La Blanca was one of the largest settlements in the entire
Mesoamerican territory during the Middle Formative period, and that it
was a key site in the cultural and trade interaction network of the
Middle Preclassic Olmec people (Love 1990, 1991, 1999, 2002).
In the Early Pre-Classic there were few
attempts to shape the landscape. The modification of space was limited
to the construction of dwellings on high
ground. Some of these dwellings were apparently more elaborate than
others and may have served as the scene of special actions or ritual
acts. This is an
important step, however, in that specific behaviors became fixed in
space; they became associated with a locale. It was the first step
toward segregating and
regularizing activities in space. Things changed fundamentally at the
beginning of the Early Middle Pre-Classic. Monumental architecture of the type
constructed at
El Mesak, La Blanca,
Ujuxte,
Tak'alik Abaj,
and other centers has several
effects on social interaction. The size and durability of these
monuments is significantly greater than anything that previously existed
in Mesoamerica. The monuments at La Blanca and its secondary centers
appear to define the center and peripheries of a polity, Just as the
earliest Maya Centers in
The Mirador Basin, in the
Petén lowlands.
At the same time social space was becoming more highly segregated during
the Pre-Classic, the
calendrical reckoning of time was also becoming more
formalized and more elaborate. The disciplinary dimensions surrounding
the control of time by the elite are enormous and had ramifications for
every aspect of daily life. (Michael Love, 1992)
La Blanca is a large site dated from
Early Preclassic to Mid Preclassic (2000-600 BC) date, located on the
Pacific coast of Guatemala, and
being the most important polity, and largest
Salt producer, mainly
in Salinas La Blanca and
El Mesak, in the Pacific
coast of Mesoamerica until 600 BC, when the dominance pass to the
Ujuxte, 13 Km northeast,
and then to Tak'alik Abaj
further to the east. There have been found Locona and Ocós Phase pottery, Interestingly, Pierre Agrinier, of the New World
Archaeological Foundation, notes that the earliest pottery from the Ocós
phase is by all odds the most sophisticated found anywhere in southern
Mesoamerica, while that from the earliest
Olmec
site, San Lorenzo represents a rather less
carefully made imitation ( Agrinier 1983; Cox and Diehl 1980). The secondary sites of La Zarca, Infierno, and
Valle Lirio all have single large mounds dating to 1000 BC.
Mound 30a at Izapa should also be included
in this group, as Izapa was a secondary center within the La
Blanca polity (Love). La Blanca has several mounds more than 5 m.
in height that appear to be ceremonial or at least non residential. The
relationship between Mound 1 and Mound 2 is the only one showing a
significant directional orientation (magnetic north), and a large plaza
lay between them. Mound 1, ca.800 BC (25 mt. high and 100x150 base) was the
tallest and largest structure build in this area
of Mesoamerica. The
Obsidian artifacts found here, came from the nearby Tajumulco
Osidian source, El Chayal in the
Central Highlands, and Ixtepeque in the
Eastern Highlands. The Jade
is also from the Eastern Highlands, in the Motagua Valley, thus making
clear that commerce was very important since the Preclassic.
The Earliest pottery in Mesoamerica is from this area known as
Soconusco:
Barra: (1800-1650 BC) -
earliest
decorated pottery, found together with fancy figurines.
Locona: (1650-1500 BC) -
first chiefly
residences; evidence for elite objects and representation of
important persons in figurines.
Ocós: (1500-1350
BC) - further elaboration of
fancy pottery and sophisticated village life.
Monument 3 was discovered in La Blanca Mound 9, in an Elite
residential zone thought to be largely or completely elite.
Excavations of the mound initially revealed domestic, or household,
features such as floors, burials, and trash pits.
Monument 3,
however, is unique in Mesoamerican archaeology. It is an earthen
sculpture, found on the western slope of the mound. The sculpture is
in the shape a quatrefoil and formed of rammed earth, composed of a
sandy loam. The rammed earth was then coated with dark brown (nearly
black) clay. The inner rim of the sculpture was painted with
hematite red.
The La Blanca quatrefoil has a channel within the rim that may
have carried water to the interior basin. Our initial hypothesis is
that the sculpture functioned as a locus of ritual in which water,
or notions of fertility, were invoked. Such an idea is consistent
with the quatrefoil shape, which in Classic period iconography
symbolizes a watery portal to the supernatural realm.
Dating to
approximately 850 B.C., the La Blanca sculpture appears to be the
earliest example of a quatrefoil known in Mesoamerica.
In fact, the context of La Blanca Monument 3 has yet to be fully
determined. Surface remains from Mound 9 clearly indicate a
residential function, as do artifacts recovered from the strata
above the sculpture. The stratum within which the sculpture was
buried, however, contain a very large number of figurines, including
many complete examples. It is possible that at the time Monument 3
was in use that it was in a “public” area or plaza associated with
Mound 1, the primary temple pyramid at La Blanca, and that Mound 9
and the other residential mounds of the elite precinct were built
only after the sculpture was buried.
Protein sources, found at Feature 9, a garbage pit from Conchas 1
period, included snook, catfish, gar, turtle, bird, opossum, deer,
rodent, agouti and rabbit remains. Based on this diversity, we can
conclude that a wide range of animals were exploited from the
earliest occupational phases at La Blanca. Although deer tends to
predominate, dog does appear in the Conchas 1 subassemblage. A few
additional species appear in low numbers in later subphases, but the
basic vertebrate exploitation pattern is essentially in place from
the earliest occupation of La Blanca. Over time, however, relative
proportions of the most important vertebrate species change. Notable
is the increase in frequency of dog remains in later phases and the
relative decrease in reliance on deer. The Area of la Blanca is the
only source of Plomizo Pottery, a well known Ceramic type, found all
over the Pacific Lowlands. Salinas la Blanca an associated coastal
site in The Pacific Lowlands, were
platforms were used to obtain sun-dry salt, such platforms have been
documented ca 1800 BC, and are perhaps the oldest in Mesoamerica. They
used Brine salt cooking vessels also to
trade with other sites.
