Beyond identifying elites: Feasting as a means to understand early Middle Formative society on the Pacific Coast of Mexico

Feasts provide a public forum where social statuses can be affirmed or challenged among pre-state societies. Documenting feasting behavior thus provides insight into the construction of prehistoric political power. This paper presents expected material patterns of feasting by focusing on intra-site variability in food preparation, presentation, and consumption. Expectations are evaluated by comparing ceramic, ground stone, obsidian, and faunal data recovered from Conchas phase (900-800 BCE) elite and village midden deposits at Cuauhtemoc in the Soconusco region of southern Mexico. I argue that elite feasting at Cuauhtemoc created political cohesion between elite and non-elite segments of society during the Conchas phase as a new polity emerged that was more socially stratified and politically hierarchical than anything previously known in the region. (c) 2006 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.