Dr. Joseph B. Mountjoy
Professor
jbmountj@hotmail.com
256-1169
In 1996 I began doing archaeological research in several valleys located in the western highlands of Jalisco, Mexico, between Guadalajara and Puerto Vallarta. This research was focused on the registration of rocks with petroglyphs and the location of shaft-and-chamber tomb burial sites. Several spectacular petroglyphs sites were registered, including one canyon (the photograph) that appears to record the kind of sacred deer hunt carried out by the nearby Huichol Indians in the 19th century. Also, excavations were conducted in one ceremonial site where a copper/bronze bell in the form of Mictlantecuhtli (an Aztec god of death) had been unearthed by looters in 1961.
In 2000 I began conducting excavations in the Mascota Valley at a burial site dated to ca. 800 B.C. with funds provided by the National Geographic Society. Excavations in that site were completed in 2005, and by that time we had excavated approximately 39 Middle Formative burial pits which contained the remains of about 175 individuals and some 500 burial offerings, some of which show distant relationships with places such as Guatemala and the border area of Peru and Ecuador. In 2004-2005 funding by the Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies, Inc. enabled us to conduct excavations in two more Middle Formative cemeteries (ca. 800 B.C. to 1000 B.C.) where we discovered and excavated human remains and burial offerings from several shuaft-and-chamber tombs.
At present, 500 of these Middle Formative burial items are on display in three rooms in the Archaeology Museum of Mascota, and a fourth room, with 35 color photographs and 4 petroglyph rocks, is dedicated to presenting an interpretation of the designs pecked or painted onto rocks in this area of Jalisco.
Selected Publications:
Click here to view a Bibliography of Published Works
2006 Burial Practices during the Late Formative/Early Classic in the Banderas Valley Area of Coastal West Mexico. (with Mary K. Sandford) Ancient Mesoamerica, Vol. 17, pp. 1-15
2006 Algunos patollis abreviados encontrados entre los petrograbados de Jalisco. Los petroglifos del norte de Mexico: Memoria del Primer Seminario de Petrograbados del Norte de Mexico, V. Joel Santos Ramírez and Ramón Vinas Valverdu coordinadores, pp. 151-155. Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Direccion de Investigación y Fomento de Cultura Regonal. Mexico, D.F.
2007 Singulares comerciantes del México antiguo. National Geographic, abril 2007, 4 pp. Article about our Project at El Pantano, valley of Mascota, Jalisco. Written by A.R. Williams, photographs by Jesús Eduardo López Reyes.
2007 Mysterios Traders. National Geographic, April 2007, 1 p. Article about our project at El Pantano, valley of Mascota, Jalsico. Written by A.R. Williams, photographs by Jesús Eduardo López Reyes and Joseph B. Mountjoy.
2007 The Big Dig: Uncovering the surprising details of a Neolithic community. UNCG Research, pp. 88-15. Article about our research at El Pantano, valley of Mascota, Jalisco, written by Brian Clarey, photographs by Joseph B. Mountjoy and Nathaniel B. Mountjoy.
2008 Diez principios de la excavación arqueológica. Tributo a Jaime Litvak King, (coordinadores P. Schmidt S., E. Ortiz D., y J. Santos R.), pp. 139-146. Universidad Nacional de México, Instituto de Investigaciones Antropológicas. México. D.F.
2008 Esculturas antroppomórfas de piedra encontradas en la región costera de Jalisco y Nayarit. Ideología Política y Sociedad en el Periodo Formativo: Ensayos en homenaje al doctor David C. Grove (A. Cyphers y K.G. Hirth editores), pp. 425-442. Instituto de Investigaciones Antropológicas, Universidad Autónoma de México. México, D.F.
2008 Arqueología de la Zona Costera de Jalisco y del Municipio de Villa Purificación. Miscelánea Historica de Villa Purificación: Testimonios del 475 Aniversario de su Fundacion, Aristarco Regalado Pinedo y Juan Sánchez Vázquez, Coordinadores, pp. 21-39 y 16 figuras. Ayuntamiento Constitucional de Villa Purificación, Jalisco.
Fieldwork:
Mexico (Zacatecas, Puebla, Valley of Mexico, Nayarit, and Jalisco); U.S. (Illinois and North Carolina).
