The Art of Urbanism explores how the royal courts of powerful Mesoamerican centers represented their kingdoms in architectural, iconographic, and cosmological terms. Through an investigation of the ecological contexts and environmental opportunities of urban centers, the contributors consider how ancient Mesoamerican cities defined themselves and reflected upon their physical—and metaphysical—place via their built environment. Themes in the volume include the ways in which a kingdom’s public monuments were fashioned to reflect geographic space, patron gods, and mythology, and how the Olmec, Maya, Mexica, Zapotecs, and others sought to center their world through architectural monuments and public art.

This collection of papers addresses how communities leveraged their environment and built upon their cultural and historical roots as well as the ways that the performance of calendrical rituals and other public events tied individuals and communities to both urban centers and hinterlands. Twenty-three scholars from archaeology, anthropology, art history, and religious studies contribute new data and new perspectives to the understanding of ancient Mesoamericans’ own view of their spectacular urban and ritual centers.

Olmec Lithic Economy at San Lorenzo examines the specialized craft production, manufacturing, adoption, and spread of obsidian cutting tools at San Lorenzo, Mexico, the first major Olmec center to develop in the southern Gulf Coast region of Mesoamerica. Through the systematic analysis of this single commodity, Kenneth Hirth and Ann Cyphers reconstruct the importation of raw material and the on-site production and distribution of finished goods from a specialized workshop engaged in the manufacture of obsidian blades.
 
The obsidian blade was the cutting tool of choice across Mesoamerica and used in a wide range of activities, from domestic food preparation to institutional ritual activities. Hirth and Cyphers conducted a three-decade investigation of obsidian artifacts recovered at Puerto Malpica, the earliest known workshop, and seventy-six other sites on San Lorenzo Island, where these tools were manufactured for local and regional distribution. Evidence recovered from these excavations provides some of the first information on how early craft specialists operated and how the specialized technology used to manufacture obsidian blades spread across Mesoamerica. The authors use geochemical analyses to identify thirteen different sources for obsidian during San Lorenzo’s occupation. This volcanic glass, not locally available, was transported over great distances, arriving in nodular and finished blade form.
 
Olmec Lithic Economy at San Lorenzo offers a new way to analyze the Preclassic lithic economy—the procurement, production, distribution, and consumption of flaked stone tools—and shows how the study of lithics aids in developing a comprehensive picture of the internal structure and operation of Olmec economy. The book will be significant for Mesoamericanists as well as students and scholars interested in economy, lithic technology, and early complex societies.