinguish between their different functions. Our approach is based entirely on their surface morphology and dimensions. Given the uncertainties in terrace function, we make sure to keep their contribution to the population estimates clearly separate from the dwellings. Table 3 summarized the total number of terraces for each site, and these form the basis for calculations in Table 9. We discard all terraces that have structures or patios on any part of their leveled surface. We further reduce this figure by removing narrow terraces too narrow to support a small domestic structure (with < 3 meters of distance behind the terrace face). This effectively removes numerous narrow terraces that were more likely agricultural in nature. Finally, we remove those terraces located in topographic positions that suggest that they captured erosion. These operations greatly reduce the number of terraces that could potentially support habitation at each site. The remaining domestic terraces (DT) are then treated as supporting domestic activities. Those structure footprints that are larger than 9 m² are then used to calculate residential population. The domestic terraces large enough to support habitation have a mean footprint of 60.2 m² with an estimated population of 6.7 people, landing squarely within the range already calculated for dwellings. Table 9 – Quantification of terraces at the four settlements

	Tepopote	Llano Grande	Navajas	Los Guachimontones
Terraces (those structures partly built into a slope and lacking at least one foundation wall)	45	13	115	1401
Total footprint in m2	1375.5	1069.9	13675.6	18149.5
Domestic terraces (DT) capable of supporting domestic activities	14	8	89	257
DT large enough to support habitation	10	2	51	194
Total area (footprint) in m2	308.0	226.8	5037.0	9893.8
Mean domestic terrace footprint in m2	30.8	113.4	98.8	51.0
Mean number of occupants	3.4	12.6	11.0	5.7
Number of people on domestic terraces	34.2	25.2	559.9	1099.9

Residential Groups

Our population estimates are based on counts of individual structures and their sizes, but we present a preliminary typology and analysis at the level of the residential group. The most clearly relevant are the three categories already introduced in the section on definitions—formal group, informal group, and isolates (Figure 14). As noted previously, formal groups incorporate evidence for contemporaneity and habitual interaction around a defined patio space. Informal groups are defined more by proximity and as units of convenience to the analyst. Formal groups provide more of a common denominator for comparison, while informal groups are heterogeneous. Isolates are individual structures that do not pertain to another group. They may incorporate domestic structures or not. Figure 14 – Examples of group types taken from Los Guachimontones. From top to bottom, formal group 82, Informal group 118, and Isolate 6 (by V. Y. Heredia Espinoza) For all three categories, we explored multiple variations in their size and complexity, but our findings are generally limited. Both formal and informal groups could incorporate domestic structures, terraces, and other structures (Figure 12). Formal and informal groups both decrease in frequency as they increase in size, while formal groups have a higher mean footprint (formal groups 164.6 m² mean footprint; informal groups 126.5 m² mean footprint). All the excavated groups discussed earlier are below the mean for their group type. Isolates have predictably small footprints (mean 31.6 m²) and are few. The relative importance of formal and informal groups and isolates at our four settlements varies (Table 10), with the highest proportion of formal groups at the site of Llano Grande, thought to represent a more planned strategic center blocking access through a mountain pass linking the Tequila Valleys to southern Nayarit. This parallels our earlier proposal that formal groups were planned and perhaps associated with the initial settlement of a location. Table 10 – Group level breakdown at the four settlements

	Tepopote	Llano Grande	Navajas	Los Guachimontones
Formal groups	3	10	15	53
Informal groups	6	6	12	171
Isolates	3	4	1	21

Our separate assessment of group size is also suggestive. When domestic group footprints are plotted on a rank-size graph (Figure 15), a distinct break occurs after about 400 m² total footprint. We can see sharply primate curves at Navajas and Los Guachimontones, both of which have a single large residential group (Group 7 and Group 40, respectively) composed of some of the very largest individual structures as mentioned earlier. This supports prior proposals that each were independent political centers with specialized residential architecture catering to the highest elite. Tepopote and Llano Grande, which are both located in strategic locations that block or overlook passes into the Tequila Valleys, both show flatter rank-size plots and lack clearly dominant domestic groups. We suggest that they were not politically independent centers, but rather special purpose settlements that served larger polities in their area. Figure 15 – Rank-size scatterplot incorporating all group footprints from the four settlements. This method of visualization shows the great differences in group sizes across sites and shows the jumps in group footprint after 400 m². Los Guachimontones is presented in an inset plot because its sample size would overwhelm that of the other settlements (plot by V. Y. Heredia Espinoza) texte alternatif : .

Population totals

The complete tabulations for the number of people residing in dwellings and atop potential dwelling terraces at the four test settlements are compiled in Table 11. We estimate that the small but dense hilltop center of Peñol de Tepopote held 151 people, while 234 resided at Llano Grande. Navajas had over 1000 people living within the mapped area, while Los Guachimontones had nearly 3000 people. Based on these calculations from domestic architecture, we can use settlement area to calculate intrasite population densities as 7.5-20.1 persons/ha. The mean is 9.0 persons/ha, but as noted below this has been skewed by the situation at Los Guachimontones. Navajas and Llano Grande suggest a more likely density of 11.7-16.1 persons/ha, and hence closer to the median of 13.9 persons/ha. These also bracket an older estimate of 14.3 persons/ha derived from a small sample of different sites with both architecture and surface artifact collections and used in an earlier study (Beekman and Baden 2011: 352, tabl. 1). We consider our figures for Los Guachimontones to be an underestimate and the most likely to change. This is because so many structures were originally mapped as alignments or incomplete structures and could not be measured. Consequently, over 450 alignments (and potential domestic structures) and 1000 terraces had to be subtracted from our sample and did not contribute to our population figures. Our site estimate of 2799 persons is therefore a minimum figure, and the population of Los Guachimontones could be as high as twice our current estimate. Table 11 – Population estimates for our four settlements, including dwellings and domestic terraces

	Tepopote	Llano Grande	Navajas	Los Guachimontones
Number of people in Category 1 dwellings (Table 8)	41.6	44.8	325.7	417.4
Number of people in Category 2 dwellings (Table 8)	75.3	163.7	145.4	1281.9
Number of people on domestic terraces (Table 9)	34.2	25.2	559.9	1099.9
Population living in dwellings and on domestic terraces	151.1	233.7	1031.0	2799.2
Population per hectare of mapped site area	20.1	11.7	16.1	7.5

Surface artifact density and estimated population

Finally, we address the density of surface artifacts as a separate line of evidence, and to bring surveys in the Tequila Valleys into closer alignment with those in other regions of the Mexican highlands. Surface density multiplied by site area has been a common method for estimating population, and especially valuable in contexts where architecture has been damaged by mechanized farming. This method was developed in the Basin of Mexico survey and carried over to the Valley of Oaxaca project, and constitutes a common system used among many descendant survey projects today. Both major regional projects developed their methods of population estimation using sites with well-preserved residential architecture and/or colonial Spanish counts of people or houses, and then correlating these figures with the density of surface artifacts (Blanton et al. 1982: 9-11; Sanders, Parsons, and Santley 1979: 37-39). The result is a well-known protocol by which surveyors could estimate population based on artifact density and then multiply the population by site area.[7] The problem is that these two well-known projects transformed the same artifact densities to quite different numbers of people. There are many environmental factors that affect surface artifact density on a local basis, but not at the scale of the valleys surveyed by these two projects. For instance, the Valley of Oaxaca survey assigned 10-25 people/ha to the same artifact densities that would result in 2 people/ha in the Basin of Mexico, even though both projects reportedly validated their artifact: population ratios by comparison to residential architecture. Oaxaca population estimates are thus up to 5-15 times higher based on the same evidence (Table 12). This is most likely due to very different rates of consumption of material culture, in which the occupants of the Basin of Mexico (no doubt with additional variation over time and across the rural-urban divide) consumed more goods per capita than they did in the Valley of Oaxaca (Beekman 1998), just as the consumption of material goods varies today in relation to wealth and cultural practices. Table 12 – Surface artifact densities and their translation into human population counts, as used in the Basin of Mexico (BoM; Sanders, Parsons, and Santley 1979: 37-39) and Valley of Oaxaca (VoO; Blanton et al. 1982: 9-11) surveys. We project the artifact densities per m² to per hectare. Recorded densities in the Tequila Valleys are shown on the far right (table modified from Beekman 1998)

BoM survey terms	VoO survey terms	BoM associated artifact densities/m2	VoO associated artifact densities/m2	BoM people/ha	VoO people/ha	Our projection of their artifact densities to sherds/ha
	Trace		Just a few sherds		5-10		Tequila Valley surface densities 0-77000
Scanty	Very Light (most settlement in VoO)	One or two sherds every few meters	Sherds spaced every few meters	2-5	10-25	4000
Scanty to Light		Wide scattering plus concentrations of sherds as close as 20-30 cm				Up to 50,000
Light to Scanty		Sherds every 20-30 cm, but with some lighter zones		5-10		Up to 100,000
Light	Light	Sherds consistently every 20-30 cm	Nearly continuous scatter		25-50	Up to 160,000
Light to Moderate	Moderate and Heavy	Mostly sherds every 20-30 cm, but up to 100-200	Up to 100 or more fragments	10-25		Up to 1,000,000
Moderate		Mostly 100-200		25-50		1-2,000,000
Moderate to Heavy		Mostly 100-200, but sometimes up to 200-400		50-100		Up to 2-4,000,000
Heavy		Mostly 200-400, but sometimes up to 400-800				Up to 4-8,000,000

Surface artifact densities in the Tequila Valleys were assessed through systematic random surface collections across 70 sites in the La Venta Corridor, including Peñol de Tepopote (Beekman 1996a: 117-134, tabl. 4.1). The intent was to empirically develop an artifact: population ratio that could be used like those in the better known regional surveys. Densities within site boundaries were 0-77986 artifacts/ha, with a mean of 8860.[8] The artifact density in any one site was unfortunately too sensitive to other factors to use in the intended manner. Sites in unplowed locations showed very low artifact densities (but high rates of architectural preservation) while plowed areas showed the opposite pattern. For example, Peñol de Tepopote is located on a mountain untouched by mechanized agriculture and had an artifact density of just 4615 artifacts/ha. The mean and range of densities across the entire sample of 70 sites do however correlate well with the same measures from the Valley of Oaxaca survey (Table 12). The La Venta Corridor mean of 8860 artifacts/ha falls within the Very Light range, which was described as the most common density in the Oaxaca survey and would be interpreted as 10-25 people/ha. This compares favorably with the 7.5-20.1 people/ha (mean 9.0, median 13.9) that we estimate at our four test sites based on residential architecture. The current evidence therefore supports a similar artifact density and artifact: population ratio in the Valley of Oaxaca and the Tequila Valleys, reflecting some systemic factor such as a lower degree of material consumption.

Conclusions

The present study has sought to clarify the size and structure of residential settlement in the Tequila Valleys in support of ongoing efforts to evaluate urbanism (Heredia Espinoza and Beekman in prep.), labor allocation (DeLuca 2019), and subsistence patterns (Beekman and Baden 2011). By conceptualizing the household as a network of practices, we have sought to break with the often immobile and circumscribed view of the household. People leave the house to carry out tasks in neighboring buildings of the domestic group, but they also regularly engage in “logistical mobility” (Binford 1980) that takes them throughout the community. They hold markets, attend ceremonies, harvest crops, bury their dead, visit social contacts, work with others, raise and teach children, and/or trade with other communities in a constant hum of activity distributed across the landscape (Arnauld, Beekman, and Pereira 2021). The spatial dispersion of household practices complicates population estimates but also suggests ways to focus the analysis on spaces used for sleeping, the only activity not potentially displaced beyond the house. Our analysis of excavated residential groups identified many domestic practices in the Tequila Valleys and whether they took place within the dwelling, in the surrounding residential group, or elsewhere in the community. The current empirical sample is small, but we suggest this model as a framework for future data collection. We used our study of residential architecture in four communities from the Late Formative and Early Classic Tequila II, III, and IV phases to generate guidelines for population estimates depending on the surviving data. First, our evaluation of our own mapping data quantifies the degree to which total station and GPS intrasite mapping methods offer greater accuracy or speed, respectively. We propose a figure of 6 m² of floorspace/person based on cross-cultural analyses, Mesoamerican ethnography, and local archaeological data for common room sizes.[9] Measurements before and after excavation allow us to project this figure to 9 m² as the minimum footprint for a one-person dwelling. Structures below 9 m² in footprint must be assigned to ancillary household activities, but we also identified qualitative criteria that can be used when excavation data are available. When neither footprint nor floorspace can be calculated due to structure damage or other factors, analysts can project our mean Category 2 dwelling of 23.9 m² with 2.7 people to their samples. Our correlation of surface artifact and structure densities agree that intrasite population densities ran from 7.5-20.1 persons/ha with a preference near the median of 13.8 due to data issues at Los Guachimontones. These are low density centers when compared to Smith’s (2005: tabl. 5) data on Postclassic urbanism and can now be compared with later western Mexican cities such as Postclassic Malpaís Prieto (up to 146 persons/ha [Forest 2023: 16]) or Angamuco (>15 persons/ha [Fisher et al. 2017: 133]). Finally, our population estimates for Peñol de Tepopote, Llano Grande, Navajas, and Los Guachimontones have confirmed that settlement sizes in the region were more modest than in many better-known areas of Mesoamerica. Estimates for Los Guachimontones, however, are subject to significant upwards modification when unmeasured terraces and alignments are considered. We hope that these results will provide a more robust dataset that encourages further research into household organization and population figures. But we emphasize that population estimation is deeply imbricated with status, the culturally specific distribution of activities, and variation between more specialized and generalized settlements. An understanding of these variables, an investment in data collection, and careful attention to contextual details are necessary to produce useful estimates.