Introduction: Issues in the Archaeology of Tropical Polities

Elisabeth A. BacusUniversity College London

Lisa J. LuceroNew Mexico State University

The term "tropics" generally invokes images ofsweltering heat, heavy rainfall, lush forest and exoticanimals, and until relatively recently, small-scalesocieties subsisting on swidden farming and hunting.These areas of the world have often been perceived,vis-a-vis temperate regions, as presenting uniqueenvironmental conditions that constrain the formationand organization of complex polities. With theexception of a few regions, such as lowlandMesoamerica and Polynesia, polities located intropical regions have generally been considered oflittle relevance to our theories of the formation andtransformation of complex society. This maypartially reflect the previous focus on the earliestcases of state formation, which primarily occurredin temperate regions, combined with the primacy,until recently, of the ecosystem approach in Americanarchaeology. The emphasis on population-environment interaction to explain stability andchange in behavioral systems (see e.g., Brumfiel1992) may have facilitated a view of complex politiesin tropical regions as less than relevant tounderstanding the earlier development of complexsocieties in temperate areas.

Current theoretical approaches (see e.g.,Bourdieu 1977; Brumfiel 1992; Ellen 1996; Mann1986), while not denying the importance ofenvironmental conditions, place greater emphasis onhuman agency and historical contingency inexplaining change. Such explanations, combinedwith a recognition of the cultural perceptions ofnature, thus warn against any reification of the"tropics." These approaches facilitate theoretical de-

marginalizing of tropical societies and, as the papersin this volume show, studies of polities located intropical regions provide insights into ouranthropological understanding of complex society.At the same time, the papers highlight aspects oftropical environments that may have presentedunique conditions affecting the formation, structureand transformation of complex polities.

The studies of tropical polities in this volumedraw upon a range of theoretical perspectives incontemporary archaeology. More importantly, theyengage theoretical issues based on results of researchby archaeologists actively involved in fieldinvestigations in areas of Belize, Brazil, theHawai'ian Islands, Indonesia, peninsular Malaysia,the Philippine Islands, Uganda, West Africa, andVenezuela (Figure 1.1). They also attest to the abilityto overcome major obstacles faced in conductingarchaeology in the tropics (e.g., diseases, seasonallyconstrained field opportunities, logistical problems,poor surface visibility and preservation [e.g.,Meggers and Evans 1957; Sinclair et al. 1993; Stahl1995]). Unfortunately, tropical-forest regions stillremain poorly represented in studies of complexsocieties (Trigger 1989:400).

THE TROPICS AND TROPICAL POLITIES

The area known as the tropics lies between theTropics of Cancer and Capricorn (231/2° north andsouth of the equator, respectively) (see Figure 1.1).Tropical regions contain the most diverse andcomplex ecosystems in the world; thus, the

Elisabeth A. Bacus and Lisa J. Lucero

Marajo lslanSantarem-MonteAlegre

Figure 1.1 Location of the tropics and of the research areas discussed in the volume.

contemporary environments of the tropical regionsof Africa, Southeast Asia, Oceania, and Central andSouth America share only a broad set ofcharacteristics, which are briefly summarized here(drawing on Hutterer 1985; see e.g., Jarrett 1977; Park1992; Senior 1979 for detailed discussions of tropicalenvironments). The most important characteristic isa high level of solar radiation throughout the yearwhich means "high levels of light during the day andgenerally high temperatures with only relativelyminor daily and seasonal fluctuations compared tothe climates of nontropical areas" (Hutterer 1985:60).Within the tropics, elevation is the main cause ofvariation in temperatures. Solar radiation is the mostimportant controlling element of tropical ecosystems,influencing the nature of tropical climates andconsequently the formation of soils;

through both it influences the compositionand structure of biotic communities intropical latitudes. The total amount of solarradiation is highest, and its seasonaldistribution most even, near the equator,while values for both of these variablesdecline with increasing latitude.

Corresponding with the importance of solarradiation in regulating other kinds ofenvironmental phenomena, the latitudeaffects all dependent variables [ibid.].

Precipitation is the next most important of theclimatic variables. The total amount of yearly rainfallreceived is generally highest, and its distributionthroughout the year most uniform, near the equator.Moving away from the equator, annual precipitationdecreases in total volume and becomes moreseasonally distributed. The tropics may thus bedivided into two major zones. The humid tropic, alsoreferred to as the equatorial or wet tropic, zone ismarked by the absence of a significant dry season.This zone lies between approximately 5-10° northand south of the equator, and is characterized byfrequent, heavy and reliable rainfall (which may bedifferentiated into those areas receiving 12 monthsof heavy rainfall and those receiving between 8 and11 months of rainfall). Extending both north andsouth from this zone, the length and severity of annualdry periods increases. The seasonal or intermediatetropical zone (Harris 1980) is characterized by clearlydifferentiated wet and dry seasons, with the latter

Issues in the Archaeology of Tropical Polities

ranging from 2.5 to 7.5 months in length. The politiesdiscussed in this volume were located in both zones.All but those in West Africa were located within thehumid tropics. Those within the latter occurred withinseveral types of humid tropics: polities in the MalayPeninsula (see Chapter 10) were within the constantlywet type; those in western Uganda, Java, the centralPhilippine Islands, Hawai'i, Belize and lowlandCentral America, and Venezuela (see Chapters 4,10,5,6,3,11 and 7 respectively) were within the tropicalwet and dry type; and those in the lower AmazonBasin (see Chapter 2) were in the monsoon type(Jarrett 1977:Fig.5). The polities of the Inland NigerDelta and Middle Senegal Valley (see Chapter 9) werelocated within the intermediate tropical zone (with aclimatic type characterized as tropical continental[Senior 1979]).

A great diversity of plant and animal taxacharacterizes tropical ecosystems. Althoughdistributed over a vast area, concentrations of anysingle species are rare. A characteristic vegetationtype of the humid tropics is the evergreen rainforest(or "tropical rainforest") which is dominated by verytall trees, extremely large phytomass, and very highspecies diversity. Rainforests though "contain feweranimals per kilogram of plant matter than any otherterrestrial ecosystem" (Hutterer 1985:62). Diversityand mass of plant species, as well as height of foresttrees, decreases with increasing distance from theequator. 'Toward the outer tropics, forests eventuallybreak up into open woodlands, scrub forests,savannas and steppes, and eventually deserts"(Hutterer 1985:62). Several tropical forest typescomprised the surroundings of the polities examinedin the following chapters: evergreen rainforests (i.e.,for those located in Java, the Malay Peninsula, centralPhilippines, windward areas of Hawai'i, Amazonbasin and Belize discussed in Chapters 10, 8, 5, 6, 2and 3, respectively); semi-evergreen and deciduousforests (i.e., for those in Uganda, though there arealso pockets of rainforest, discussed in Chapter 4);and dry woodlands, savannas or grassland forests(i.e., for those in the Senegal Valley and Mali, leewardHawaiian areas, and western Venezuela discussed inChapters 9, 6 and 7, respectively) (see Park 1992).

Organization of Tropical Polities

To encourage reading across regions, thechapters are not organized geographically, but insteadby shared aims. Thus, Chapters 2 (Roosevelt), 3(Lucero) and 4 (Robertshaw) present new models orhypotheses for explaining the development ofcomplex polities in Amazonia, the southern Mayalowlands, and Great Lakes region of Uganda,respectively; Chapters 5 (Bacus), 6 (Kolb), 7(Redmond, Gasson and Spencer), 8 (Allen) and 9(Mclntosh) investigate organizational dynamics ofchiefly and state polities in the Philippine Islands,Maui, Venezuelan llanos, peninsular Malaysia andwest Africa (though Chapters 8 and 9 also overlapwith the first group); Chapters 10 (Miksic) and 11(Graham) examine urbanism in the tropics of Javaand Maya lowlands; and Chapter 12 (Helms)comments on the preceding chapters within thecontext of political ideology in complex polities.Concern with several issues is shared by two or moreof these chapters; five of the more dominant ones—tropical environmental conditions, heterarchy, controlof resources and labor, prestige economies, politicalideology—are discussed after first highlighting eachauthor's contribution below.

In Chapter 2, Roosevelt critiques environmentaldeterministic and functionalist explanations ofAmazonian societies. She proposes three forms ofcomplex society— unranked, graded and stratified—and not all are based on the presence of hierarchicaldifferentiation. The archaeological records of MarajoIsland, located at the mouth of the Amazon River,and the Santarem-Monte Alegre region of the lowerAmazon indicate that a diverse group of complexsocieties developed in a wider range of environmentsand engaged in a wider variety of subsistence systemsthan previously recognized. Roosevelt suggests thatthe societies exhibiting dense settlement on MarajoIsland were heterarchical, graded-ranking complexsocieties, which is contrary to functionalistexpectations. Those in the Santarem region werecomplex chiefdoms; this interpretation contrasts withearlier environmental-based ones that assumedrainforest environments limited the development ofhierarchical polities,

Lucero, in Chapter 3, offers an explanation forthe rise of Classic Maya rulership (ca. A.D. 250- 850)

Elisabeth A. Bacus and Lisa J. Lucero

in the southern Maya lowlands. She proposes this Dumaguete's economy exhibits similarities to eachresulted from emerging Maya leaders' reliance on of the models, for example, in the elite restrictedideological sources of power to counter a centrifugal distribution and political use of some of the foreignsubsistence economy. She argues that emerging goods, particularly Asian porcelains. Bacus alsoleaders associated themselves with a critical resource, compares Dumaguete's economy to that of thewater, and performed the rituals considered necessary contemporary Cebu and Tanjay polities to examineto ensure its abundance and purity. This may account variability in elite economic control within the centralfor why the largest Maya polities developed in areas Philippines. Results suggest both similarities (e.g.,where farmers relied, particularly during the annual political valuation of foreign goods) and differencesdrought, on artificial reservoirs. These reservoirs (e.g., valuation of local craft goods; means by whichwere located in the centers, at palaces and temples, elite acquired foreign goods that ultimately derivedwhich enabled rulers to exercise political power from mainland Asia). Political authority may not havethrough control of this resource. ultimately resided though in elite control over the

In Chapter 4, Robertshaw presents a model of economy, but instead in chiefly elite manifestationsstate formation for Buganda and Bunyoro in western of "potency." Bacus suggests that potency andUganda. The elite demand for agricultural labor, political economy may thus have been in a "circularparticularly women's labor, is central to his model, reciprocal relationship."Historic, demographic and epidemiological evidence In Chapter 6, Kolb argues that staple financeindicates that women's labor was essential for the underpinned Hawai'ian chiefs' ideological controldevelopment of subsistence economies, but also that based on a study of the political context of pigthere was a scarcity of women in this area of East sacrifice in Maui polities of A.D. 1200 to 1820.Africa. Robertshaw thus argues that the ability of Ethnohistoric accounts indicate domestic pigs wereleaders to attract followers, which encouraged elite a potent sacrificial offering and a highly valued foodcontrol of resources to do so, was essential to the usually restricted to high status individuals. Kolbdevelopment of complex polities in western Uganda, analyzes faunal assemblages from temples, whereArchaeological evidence from Bunyoro indicates that sacrifices and feasting took place, to assess changesin the 11th to 14th centuries, emerging leaders in pig production, husbandry practices, preparationaccomplished this through control of prestige goods and consumption, and the links between economicandiron, the giving of feasts, and the exercise of ritual and ideological changes. Results, such as thepower. With the development of several larger polities documentation of a dramatic increase in pig remainsin subsequent centuries, the strategies changed to and of the harvesting of younger pigs beginning ca.involve raiding for cattle and women, competition, A.D. 500, suggest changes in ritual practices. Kolbthe development of markets, and long-distance trade, proposes that such ritual changes enhanced chieflyDespite differences in Buganda's subsistence and social control. The increased ceremonial importancepolitical economies, and evidence of greater political of pigs created greater economic demand for pigscentralization in the 19th century, women's which resulted in their becoming an elite status food,agricultural labor also represented a crucial Redmond, Gasson and Spencer examine cyclesprecondition for the existence of this neighboring of political centralization and dissolution in complexstate. chiefdoms in western Venezuela in Chapter 7. They

Bacus (Chapter 5) investigates elite control of take a macroregional view to investigate oscillationsforeign and local craft goods in the Dumaguete polity of two polities, one centered at El Gavan and thelocated in southeastern Negros Island, Philippines, other at El Cedral. Results of survey and excavationEthnohistoric and previous archaeological evidence indicate that El Gavan arose (ca. A.D. 500) as asuggests that control over the economy was important regional center approximately two centuries earlierto political authority in protohistoric Philippine than El Cedral, though they were contemporaries forpolities. Drawing upon tributary, prestige goods and a period of time. The El Cedral polity appears towealth finance models, she analyzes ll l h to 16th have been greater in scale and political might duringcentury archaeological data to examine changes in its peak than the El Gav£n polity. The former'sthe production, distribution and use of craft goods, regional center was larger, had grander public works,

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was connected by causeways to secondary centers, may, in part, explain why there is evidence forbut not to villages that were packed-in around the monumental architecture without the "usual"center, and was adjacent to agricultural fields that accompanying dense settlement in the humid tropicalappear to have produced greater surplus. El Cedral regions of Southeast Asia. Miksic's analysis of themay thus have developed out of the consolidation of 14th century urban site of Trowulan in eastern Javapreviously autonomous chiefdoms as part of the suggests its inhabitants were able to overcome thecycling process of chiefly polities. problems of potable water through digging wells and

Allen (Chapter 8) investigates changes in the the use of water features originally designed forpolitical and economic structures of the Kedah polity ceremonial use.(ca. A.D. 700-1500) located in peninsular Malaysia. In Chapter 11, Graham outlines an approach thatUsing archaeological, historical and environmental she suggests allows a better understanding ofevidence, she argues that Kedah was a state that complex societies in the humid tropics, specificallydeveloped primarily as a result of the structures and of the Maya, than one based on cultural evolutionism,hierarchy required for redistributive exchange. State Both historical and evolutionary approaches areformation processes in coastal Malaysia (and possibly important to understanding complex polities in thesein other coastal areas of Southeast Asia) thus contrast environments, and she further suggests thatwith those of agrarian-based states such as Angkor environment be examined as a factor in people'sand Jawa. Kedah's economic relations were not all decision-making about their daily lives. Thus,hierarchical though, and Allen suggests that its Graham redefines urbanism, and offers newexchanges with interior forest groups and some trade interpretations of and strategies for investigatingrelations with China, India, the Middle East and other Maya settlements and urban densities. These areSoutheast Asia polities were heterarchical. Finally, based on a consideration of how a humid tropicalAllen links the decline of Kedah as a trade state to environment affects, for example, building form,environmental changes in its landscape, specifically, repair cycles, agricultural strategies and engineering,to coastal progradation that isolated the center from She argues that a focus on roofed and walled spacesthe marine and riverine transportation routes that were underestimates the actual densities of occupation andessential to its economy. use in Maya cities, and suggests that such green cities

In Chapter 9, Mclntosh examines the various represent an alternative urban pathway,ways that specialization, trade, population The final chapter (Chapter 12) by Helmsheterogeneity and urbanism developed apart from comments on the foregoing papers, identifyingstratification and centralization in West Africa. She several related themes. The first theme, brought outcompares the development of iron-using societies in in several papers, is a caution against viewing thedifferent floodplain environments—Inland Niger tropics as a unified setting. At the same time, HelmsDelta and Middle Senegal Valley—during the first points out that several authors discuss distinctivemillennium A.D. Differences in environment, crops environmentally-related conditions that may haveand risk-buffering strategies may account for the particular salience for the tropics, such as the qualitydifferent developmental trajectories in these two and quantity of water. Expanding on various papers'areas. Nonetheless, Mclntosh suggests the polities— discussions of elite ties with supernatural powers,Jenne-jeno and Takrur—that developed in each area Helms concludes with a consideration of the naturewere heterarchical in their political structure. Her of the underlying concepts that inform aristocraticchapter offers an alternative perspective from that of legitimacy. At the core of this is elite identificationthe majority of studies of complexity which focus with, and acceptance as, cosmologic ally other beings,on vertical hierarchies. and their ability to manifest association with

Miksic (Chapter 10) presents an explanation for cosmological origins (see Helms 1998).the late development of urbanism in Java, an islandlocated in the humid tropical zone. Tropical settings CROSSCUTTING ISSUESmay be less amenable to dense settlement becauseof the problem ofpotable water; water-borne diseases Beyond a shared location in tropicalpose a major threat to both people and animals. This environments, there are several issues that crosscut

Elisabeth A. Bacus and Lisa J. Lucero

these studies of complex polities. These include theeffects of various tropical conditions on thedevelopment and organization of complex society,heterarchical systems, control of resources and labor,prestige economies, and political ideology. As such,these studies contribute to theoretical issuesconcerning the formation and structure of complexpolities, which we return to in the concludingremarks.

Tropical Conditions

Several papers consider conditions of tropicalenvironments that affected the trajectories of complexpolities in lowland Central America, South America,Southeast Asia and Africa. They also consider theheterogeneity of tropical environments. For example,Graham (Chapter 11) distinguishes between OldWorld and New World tropics in regards todifferences in the co-evolution of humans, diseasesand parasites; these reflect the longer period of humanevolution in the Old World. She suggests this mayhave positively affected health and sanitationconditions in the New World, and consequentlyaffected the population densities that could besupported over the long term.

Extensive tropical forest may have preventedor hindered the development of centralized andstratified types of complex polities. Roosevelt(Chapter 2) suggests this was the case in the AmazonBasin since such areas could serve as a refuge forthose unwilling to submit to coercive politicalauthority.

In the semi-arid tropics of West Africa,Mclntosh (Chapter 9) suggests that differences in thedistribution of critical resources, such as levees forstock during flood season and appropriate agriculturallands, were factors responsible for differences in thegrowth and changes seen in the social organization,specialization and nucleation of the complex politiesin the Middle Senegal Valley and Inland Niger Delta.

Problems of water, according to Miksic (Chapter10), discouraged urban living in the equatorial tropics,specifically in Java. Counterintuitively, water—ininsufficient quantities or of poor quality—can be aproblem in the tropics (see also Lucero, this volume).While flowing water is safe, standing water can breedmany types of diseases, parasites and insects thataffect the health and living conditions of humans, as

well as the survival of livestock, in theseenvironments. Disease was also a problem in westernUganda, particularly for women, as Robertshawdiscusses in Chapter 4.

Heterarchy in Tropical Polities

While the focus on complex polities in thisvolume denotes interest in hierarchies of power, thechapters by Roosevelt, Allen and Mclntosh alsoexplore heterarchical relations. Heterarchy, definedby Crumley (1995:3) as "the relation of elements toone another when they are unranked or when theypossess the potential for being ranked in a numberof different ways," is a concept of recentarchaeological interest (see e.g., Ehrenreich et al.1995;Rautman 1998).

Roosevelt (Chapter 2) considers heterarchy asan alternative to cultural ecological explanations ofAmazonian societies. New evidence from thePolychrome Horizon of Marajo Island suggestsuncentralized societies though ones that accord withthe expectations of one of her three forms of complexsociety—graded ranking. She argues that non-hierarchical organization (i.e., uncentralized andunstratified) characterized the Amazonian complexsocieties that produced massive earthworks and large,elaborate artworks into late prehistoric times.

Allen's and Mclntosh's chapters contribute toour understanding of heterarchical economic andpolitical relations, respectively, within complexpolities. Allen (Chapter 8) proposes that anheterarchical economic system involving unrankedinteractions with inland forest collectors, ahierarchical internal collection and redistributionsystem, and peer-polity relations with foreign statesled to the development of the Kedah state. Herchapter illustrates how "heterarchy cannot only co-exist with hierarchies of control but actuallystrengthen inequality and dominance" (Brumfiel1995:129). Of specific relevance to Southeast Asia,Allen offers an alternative to the more generallyaccepted view of coastal-interior exchange as basedexclusively on hierarchical political relations.

Mclntosh (Chapter 9), drawing on historical andethnographic examples of heterarchies of power inWest Africa, proposes a non-hierarchical model forJenne-jeno's political organization. Insfead^pf acentralized political system, sh£y>i Tgests | |in<yeno

Issues in the Archaeology of Tropical Polities

had heterarchical sources of power distributed amongdifferent segments of society, possibly akin to theYako of southeastern Nigeria who had associationsthat exercised ritual or secular authority over all orpart of the population. Heterarchical principles mayhave also characterized the political structure of theTakrur polity with power possibly shared amongstallied "land chiefs" of supralocal territorial units. Ofmore general significance, Mclntosh's West Africancases suggest that political heterarchies may beassociated with both the presence and absence ofsettlement hierarchies.

These three chapters add to the currently limitedliterature investigating heterarchical relations intropical societies. This is particularly the case forOld World archaeological studies where White's(1995) study of horizontal differentiation in economicand social organization in Thailand during the firstand second millennium B.C., and R. Mclntosh's(1998) studies of the emergence of cities andterritorial polities in the Middle Niger using thisconcept, are the only previous examples (see alsoMclntosh 1999).

Control of Resources and Labor

Control over resources (both natural anddomesticated) and of labor enables the elite to acquiregoods and services from people in exchange forproviding access to resources. This is an issue centralto several chapters, and indicates their relevance totheories of political development that emphasize suchelite control (e.g., Earle 1997; Gilman 1981).

Lucero (Chapter 3) argues that it was the elitemanagement and control of water resources, and notof agricultural land, that led to the development oflarge southern Maya lowland Classic polities. Waterwas a critical resource which elites used to drawlaborers, who in return, provided them with goodsand services. In contrast, Robertshaw's (Chapter 4)model of political developments in Buganda andBunyoro proposes elite control over labor as key tothis process. To attract needed followers (particularlywomen) required the elite to control resources.Differences in degree of centralization of Buganda(more) and Bunyoro (less) resulted in part fromdifferences in types of, access to, and control ofparticular resources and trade routes.

Control of trade was likewise central to the

Kedah state discussed by Allen (Chapter 8). Thistrade though was dependent upon forest productswhich were obtained through nonhierarchicalexchange relations with interior groups. ThoughKedah's rulers did not control direct access to theseresources, they did control the smaller centers andsettlements along their rivers which passed the forestproducts to Kedah's center on the coast.

Control of agricultural resources and domesticanimals created changes within and among politiesin Hawai'i and western Venezuela. In Hawai'i, chiefsowned certain food resources such as fields forintensive taro agriculture and fish ponds. Kolb(Chapter 6) documents the transformation ofdomestic pigs from a staple food into an elite-controlled status item in Maui polities. Concomitantwith an increasing demand for pigs, to be used inceremonial sacrifice, was an increase in politicalcentralization and expansion of the chiefly hierarchy.

Differences in the amount of agricultural landcontrolled by the ruling elite of the El Gavan and ElCedral polities contributed to differences in the extentof their respective political power. Both relied onintensive maize agriculture using drained fields withcanals and ditches, with calzadas (causeways) linkingfields to each center. El Cedral's center though wasadjacent to agricultural lands and controlled a largerextent of fertile land. Its access to greater surplusthus enabled the formation of a larger scale polity(its center was four times the size of El Gavan's)exhibiting greater regional power.

Prestige Economies in the Tropics

Items of wealth and prestige have been positedas central in the development of complex polities andin the financing of their political economies (e.g.,Brumfiel and Earle 1987; Earle 1997; Frankensteinand Rowlands 1978). Elite control of such goodsplays an important role in the dynamics of severalpolities discussed in this volume, particularlyBunyoro and Buganda, Kedah, Dumaguete, and ElGavan and El Cedral. The chapters highlight thesignificance of prestige goods economies to tropicalpolities, and thus similar processes of complexsociety formation as in temperate regions.

Allen (Chapter 8) suggests that elite control ofinternal, riverine exchange in forest products andexternal, maritime trade at its port was central to the

8 Elisabeth A. Bacus and Lisa J. Lucero

development of the Kedah state. Foreign tradebrought various prestige and wealth goods fromthroughout South, East and Southeast Asia and theMiddle East. Kedah's successful control of trade,which required moving the political and economiccenter several times due to infilling of streamsnecessary for conducting internal exchange, enabledit to maintain its later traditional independence anddelay British colonial control until the early 20th

century. East and mainland Southeast Asian goodswere also central to the political economy of theDumaguete and other Visayan polities in thePhilippine archipelago (Chapter 5). Bacus suggeststhat access to these foreign goods was necessary toVisayan chiefs' manifestation of political authority.While their political value was apparently similaramong the polities, that of local prestige goodsappears to have differed. Furthermore, over time,the distributions of several types of wealth itemschanged, suggesting their changing political uses byVisayan elite.

Similarly, prestige goods exchange linked theEl Gavan regional elite in the Venezuelan llanos withdistant paramount rulers in the Andes, as well as withthe local elite (Chapter 7). Redmond, Gasson andSpencer further suggest that the competitive dynamicbetween El Gavan's and El Cedral's elites involvedaccess to exotic goods.

In a different vein, Kolb's study (Chapter 6, anddiscussed in more detail below) of Maui politiesillustrates the elite transformation of a Hawai'ian foodstaple into a prestige item. This occurred within apolitical economy that had few crafted wealth items.

In Buganda and Bunyoro, Robertshaw (Chapter4) suggests monopoly of trade in various prestigeobjects was a strategy the elite used to attract andretain followers. Interestingly, as states developedin this region, their system of finance appears to havechanged from one based on wealth to one based onstaples. In contrast to these East African polities,control of prestige items does not appear to haveplayed a significant role in complex societydevelopment in West Africa (Chapter 9). Althoughexchange in metals is documented from A.D. 500and iron-smiths appear to have been installed atJenne-jeno, Mclntosh suggests that the elite were notcontrolling a prestige-goods based economy.Interestingly though, in the Middle Senegal Valley,there appears to be a correlation between significant

growth in settlement size and trade in exotica afterA.D. 900.

Political Ideology

Political ideologies can serve to integrate andunify diverse groups of people, as well as todifferentiate groups, often through ceremony.Ideologies representing the views of a few are key tothe success of any interest group, especially thepolitical elite, who need to legitimize their differentialaccess to resources and wealth, as well as the tributeand services they obtain from commoners. Kolb(Chapter 6) argues that Maui chiefs transformed thecultural value of a staple food, domesticated pigs,into an elite item which they used in feasts. Thesefeasts provided chiefs a means to display theireconomic and ideological power, as well as topromote solidarity between chiefs and commoners.Simultaneously, the restriction of pig consumptionto the elite distinguished them from commoners.

Expanding the discussion of the importance ofobjects imbued with political value, Bacus (Chapter5) suggests that in the Visayas, as elsewhere inSoutheast Asia, political power is best understood as"potency" that leaders exhibit, as opposed to powerthat is exercised over others. Visayan elites exhibitedpotency through control of foreign and local craftitems. This enabled the elite to attract followers andlaborers who were short in supply. Bacus thussuggests that it is not possible to understand fullythe political economy of Visayan polities without anappreciation of political ideology.

The explicit association of the elite withfounding ancestors provides them with a powerfullegitimizing tool (Helms, this volume; Helms 1998).While Maya leaders were closely connected tofounding ancestors, who themselves were associatedwith deities, Lucero (Chapter 3) suggests the Mayarulers ofthe Late Preclassic and Early Classic periodsattained power through associating and managingwater, a vital element of life. They did so in areaslacking permanent surface water where watermanagement was critical, and attracted followers byappropriating water rituals and symbols, especiallythe waterlily, that signified the elite could providepotable water during the dry season.

Issues in the Archaeology of Tropical Polities

CONCLUDING REMARKS

To conclude our introduction to the papers inthis volume, we wish to highlight severalcontributions these studies empirically,methodologically and theoretically offer to theanthropological archaeology of complex polities,especially those situated in tropical environments.Many of the contributions, however, are relevant notonly to "tropical polities." As several authorsexplicitly point out or imply, even though tropicaland temperate environments differ, there are alsosimilar processes in complex societies.

In their respective studies of the formation,organization and transformation of complex polities,the authors draw on and contribute new data to thecomparative study of complex society. This isparticularly noteworthy given many of the areas aregenerally not incorporated into comparative studies,such as the Malay Peninsula, Java and the centralPhilippine Islands; Senegal, Mali and westernUganda in Africa; and the Venezuelan llanos of SouthAmerica. These studies further offer newinterpretations of political economy and authority inthe Dumaguete polity, of political cycling betweenthe El Cedral and El Gav£n chiefdoms, of thedevelopment and structure of the Kedah state, ofurban development in Java, of complex societydevelopment in West Africa, and state formation inEast Africa. For those better known areas, such asHawai'i, lowland Central America and the AmazonBasin, the authors also offer new views on thedevelopment of the Classic Maya, of Maya cities, ofthe forms of complex society in the Amazon Basin,and of chiefly ideology in Maui.

Several authors contribute to new perspectivesfor understanding the development and structure ofcomplex polities. The concept(s) of heterarchy areused to investigate and interpret the development andstructure of West African, Malay and Amazoniancomplex polities. At the same time, these case studiesprovide new empirical examples of heterarchicalrelations. Other authors highlight insights that canbe gained from other disciplines. Tropical medicineand water pollution studies in civil engineeringinform the interpretations of political and spatialchange in complex polities in Java and central Mayalowlands, respectively. Several also contribute to the

rethinking of assumptions about tropicalenvironments (e.g., their homogeneity) and of themethodological approaches needed to investigateissues such as urbanism in the tropics. Many of thestudies are also examples of how ethnographic,historic, ethnohistoric and textual sources may beintegrated with archaeological data in critical waysto inform interpretations and models.

Finally, the papers contribute to anthropologicaltheories of complex society, includingreconceptualizating its forms to include ones notdefined solely on hierarchical differentiation, andredefining concepts so as to be relevant to tropicalconditions. Among the contributions is a new modelof complex society formation centered aroundemerging leaders' need to attract laborers. Whileproposed specifically for the Great Lakes region ofEast Africa, it is also relevant to understanding state-gender hierarchy relations; it builds from historicaland other evidence to place the ruler's control ofwomen producers as central to state formation.

Several authors draw upon a number oftheoretical frameworks. In doing so, they presentproductive integrations of, for example, aspects ofprevious "adaptationist" models (e.g., resourcemanagement) with more recent ideologicalexplanations and heterarchical perspectives ofcomplex society. Many authors draw on recentpolitical approaches. Several contribute tounderstanding the dynamic interrelations of politicaleconomy and ideology. Among these is areconceptualization of the economic foundations ofideological control to include staple finance systemsand not only wealth-based economies. Othersdocument, as well as reveal, some of the ideologicaland economic factors underlying the instability ofcomplex polities.

Significantly, these studies also elucidatepolitical processes in complex societies, includingthe strategies used by emerging leaders and the rulingelite to acquire and maintain political authority. Theseinvolved control over some aspect of the economy,such as trade, critical resources, or wealth. Tropicalenvironments, though, possess unique features andconstraints that consequently structured elitestrategies to control the economy. Some tropicalregions have highly spatially varied resources whichprovided different subsistence and settlement options(e.g., dispersed farmsteads). The presence of large

10 Elisabeth A. Bacus and Lisa J. Lucero

expanses of tropical forests also created politicalrefuges; people could flee to such landscapes to avoidfunding—via tribute payments, labor demands,conscription—the careers of ambitious elite. In somecases, this situation was offset by the elite's use ofcentripetal strategies, such as rituals that exhibitedtheir cosmological ties, to create commoner supportof their centralized rulership; or by the developmentof heterarchical political systems.

The papers in Complex Polities in the AncientTropical World offer new, comparative data andinsights on the conditions under which bothhierarchical and heterarchical political systemsdeveloped in the tropics. Thus,, we hope this volumecontributes to the anthropological understanding ofthe full diversity of past complex polities.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS .

We wish to thank Jane Allen, Jay K. Johnsonand William H. Walker for reading and providing,under rushed conditions, very useful comments onthis chapter. We again wish to thank the contributorsto this volume for giving us many stimulating ideasabout tropical environments and complex society.

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