An Unexplored Realm in the Heartland of the Southern Gulf ... - Famsi

techniques (Berger et al. 1967; Heizer 1968; Heizer, Drucker et al. 1968; Heizer, Graham
et al. 1968). In 1984, INAH initiated a new project at La Venta under the direction of
Rebecca González-Lauck and, in 1988, the La Venta Archaeological Project was
established to protect and investigate the site. Her efforts resulted in substantive
investigations within the primary civic-ceremonial center and outside the core zone.
The civic-ceremonial center of La Venta is situated atop a natural salt dome that
rises well above the surrounding floodplain. In the adjacent lowland zone, over 100
precolumbian settlement areas have been located within a 20 km radius of the site’s core;
58 of these have been determined to have existed during La Venta’s ascendancy
(González-Lauck 1996b:80). In 1986 and 1987, William Rust conducted a series of
surveys and excavations in and around La Venta (Rust 1988, 1992; Rust and Leyden
1994; Rust and Sharer 1988). Test units around the perimeter of the La Venta ceremonial
district uncovered permanent Middle Formative period settlement features that included
urn burials, ceramic offerings, house floors, storage pits, and a serpentine and greenstone
workshop (Rust 1988:103, 1992:125).
Using aerial photography of the region, Rust plotted the course of an ancient
riverbed associated with the Río Barí that had flowed around the northeast sector of La
Venta. Surveys and test excavations located nine settlement areas, five of which had sites
demonstrating extended Middle Formative occupations that ranged from 2-12 km away
from the main center of La Venta. This evidence indicated a substantial Middle
Formative occupation of the ceremonial center and showed conclusively that La Venta
was not an empty center, as had been claimed by Drucker, but had evolved into a
permanent, domestic settlement (Rust 1992:125; Rust and Sharer 1988:102).
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