has been true the soil and the narrownessof the strips

S _ _ _ _ _ _

12 November1971 Volume 174 Number4010 CI-E; NCE

Xochimilco-Chalcodistrict was unques-

tionably acknowledged to be the core
area of chinampahorticulture.
The pattern and procedure for the
laying of these plots, and the essentials
Gardenson SwamIpS of the farming system, are outlined in
the following excerpts froxn 16th-cen-
tury reports: "they make garden plots
Archeologicalresearchverifies historicalcSata @o . carrying in canoes sod cut in the
mainland, to heap it up in shallow
on Aztec land reclamationin the Valley of MexlCO. waters, thus forming ridges from 3 to
4 varaswide [about2.52 to 3.36 meters]
and raised half a vara above the water
Pedro Arm llas a farm has many of these ridgess and
the farIners circulate in their canoes
between thems to tend the crops" (2);
"these plots are . e * built upon the
A system of shallow lacustrinebasins witnesses of native land-reclamation
] water by heaping sod from land and
forms -the floor of the mountain-girt methods. The results ofEthe researchon mud from the lagoon, forming very
plateau known as the Valley of Mexico. this ancient farming syrstemare impor- narrow strips . . . separated by canals
This was the heartland of the Aztec tant in retrospectivestudies of demog- and, as these gardens are raisedlless
empire.At the time of the Spanishcon- raphy and political economy; their than a vara above the water, even with-
quest In 1521, the Aztec capital city Te- broader significance can be seen in out rainfall they bear vigorous maize,
nochtitlanstood on an island in an em- terms of cultural ecology. sustained by the moisture provided by
bayment of Lake Tezcoco (F;g. I). To the lagoon"; ands "they set maize-seed-
the south, and screened by a range of beds on the chinampas and they trans-
volcanic cones, extends a subdivision The Chinampas plant the seedlings, which is a thing
of the valley, the XochimilcoChalco peculiar to that country" (3). Seedlings
Basin. The bottom of this basin enconz- The natives' methoc Ss ol expanding were also started on floating founda-
passes about 200 square kilometers of farinland over swamps , and lagoons in tions, according to another witness.
flats. Until 70 years ago, when the conzw the Valley of Mexico were described These movable nurseries were "20 to
pletion of drainage works caused the by a number of early Spanish
' C:olonial
30 feet long [about 6 to 9 meters] axld
desiccation of most of the area, a con- writers from the 16th century onward. as broad as the farnzer deelns conven-
tinuous tract of marshes, swamps, and In freshwater lagoons,, wrote one of ient, laid on rush, cattail, and sward;
lagoons extendedon these bottomsfrom them, the Indians "wit]hout much trou- OI1these they set seedbeds for vege-
the eastern head of the basin to the ble plant and harvest their maize and tables which are to be transplanted
natural outlet that led into Lake greens, for all over are ridges called laterq and they tow them with ropes
Tezcoco through the narrows situated chinampas;these are strips built above from one place to another within the
betweenCulhuacanand Huitzilopochco. water and surroundedtty ditches, which lagoon" (4). Parenthetically,the legend
Since pre-Columbian times, garden obviates watering"(1). Late in the 16th of the so-called Montezuma's floating
plots raised above water -have been century, after the disruption caLusedby gardens (which induced the Egment
built on these swamps. My recent in- the razing of Tenoc: htitlan and the that Aztec horticulturewas waterborne
vestigation, based on the interpretation changes in hydrograph vydue to clumsy and that latter-day chinampas were
of aerial photographs and the inspec- rol, these garden
attelnpts at flood contI grounded derelicts) appears to have
tion on the ground of traces of the old plots were still farmes d by Indians sn arisen through errors of observation
field system, has revealed that the ex- the outlying wards of Mexico
] City, themade by some witnesses who mistook
tent of the raised plots in the Xochim- Spanish town rebuilt over the rubble the movable nurseries for the farm
ilco-Chalco Basin was much greater in of the destroyed Aztec < capitaL Within plots.
the Aztec period than had been recog- the saine embaymentof Lake 'lzezcoco, As these reportsmake clear, the lay-
nized (Fig. 2). Also, archeological evi- other areas of chinz ampas extended out of the chinampas was designed to
dence has been obtained to substantiate around island settlemeInts, such as Izta-capture moisturesStanding water is es-
the descriptions left by 16th-century calco; and off the shore of the main sential for the operation of the system.
land, at Huitzilopochccz and Iztapalapa. In these artificialisletsSthe porosity of
The author is professor of anthropology at the
State University of New York at Stony Brook, But at that times as
Stony Brook :11790, since before the Spaniish conquest, the allows seepage from the surrounding
12 NOVEMBER 1971 653

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 Causeways t-tH Fl I

canals to keep the soil perpetuallymoist ers sustained the fertility of the soil by TheoreticalUnderpinnings
where it counts most, at root level. mucking and manuring, as their de-
Permanent irrigation by seepage per scendants still do today. The words for The investigation of pre-Columbian
mits continuouscultivationon the plotss farming practices listed in the 16th- undertakingsin swamp reclamation in
even through the dry season of the century dictionaries of the native the Xochimilco-ChalcoBasin was con-
year (Fig. 3). (Nahuatl) larlguage, as well as refer- ceived as an integral part o a more
The practice of planting in seedbeds- caces by contenzporarywitnesses, indi- comprehensive research project: the
saves spaceSsince the seedlings can be cate that muckirlg(scooping rom the study of man's role in shapingthe land-
planted in a little corner of the plot, or surroundingcaxlalstnud rich ill organic scape in the Valley of Mexico through
in the armerssbackyard, or on the nutrients ad- spreading it over the the 2000 years preceding the Spanish
rafts used ill earlier times; it also im- c:hinampa)and rnamlring(with a com- conquest ;(roughly 500 B.C. to A.D.
proves crop yield, since only healthy post that ;ncluded aquatic weeds and, 1500). This study can shed light on
sprigs are trarlsplanted.The seeding is probably, night .soil too) were common the relations between the growth of
timed so that the shoots are ready for practices ill Aztec hxnes(5) civilization and the developmentof re-
transplantingimmediatelyaterthe pre- Plot building orl swamps permarlent sources (and vice versa) in the region
vious crop has been harvestedeThus irrigation, the use of REertilizers pro that b&camethe :hearthof the Aztec
the ertile soil is kept in an intensive dllced by the ecosysteln, and plant;ng empire.
cycle o przduction. ln seedbeds (to intensify the cycle of
My project was designed within the
To keep the plots under continuous production)were enmeshed in the sys-
conceptual framework of landscape
cultivation, the ancient chinampafarm tem of chinampa hertlculturev archeology, which is a relatively new
discipline pioneered by British archeol
egists. The study o ancierlt cultural
99o oo
larldscapes involves the investigatlon Qf
a11man-made features related to what
geographers call the organization Qf
space. The basic tenet of landscape
archeology is thats through the integra-
tion of the data on the features of land
use that characterized a man-shaped
habitat (;ncluding settlement, field sys-
tems md hydraulic works, as wel} as
the layout of the web of trackways,
-causeways, and waterways that ltnked
the componentsof the regiona}system),
one can perceive the culturallandscape
as a reflectionof the interplaybetween
the environment and the techno}ogy,
structure,and values of the society that
shaped it.
Such a study transcends the ltmtta-
tions imposed by the traditiona} ap-
* TE7COCO proach to 4;sites?as discreteursits;these
units are often conceptuilized as the
largest definableentities fit for archeo-
logical researche Alsoa although their
C Coat/inchan subject matter overlapsXlandscape ar-
cheology and studies of settlementpat-
terns diSer in scope, the former being
the broader the latter oftenbeing lim-
ited (although not by the best practi-
tionersof the art) to analysisof internal
structureX functioIlaldiSerentiatton,and
* lzfapa1uca size and spatlal distribution of towns
and villages. The twist that gives mean-
ing to the term landscape archeologyis
owvvottt"' w ,/co the emphasis it places on the study of
civilizationssimprinton the countryside
the modificatiorlsof the natural en
vironment through man's constructive
o o $ and exploitative activities. Finally, in
lo

contrast to environmental archeology,

.._*-- Oflts K I L O ET R M g s
which tends to focus upon the natural
__

aspects of the habitat, the-emphasis of

fFigv1a Lake areas arld main towrs in the Valley of Mexico aroulld A.D. 15()0a landscapearcheologyis on man'sworks
SC IENGE, VOLr
6541$
174

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 ; C<xuseweap 0 ? 0 f fl; E

to reshape the physical environmentin Aerial Views, Old Maps, and Footwork detail in more recent aerial photos of
terms of his cultural desiderata.Never- the less disturbedsections.
theless, it is obvious that the two sub- Methodologically, the archeological A mosaic at the scale of 1: 25,000
disciplines are complementaryand that investigation of a cultural landscape provides an overview of the whole
the features distinguishingthem depend begins with the interpretationof aerial Xochimilco-Chalco Basin. One can
on their different perspectives on a photographs. The view from the air trace on this picture the old shorelines
common subject the study of the in- reveals the faded outlines of many fea- and the cobwebof through-trafficwater-
terrelationships between culture and tures of the old landscapes marks that ways that formed the arterialsystem of
environment. are often hardly perceptible at ground regional transportation.It was used as
Because of unending reshaping, the level. Also, by virtue of its synoptic the base map on which were plotted
landscape in areas of old civilizations character, the aerial map discloses the details of the ancient pattern of land
can be pictured as a sort of palimpsest relationsamong the componentparts of use taken from larger-scale pictures.
on which the marks of man's efforts to the intricatepatchworkthat constitutes Also, most of the area included in my
change the natural environment are the living landscape,and it affordsclues survey is covered by sectional photo-
continually being erased and rewritten, for interpretingthese features in terms maps at the scale of 1:1 0,000. This
and quite often smudged (6). It is the of their historicaldevelopment.I started scale proved adequate not only for
task of the landscape archeologist to by scrutinizing a large number of identifying the marks of the grid of
map these marks, to date the features, aerial maps and sets of stereographs feeder canals that crisscrossedthe zones
and to discern the fllnctional and his- produced commercially by the Com- of chinampas and divided them into
torical relationships among them. The pania Mexicana de Aerofoto. The ear- blocks of parallel plot-and-ditch sets,
goal of these endeavors is to attain liest of these pictureswere taken in the but even for counting ridges on each
a comprehensive view of the man- late 1930's. They are now historical block. In addition, the advantage of
made environment of a particular documents of exceptional importance photographstaken at a low altitudewas
period and to trace the evolution of the because, since the late l950's, the oblit- tested on a 4-square-kilometer area
landscape its genesis and its fading eration of vestiges of the ancient northeast of Xochimilco (the area was
away as a result of mismanagement, cultural landscape has been rapidly chosen after having been explored on
the impact of new technologies, or accelerated by construction and deep foot and photographedfor my project
changing cultural demands upon the plowing. However, traces of the old by Compania Mexicana de Aerofoto).
environment. chinampa system -are shown in rich On these photographs, the outlines

a C * e EsJfes'
i'_ a.2 nX*t3
g
Mf > .:>

Terec*7E , / Sa D!

A / t2/Jq pets
tts9. >r.:P4 y< <
a Z9 J9.as
{t.#wRt .

:t R.ALM#Ca J
S :,,744E, . 1

\.Se

ZEPEPAS

XOCff/tM:oX X * _ _
b ;+ x<s
- tSs!b;

0frsE
omv
<ell5sSsv
hs e * k 3 * s

9,.ot.,sB

B R L a a 4 T t * $

>f XOCf#MALCCHALQ SAS/N :: : :;

s -: -Jfs*e @ etevoten 224O meters obovesealeve} * ; ; ;4 v ; \

wExtont chnompos

Forrrer chinompas z No doto < _SOTSf.vffiiO i

:

_Extont conoNs : . +.

-+-OX coml treces -oo *-5* 0

Fig. 2. Map of the XochimilcoXhalco lacustrine basin, showing the extent of ancient swamp reclamation and the remnants of
chinampas cultivated in recent times. Some of the blank zones coincide with the location of old lagoons; in other sections, lack
of data may be due to erasure of the evidence. Sections of the extant canals seem to have been realigned during the l9th century.
(Abbreviations: C, cerro; V, volcan.)
12 NOVEMBER 1971 655

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of the ancient field system are shown Xochimilco-C:halcoBasin at the time of the area. Obviously the information
as shadow marks on ground that has of the Spanish conquest. The best on water depths is important in my
not been completely leveled by plow- mid-16th-century general chart of the study. It is noteworthy that the distri-
ingl(Fig. 4). Also, the parallax allows Valley of Mexico (the pictorial map bution of ghosts of ancient chinampas
one to see on the stereographs the preservedat the University of Uppsala) on aerial photographs corresponds to
relief of the ridges formed by eroded portrays the tract of marshes and the the swamp zone representedon these
chinampa strips, the low mounds layout of the main canals across them, 18th- and l9th-century maps, but such
where the farmhouses stood, and the as well as the island-towns and the marks are missing on the old beds of
shallow grooves that reveal the causeways that linked Cuitlahuac to major lagoons where deeper water pre-
clogged ruts of old canals. Of course, the mainland-but it does not depict cluded the building of raised plots.
only weed marks produced by the the garden plots. The gross acreage of The indicationsof past land use that
differential growth of plants on the chinampasdoes not seem to have been one spots on the aerial photographs
former plot and along the ditches-can delimited on maps until the l9th cen- have to be identifiedand dated through
be seen on repeatedlyplowed surfaces; tury, long after the upsetting of the the field survey, which must be per-
but it is in these sections that the ecosystem had reduced the areas of formedon foot-one missesthe "ground
palimpsest effect created by the over- chinampa horticultureto a fraction of truth" when riding in a jeep. Walking
laying of present field boundaries on their peak size. Nevertheless,the search over the surface of old chinampas,one
the old chinampagrid is most strikingly through old maps produced important can feel, through the soles of one's
shown by aerial photography (Fig. 5). information about hydrologic condi- boots, revealing differencesin soil tex-
Even without enlargement,the scale of tions before they were changed by arti- ture or the slight undulations of the
the contact prints (approximately 1: ficial drainingof the basin. ground. This is pedestrian archeology,
5000) allows delimitation of separate In several maps drafted during the but it works. On ground that has never
farm units, throughcorrelationbetween 18th and 19th centuries, the areas of been plowed, the raised strips of for-
icolated farmsteads and blocks of standing water within the zone of mer chinampas can be seen to form
chinampa strips, and makes it possible swamps were clearly demarcated. A parallel ridges that simulate a huge
to measure with reasonable accuracy comparison among different versions washboard, but in most places the
the size of the landholdings. made over a 120-year period shows ridges eroded or have been completely
Old maps were consulted too, but general agreementas to extent and lo- flattenediby plowing after the area has
none of the early ones helps to plot the cation of the pools; these were perma- become desiccated (Fig. 6). In general,
extent of swamp reclamation in the nent Ceaturesdetermined by the relief the ghosts of the chinampas are out-
lined by rows of hydrophilic weeds,
which thrive along the filled ditches
between chinampas,or they may show
as soil or moisture marks (depending
on the season in which they are
observed).

SwampDwellersin the
Perspectiveof Time
Although lakeside settlements were
numerous and important, it appears
that in Aztec times a pluralityof chin-
ampa tillers dwelt in the middle of the
swamps, rather than on the shore of
the mainland.The island-townsof Miz-
quic, Cuitlahuac,and Xochimilco were
mentioned by Cortes in his letters to
Emperor Charles V (7). Mizquic was
"a small town, completely set upon
water," at a distance of "almost two
crossbow shots" from the shore; it had
no walkways to the mainland. Cuitla-
huac {described as "the best-looking
small city we have seen") was placed
in the center of the basin, thus com-
manding waterbornetransport through
the arterial canals along the east-west
axis. It was linked to the shores of the
- - :} l:V:ESiL:L!EtEDE;:::vESEME1iD::
f - - mainland to the north and south by
-4:iL:; 0{<lt .g if;/ i;;0
tiV:
07- 3
causeways that were part of a major
Fig. 3. Chinampa plots at Tlahuac, Federal District, Mexico. Seepage from the sur- land route to Iztapalapaand thence to
rounding canals allows continuous use of the farmland. Tenochtitlan. These causeways still
6s6 SCIENCE, VOL. 174

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stand. Xochimilco was close to the reveal the ghosts of flattened house did excavation in the foundations of
shore, on the outer side of a slough. mounds (which may also be spotted as the man-made island of Cuitlahuac
Cortes alluded to "a broad causeway" soil marks on aerial photographstaken produce any indication of greater an-
and to bridges spanning "all the en- at low altitudes). The fact that these tiquity; as it stands, the limited evi-
trances to the city." These three towns sites are scatteredover most of the for- dence obtained in these test pits dates
are still standing on their old sites, and mer swampzone facilitatesthe determi- the earliest construction yet found
they have adjacentareas of chinampas. nation of the age of the surrounding there to the dawn of the Aztec period.
In addition, the ruins of Xicco rest on chinampas the vestiges can be asso- All told (adding observationsmade all
an apparentlyman-madeplatformabut- ciated with safely datable dwelling over the area in the course of the
ting to an abrupt volcanic hill that places. The samples of domestic pot- ground survey), the data conclusively
formed a natural island in the eastern tery collected on the surface of 50 well- show that the peak of chinampaexpan-
lobe of the basin. Xicco had been an defined house sites were used to this sion was attained during A.D. 1400 to
importantpolitical center, and, accord- end. The sampling units are broadly 1600. The distribution plotted on the
ing to native lore, was the mother city distributed within the swampy basin, map (Fig. 2) representsthe man-shaped
of the founders of Cuitlahuac. and the ceramic assemblagesare quite landscape in Aztec times. In historical
Besides these island-towns,the watery uniform in all of the units: the bulk of percpective,the evidence of the oldest
landscape was dotted with small com- the material unequivocally dates occu- ceramic components in samples from
munities and dispersed farmsteads set pancy to around A.D. 1500. Also, the islet dwellings indicates that this pat-
on artificial foundations amid the time indicatorsshow that the patternof tern of dispersed settlement developed
chinampaplots (8). Nowadays, the sites islet dwelling had spread during the during the cycle of expansion initiated
of ancient islet dwellings are marked span of a few lifetimes. The construc- at the end of the Toltec period (13th
by low platform mounds and heavy tion of these mounds was relatively re- century).
concentrationsof crockery. Where the cent: many of the ceramic lots include Nevertheless, settlement on man-
ground has been leveled by plowing, wares in vogue two or three centuries made isles (presumablysurroundedby
circumscribed deposits of potsherds, before the time of the Spanish con- chinampas)in the middleof the swamps
and, perchance, a scatteringof founda- quest, but nothing definitely older was had remote antecedents in this basin.
tion rocks or lumps of burnt adobe, found in any of these sites (9). Neither This was conclusivelyestablishedas the

Fig. 4. Shadow marks of old chinampas in a still unplowed section to the northeast of Xochimilco; the ridges at the upper left are
shown in Fig. 6 (top). Approximate scale, 1: 5000; the top of the photograph is the southeast. [Aerial photograph taken by Com-
pania Mexicana de Aerofoto]
12 NOVEMBER 1971 657

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result of my 1970 testing at a site lo- Large sites dating from the Teotihua- since it is documented that chinampa
cated in the bottoms to the southwest can and Toltec periods are located on constructionwas going on decades after
of Tlaltenco (10). The site is made up the shores of the mainland and on the the arrival of the Spaniards.However,
of a fair-sizedcluster of dwelling struc- island of Xicco; the townsfolk might this hypothesis must be tested by fur-
tures set on artificial foundations in have farmed nearby chinampas, al- ther archeological investigations and
what was then a shallow embayment though I do not yet have proof that paleolimnologicalresearch.
of the lagoon. The excavation revealed they did so. However that may be, no
that the construction of the isle ante- time markers for these periods were
dated by severalcenturiesthe beginning found in indisputable association with The Setting for Raised Gardens
of the Christianera and that its occu- vestiges of offshore settlement.In view
pation came to an end before the onset of the evidence for an earlierbeginning, The relief of the bottom and the vol-
of the ClassicTeotihuacanperiod(about it would seem that swamp reclamation ume of standingwaterwere the physical
A.D. 1). More precise dating of this receded to a minimum during the long factors that controlled chinampa ex-
site must await processingof the infor- intervalfrom A.D. 1 to 1200; the most pansionin the Xochimilco-ChalcoBasin
mation yielded by the stratitests. An- likely cause of the recessionwas hydro- (12). The bottom of the basin is shaped
other site within the lacustrine basin graphic changes in the basin. I postu- like an exceedinglyshallow saucer. This
might prove to be ancient too, but it is late that the water level rose, resulting even-floored depression is confined by
still untested (11). At any rate, the in the spread and coalescence of stand- a ground rise that forms a low banlc
paucity of remainsdating to pre-Classic ing ponds to form a large lagoon that along most of the circuit; the break-of-
times suggests that the early wave of completely filled the bottom of the slope approximatelycoincides with the
expansioninto swampswas restrictedin basin. This would have restricted the 2240-metercontour line. Only the gen-
scope, being limited to choice locations setting for chinampasto the remaining tle slopes on the eastern shore and a
because of either lack of population marshlandnear the shore. Later on, the limited fringe at the western end are
pressure on resources or dominant reversal of the trend led to the rapid susceptible to flooding by a moderate
physical conditions that were less fa- expansion of reclamation in Aztec rise above this level. The rim of the
vorable for the setting of chinampas times. It seems that optimal conditions high ground is studded with a score of
than those prevailingin Aztec times. obtained through the 16th century, towns and villages. These settlements

Fig. 5. Weedmarksof old chinampasin plowedfields.Notice the parallelalignmentsof marksand the blocksoutlinedby former
service canals at the bottom of the picture.Approximatescale, 1: 5000; the top of the photographis the southeast.[Aerial
photographtaken by CompaniaMexicanade Aerofoto]
658 SCIENCE, VOL. 174

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 a

have been tenantedsince Aztec times or :

before; older sites too, long deserted, i i::<

7.: R

define this ancient shoreline. The per-

sistence of location indicates that, ex-
cept for disastrous flood stages, the
high-water mark has stood close to
the 2240-meter elevation since at
least several centuries before the be-
ginning of the Christianera. Within the
ambit enclosed by the ground rise, the
present elevation of the flats generally
ranges between 2238 and 2239 meters,
although the depths reach 2236 meters
in the area of the old Lagoon of Ayotla
(depicted in 18th- and l9th-century
maps). Admittedly,these figuresmay oe
at variance with past values. Floor lev-
els might have been raised through silt-
ing l(since,for the most part, the zone
was under water until the end of the
l9th century), but, on the other hand,
this effect may have been compensated
for by ground subsidenceafter the des-
iccation of the basin. Be that as it may,
old maps and archeologicalevidence in-
dicate that changes in floor relief
through the last 600 years have been
of minor consequence.
The topographic data clearly show
that a rise in water level above 2240
meters would flood the whole plain,
forming a shallow lake some 180 to
200 square kilometers in size (13); be-
low that mark, large lagoons would be
interspersed among tracts of swamp-
land; a water level under 2238 meters
would reduce the areas of standing wa-
ter to a sizable lagoon (on the deeper
groundto the southwestof Ayotla) and
a numberof scatteredpools. This poses
the question:What environmentalcondi-
tions spurred chinampa expansion in
Axtec times? With this in mind, the
level of the normal high-watermark in
the Aztec period (from the 14th to the
16th centuries) was tested through my
1968 excavations at Tlahuac (ancient
Cuitlahuac). In the test pits that were
dug to investigate the structure of the
man-made island, construction floors
and wall stumps dating from Aztec
times (14) were found at depths which
indicate that the lagoon level in the
rainy season was less than 2238.8
meters (which is the level of the floor
in the lowest dwelling) when building
began there (15). The landfill for the
foundations was piled on an evenly
laid base of cut cattails that rested on
a stratumof mud rich in vegetal matter Fig. 6. Three stages of obliteration of the evidence of old chinampas: (top) well-
- probably marsh sediment 116). The preserved ridges and plowed area, to the right, with parallel alignments of hydrophilic
weeds; (middle) eroded ridges outlined by the vegetation growing on the intervening
cattail carpet is at 2238.4 meters; the ditches; (bottom) leveled ground showing traces of chinampas, largely by means of
ground level for later structures was soil contrast. In all of the pictures, the average width between the canal medians
progressivelyraised by the addition of measures 4.8 meters.
12 NOVEMBER 1971

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landfill, so that the Roor of the latest levels I expect that aerial photography from the places of production to the
pre-Colonialbuilding (in the exeavated with infrared wavelengths (which has docks of the Aztec capital city Te-
area) was laid at 2240.2 meters -(17). not been used yet to survey the ibasin) nochtitlanand her annex Tlatelolco, the
(Caveat:jAlthoughpreeisely determined will reveal enough marks of the grid to site of the central market.
by leveling from a beneh mark on the fill the gaps between Misquic and Xicco In historicalperspective,the creation
mainland, the figures for elevations at alld between Xicco and Tlahuac. of farmland over marshes and lagoons
the time of eonstruettonmust be viewed Whether the systematic allotment of in the Valley of Mexico representsthe
as approximations,owing to the possi- space for chinampaswithin a frame of ultimate developmentof its natural re-
bility that the old lake bed has subsided parallelaxes followed earlier models, or sources through aboriginal technology
beeause of the reeent depletion of the whether the regulating plan represents The high productivityof chinampahor-
aquifers.However that may bevone can an innovation fostered by the changes ticultureconsiderablyenlargedthe basis
safely posit, on the basis of geomor- in political organization that occurred of subsistence of the local population
phological eonsiderations}that the ex- during the 15th century} has not yet This might have been -thebreakthrough
tent of subsidenee has been not more been ascertained. It seems rather im- that finally made this region a key eco-
than 1 meter.) Correlatingall these fig- probableshowever, that a regular lay- nomic area Anyhows the expansion of
ures, and allowing for seasonal and outs extending without major discor- chinampa farming during the 14th and
yearly variationsin the range of 0.8 to dances from end to end o the basins l5th centuries (22) appears to be re-
1.4 meters (18), it follows that the could have resulted from community lated to a substantialincrease in popu-
ehinampas were built on what was agreementsto adjust the coaleseent lo- lation. On the eve of the Spanish con-
swampy ground at the end of the dry eal systems. As I see itS the pattern of questSthis heartland of empire greatly
seasons !(althougha number of large chinampa expansion in Aztec times be- outranged in human resources any
pools and extensierebaekwater areasS tokens control at a higherpolitical level. other center of power within the sphere
eonneeted by a maze of sloughs, were Although the Valley of Mexico in- of Mexican civilization (5 p. 268).
undoubtedlypermanentfeatures of the cluded other prime agriculturaldistrictsS Since the mid 1400's (when unity and
natural landseape, even through the none seems to have matched the pro- stabilitywere achieved under a confed-
driest years). The eorrespondenee be- ductivity of the continuous zone of eral system that brought to an end a
tween the distribution of ehinampa chinampa farming in the Xochimilco- period of conflict between contending
ghosts and the extent of the swamps Chalco Basin. The economic impor- city-states), the rulers of the alliance
shows that the gardell plot builders tance of the districtSin the context of controlled formidable reserves of man-
avoided the deeper waters. the Valley of Mexico as a whole, can power for engaging in military expan-
be gauged with the help of a few fig- sionist adventures, as they did. In this
ures. The gross area of reclaimed light, it can be said that the material
ChiIlampasand Polity swamps,excluding islands, amountedto foundationsfor vAztecimperialismwere
more than 120 square kilometers. Re- establishedby the farmerswho had con-
Considerationof the formal features ducing this Egure sby cone-fourth to quered the swamps.
of the mar-shaped landseape in the account for canals and an indeter-
References and Notes
early lSOO'ssuggests that the late pre minate number of interspersedpools--
Columbian expansion o swamp re- we are left with over 9000 hectares of I. Fr. J. cle Torquemada, Monarqlzza Indiana
(Madrid, 1723), boolc 13, chap. 32.
clamation over the Xoehimileo-Chaleo productive soil built upon natural 2. B. de Vargas Machuca, Milicia y clescripcion
Basin reRectsplanned enterpriserather de las Yndias (Madrid, 1599).
wastes. The yields of this farming sys- 3. Relacio'n breve y verdadera de algJunas cosas
than spontaneous initiative. The eom- tem per unit of tilled land are extreme- de los mlfshas que sllcecSieronal Padre Alonso
prehensive view of traees of ;old ch;- Ponce en las provincias de la Nueva Espana
ly high (21?; according to empirically (Madrid, 1723), book 13, chap. 32.
nampas afforded by the aerial photo- derived Egures on the subsistence po- 4, Fr. H. Ojea, Libro tercero de la hisforia
religiosa de la Provincia de Mexico de IA
maps ineontestably shows that the tential of chirzampahorticulture, the Otder1 de Santo Dolningo (Mexico, 1897), p. 3.
layout of plots was regulated by some zone may have produced enough food 5. P. Armillas, in A History of Land Use in Asid
Regions, L. Dudley Stamp, Ed. (UNESCO,
overall seheme. Generally, the ehinam- to nourish some 100,000 people. Cer- Paris, 1961), pp. 266-267.
pas that ean be dated to Aztec times tainly not all of the output was con- 6. See O. G. S. Crawford, Archaeologry in the
Field (Phoenix House, London, 1953), p. 51.
were built in sets that were arrayed sumed locally; my data on plot sizes Also, I am intellectually indebted to J.
within the reetangularbloeks delimited suggest that over one-half of the food Bradford [Ancient Landscapes (Bell, London,
1957)1 for maIly of the concepts expressed
by the grid of serviee eanals. IDistanees raised on these gardens was available in my formulation. Sttldies in landscape
between the limiting eanals are not uni- archeology are well advanced in several parts
for distributionamong nonfarmingcon- of the Old World; in the New World the
form everywhere, but they fit in pat- sumers There is conclusive historical approach has been pioneered by G. 1t.
terns that indicate some sort of modu- Willey [Prehistoric Settlement lvatterns itt the
evidence that, through tribute and rent, Vxru VaZ,ley, Perzz (Bureau of American
lar system in the allotment of space and throughthe marketsystem, the sur- Eithnology Bulletin No. 155, Smithsonian ln-
(19). A series of parallel alignments of stitution, Washington, D.C., 1953)].
pluses producedin this zone significant- 7. Letters of Cortez: The Five Letters of Rel-
regularly spaced service eanaIs can be ly contributedto the support of urban tion froJtI Hernando Corfes to the Eelperor,
Charles V, translated by F. A. Macnutt
traced from shore to shore all over the life at the empire'shub. The advantages (Putnam, New York, 1908). The references to
XochimiIco seetion of the Ibasin and, of its location for the movementof pro- Mizquic and Cuitlahuac are found in the
second letter written in 1520, Sochimilco is
in less extensive areas, within the Chal- duce to the centers of consumption ac- mentioned in the third letter, written in 1522+
eo lobe. From end to end, the pattern crued to the importance of the zone; 8. See Vargas Machuca (2): "A large number of
Indians dweIl inside the lagoon; they make
is definitely oriented along south-south- waterbornetransportation,through the staked enclosures and fill these with earth to
some height above the water, and built their
west to north-northeastaxes (20). On networkof canals and expansesof open houses on top."
the basis of indicia observed at ground watet provided direct routes by boat 9. Plain kitchenware (including an exceedingly

SCIENCE} VOL. 174

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 large number of earthen griddles, which at- in the test pits at Tlahuac; it flooded houses true around Mizquic, where the layout still
test to generous consumption of tortillas) that were tenanted in the early 1500's and conforms to a basically radiat pattern. The
constitutes the largest percentage of shards caused the collapse of the walls, leaving over lack of regular grid in the surroundings of
found in the debris. The bulk of the decorated the rubble a layer of silt that underlies de- these centers leads me to infer that the peri-
dinnerware belongs to the so-called Aztec posits containing potsherds dated to the 17th island chinampas were built before the adop-
black-on-orange series. Of these, the fine line, century This rise must have reached a tem- tion of the regulating plan. However, some
geometric, "Tenochtitlan" type is present in porary high mark at about 2243 meters, in regular alignments of canal stretches can be
alt of the samples in a significant percentage. view of the evidence (found by inspectors traced across the mazes formed by the sur-
The chronologically overlapping "Tlatelolco" of the Direccion de Monumentos Coloniales) viving chinampas at Xochimilco and at
figurative style occurs in a majority of the of a flood that laid silt deposits above the Tlahuac-which suggests that the present ir-
lots, but it surpasses the frequency of the 16th-century foundations of the parish church regular layout may be partially the result of
"Tenochtitlan" type only in some collection (Architect Luis Ortiz Macedo, personal com- alterations that followed the breakdown of
from large homesites that might have been munication). the system, probably after 1600.
principals' houses. The earlier, cursive, "Tena- 14. This is on the evidence of underlying fill 20. Of course, visual alignment across 5 kilome-
yuca" style appears in token or small amounts containing shards of "Tenochtitlan' black-on- ters of flooded ground will seldom produce
in about three out of four sitesS and the still orange and associated wares. perfect parallels. Over most of the area,
older "Culhuacan" bold line style is concen- t5. The t970 excavations at site 14QMS972324 azimuthal deviations run from 18 to 26
trated in locations close to the shore of showed that, some centuries B.C., the high- clockwise from the astronomic north; the
Xicco Island (this type is rarely found in water mark stood perhaps somewhat highel modal orientation stands close to 22. How-
dispersed homesites). Other fineware asso- than in Aztec times-but certainly below ever, to the north of Xochimilco the devia-
ciated with the Aztec black-on-orange include 2239.8 meters, since house floors were laid tions vary between 12 and 18; and, to the
Aztec polychrome and Chalco polychrome, at this level. west of Xicco, the azimuths of a series of
but the incidence of the latter is relatively 16. Two wooden pegs, found imbedded in the canals run 14 from the true north. Whether
small and spotty. Nothing definitely older landfill, appear to have strengthened this the orientation of the grid was dictated on
than the black-on-orange series was found in structure. the basis of cosmological notions, or whether
any of these sites. On the other hand, a few 17. Several of the layers of landfill, found in it was adjusted to established traffic patterns
Early Colonial glazed shards, a figurine, and the main testing pit under superimposed floors, determined by the natural drainage of the
a glass bead picked up in scattered places contained only potsherds and terra-cotta basin, is a matter of opinion. Certainly, the
attest to the persistence of this pattern of figurines of the Middle Formative peliod (about the general aerial maps show that, in the
dispersed settlement after the Spanish con- 600 to 800 B.C.). Since these deposits central and eastern sections of the basin,
quest-probably until the beginning of the overlaid structures firmly dated at the 14tl the layout of feeder canals runs approxi-
17th century. or the 15th centuries A.D., it is evident that mately perpendicular to the courses of the
10. Site location: 14QMS972324 (Universal Trans- the rubble used to raise the foundations was arterial transport routes, whereas at the
verse Mercator Grid); a range of flattop borrowed from an old abandoned site. A western end it is deflected toward the ola
mounds rising about 2 meters above the sur- Middle Formative site located by J. R. outlets to Lake Tezcoco.
rounding plain. Test excavations at its eastern Parsons (personal communication) at the vil 2l. W. T. Sanders, thesis, Harvard University
end exposed dwelling structures resting on a lage of Tlaltenco, on the mainland to the north, ( 1957).
foundation of large rocks set on swampy might have been the source of the rubble used 22. In addition to the swamps in the Xochimilco-
bottoms. Upright pine logs (driven deep into in Aztec times to build up the island. Chalco Basin, smaller (but considerable)
the lake bed) reinforced in some spots the 18. This is assumed on the basis of recent records sections of Lake Tezcoco and the Lagoon
banks of this man-made island. cf th control station at Xochimilco [see of Xaltocan had been reclaimed for chinampa
t 1. Site location 14QMS997292 (about 1 kilome- Comision Hidrologica de la Cuenca del farming.
ter south of the edge of Tlahuac); a plowed Valle de Mexico, Hidrologia de la Cuenca 23. Field surveys 1965 to 1967 supported by
bulge (about 80 meters in diameter) carpeted del Valle de Mexico (Secretaria de Recursos NSF grant GS-890; test excavations (1968
with potsherds similar to those found in site Hidraulicos, Mexico, D.F., 1964), vol. 6, and 1970), by grants-in-aid from the Wenner-
14QMS972324. pp. 16 and 191]. A large number of his- Gren Fcundation for Anthropological Re-
12. Salinity, which limited the spread in Lake torical documents, including pre-Hispanic an- search. Southern Illinois University (1965)
Tezcoco, does not seem to be of consequence nals, refer to broad-scale fluctuations of the and the University of Chicago (1966 and
here. level of the lakes-fluctuations large enough 1967) contributed research time. I gratefully
13 A high stage began about 1600- it was to drown chinampas, flood island settlements, acknowledge the support of Mexico's Instituto
caused by the blocking of the outlets that and alter the hydrologic balance to the ex- Nacional de Antropologia e Historia; I thanlQ
discharged into Lake Tezcoco fione of the tent of reversing the flow between the inter- J. L. Lorenzo, head of the Direccidn de
many Early Colonial attempts to protect connected lakes. Prehistoria, for helpful advice, for the use
Mexico City from floods caused by the up- 19. Around the nodes formed by the former is- of the department's laboratory facilities and
surging of that lake. The effects were dis- lands of Cuitlahuac and Mizquic and, to a equipments and for the valuable assistance
astrous for swamp farming; the rising waters lesser extent, in the immediate vicinity of of members of the department's staff, R.
submerged the chinampas and forced the Xochimilco, this pattern was blurred by the Arana, T. Alvarez, and A. Flores, who, re-
lagoon dwellers to move out [see Torquemada radial cobweb of through-traffic canals that spectively, supervised the excavations, iden-
(1)]. A rise above 2241 meters was detected converged on these centers. This was most tified bones, and analyzed soils.

12 NOEMBER 1971 66t

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