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Cited by 41Archaeology and ancient environmental studiesAmazonian Archaeology and EthnohistoryHistorical Studies in Central America

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The Ecuadorian Formative

Zeidler, James A.·2008·The Handbook of South American Archaeology
DOI 10.1007/978-0-387-74907-5_24
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Abstract

The formal definition of the Formative Period in the New World began with the seminal work of Gordon Willey and Philip Phillips (1958) in their attempt to devise a historicaldevelopmental periodization scheme for pan-hemispherical application. As Jorge Marcos has noted, this concept was largely “identical to what Gordon Childe had called the Early Neolithic” of the Old World (Marcos 2003:7), with connotations of agricultural production and sedentary village life. James A. Ford (1969) carried out the first detailed treatment of the concept for the Americas; he posed a unitary model of Formative development from maritime diffusion, which he pitted against an alternative explanation based upon the “psychic unity of man”. As Ford (1969: 9) defines it, the Formative Period consists of “the 3000 years (or less in some regions) during which the elements of ceramics, ground stone tools, handmade figurines, and manioc and maize agriculture were being diffused and welded into the socioeconomic life of the people living in the region extending from Peru to the eastern United States”. Such unitary diffusionist models were posited as early as 1917 by Herbert Spinden (1917, 1928), but were not systematically explored or championed until the work of Ford (1969) and, in more recent decades, various writings of the late Donald W. Lathrap (see, for example, Lathrap 1974, 1977, 1985, 1987; Lathrap et al. 1975), among others. This chapter begins with a summary of the Formative Period cultures known for the coast and western lowlands: the Valdivia, Machalilla, and Chorrera cultures. Following that, I consider the Formative Period manifestations in the northern, central, and southern highlands, and the eastern lowlands or oriente. Figure 24.1 shows the locations of the various archaeological areas and sites discussed in the text.

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Authors
Zeidler, J. A.
Venue
The Handbook of South American Archaeology
Publisher
Springer New York
Published
2008
Pages
459-488
DOI
10.1007/978-0-387-74907-5_24
OpenAlex
W115438029
Cited by
41
References
66
Citations by year
2026: 3 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 3 · 2023: 2 · 2022: 5 · 2021: 7 · 2020: 3 · 2019: 2 · 2016: 1 · 2015: 1 · 2014: 1 · 2013: 1 · 2012: 2
FWCI
11.97
Type
book chapter
Language
en
Open access
closed
Locations
Springer eBooks (publishedVersion)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Archeology › Archaeology and ancient environmental studies
  • Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › History › Amazonian Archaeology and Ethnohistory
  • Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › History › Historical Studies in Central America
Keywords
Formative period, Ecuadorian archaeology, Valdivia culture, diffusionism, Early Neolithic, maize agriculture, ceramics (art and archaeology), ground stone tools, figurines, periodization

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