Paleodietary analysis of the sacrificial victims from the Feathered Serpent Pyramid, Teotihuacan
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ORIGINAL PAPER
Paleodietary analysis of the sacrificial victims from the Feathered Serpent Pyramid, Teotihuacan Kristin L. Nado 1 & Natalya Zolotova 2 & Kelly J. Knudson 1
Received: 7 September 2015 / Accepted: 6 October 2016 # Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2016
Abstract The consumption of different types and quantities of food frequently serves as a practice that expresses and reinforces social distinctions among individuals within complex societies. This study explores the dietary behavior of probable sacrificial victims interred within the offering complex underlying the Feathered Serpent Pyramid as a line of evidence concerning the identities and life experiences of individuals selected for inclusion within one of Teotihuacan’s public monuments. Stable carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen isotope values from rib samples of 12 individuals within the Feathered Serpent Pyramid complex were compared with those of 14 individuals interred in residential contexts within the city. Results provide new information concerning daily subsistence at Classic period Teotihuacan (ca. A.D. 200–600) and highlight the dietary distinctiveness of individuals interred within the Feathered Serpent Pyramid as compared to the general residential population of the site, particularly in terms of the carbon isotope composition of protein sources consumed by a number of the sacrificial victims. Oxygen isotope analysis suggests that most individuals from the Feathered Serpent Pyramid resided within the local Teotihuacan area during the years immediately prior to their deaths, indicating that the unique dietary pattern seen in stable carbon isotope values cannot be attributed to nonlocal residence prior to sacrifice. Rather, these dietary differences may suggest that the group of
* Kristin L. Nado [email protected]
1
Center for Bioarchaeological Research, School of Human Evolution and Social Change, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85287, USA
2
School of Earth and Space Exploration, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85287, USA
individuals selected for interment within the Feathered Serpent Pyramid offering complex maintained a distinctive social or economic identity as compared to the rest of the Teotihuacan population during their lives. Keywords Carbon isotopes . Nitrogen isotopes . Oxygen isotopes . Mexico
Introduction Diet and cuisine provide insight both into the economic power relationships governing food consumption and into nonmaterial aspects of social life, such as ideology and social identities. In addition to differences in economic access to food sources between people, a range of cultural attitudes and symbols surrounding food and cuisine defines what is appropriate for particular types of individuals to consume and how these foods should be prepared (Bourdieu 1984; Bray 2003; Goody 1982). The constant repetition of daily differences in practices such as food consumption serves to reinforce group boundaries by naturalizing the idea that people within different social groups are fundamentally different (Bourdieu 1977; Butl
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