FRAMING A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF TROPICAL CIVILIZATIONS: SETS Project – Phase 1 (Volume 1) Edited by Gyles Iannone Trent University Department of Anthropology Occasional Papers in Anthropology No. 17 2014 Dedicated to Michael D. Coe, whose writings on the importance of the comparative analysis of tropical civilizations first inspired me as an undergraduate student, and more recently, whose kind words encouraged me when I subsequently started my own intellectual journey to contribute to this worthy endeavour. Acknowledgements: Members of the SETS Project are thankful for the generous support of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (Insight Development Grant 2013- 2015). We also extend our sincere gratitude to Dr. Damian Evans, who took time out from his busy schedule to tour us around Koh Ker and Beng Mealea during our trip to Angkor in 2013. Finally, our deepest appreciation goes out to all of the people who have housed us, fed us, and driven us around Southeast Asia. Your generosity, hospitality, and good nature are unsurpassed. Cover Image: Wat Mahathat, Sukhothai, Thailand. Trent University Occasional Papers in Anthropology ISSN 0825-589X; No. 17 ©2014 Peterborough, Ontario SETS PROJECT MEMBERS Gyles Iannone (Trent University): Principal Investigator Kendall Hills (University of Illinois at Chicago): Research Associate (Integrative Features) Scott Macrae (University of Florida): Research Associate (Agriculture) Leah Marajh (Trent University): Research Associate (Water Management) Peter Demarte (Trent University): Research Associate (Settlement) Melissa Jo Coria (Trent University): Research Associate (Settlement) Samantha Walker (Trent University): Research Associate (Settlement) Lindsay Shirkey (Trent University): Research Associate (Epicenters) Natalie Baron (Trent University): Research Associate (Epicenters) Wendy Solis: Research Assistant Ameeta Lodhia: Research Assistant Kong Cheong: Research Assistant TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter 1: Framing a Comparative Analysis of Tropical Civilizations: An Introduction to the Socio-Ecological Entanglement in Tropical Societies (Sets) Project Gyles Iannone 1-23 Chapter 2: Water Management amongst the Charter States of Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia, and Java Leah Marajh 23-57 Chapter 3: Agricultural Intensification amongst the Charter States of Southeast Asia: A Study of Resilience, Vulnerability, and Entanglement Scott Macrae 58-85 Chapter 4: Epicenters and Entanglement at Angkor, Bagan, and Sukhothai. Lindsay Shirkey 86-99 Chapter 5: Socio-Ecological Entanglement in Tropical Societies: A Study of Epicenters in Java, Indonesia Natalie Baron 100-107 Chapter 6: Sets 2013 Phase I Settlement Study: Angkor, Bagan, and Sukhothai Pete Demarte 108-119 Chapter 7: Socio-ecological Entanglement in Tropical Societies: Settlement in Java Melissa Jo Coria 120-141 Chapter 8: Investigating the Socio-Ecological Entanglement of Integrative Mechanisms in Early Low Density Agrarian Tropical States: Case Studies from Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand, and Java Kendall B. Hills 142-177 ~ 1 ~ CHAPTER 1 FRAMING A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF TROPICAL CIVILIZATIONS: AN INTRODUCTION TO THE SOCIO-ECOLOGICAL ENTANGLEMENT IN TROPICAL SOCIETIES (SETS) PROJECT Gyles Iannone (Trent University) Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada funding has been secured to facilitate the cross-cultural, comparative study of socio-ecological dynamics in tropical civilizations. The Insight Development Grant is being used to conduct a pilot study aimed at evaluating the quality of various data sets relevant to elucidating the reasons for the “collapse” of a number of tropical state formations throughout South and Southeast Asia in the latter part of the “Charter Era” (CE 800-1400). The proposed research activities will build 24 years of previous research focussed on the Maya of Central America, and a number of cursory, self-funded site visitations (2010-2014) and an extensive literature survey that have, in combination, provided the research team with a basic understanding of the ground plans and socio-ecological histories of the various Asian “Charter States” that form the sample for this study. The insights generated through the proposed investigations will ultimately be leveraged to craft a Partnership Grant to support an international, transdisciplinary research team whose primary objective will be to mobilize knowledge concerning socio-ecological issues in the world’s tropical zones, past and present. BACKGROUND In recent years there has been a growing concern with how climate change, population growth, declining resources, landscape modifications, food and water security, wealth disparities, pandemics, and the increasingly interconnected nature of the world economy might impact global society during the 21st century. This has fostered greater interest in the study of coupled socio- ecological systems (e.g., Berkes and Folke, eds. 1998; Berkes et al., eds. 2003; Gunderson and Holling, eds. 2002; Scheffer 2009; Walker and Salt 2006, 2012). Archaeologists are positioned to make a significant contribution to this important research endeavor given their unique database, which extends back millennia (Drennan et al. 2012:1). This comprehensive database is particularly relevant because: “…the present nature and complexity of socioecological systems are heavily contingent on the past; we cannot understand the present condition without going back centuries or even millennia” (Costanza et al. 2007:8). The ultimate goal of the proposed project is to use comparative archaeological data to build a more nuanced understanding of the roots of the various socio-ecological issues faced by contemporary tropical societies, including population growth, increasing disease rates (e.g., malaria and dengue), growing poverty, deforestation, expansion of agricultural production and monocropping, diminishing biodiversity, increasing water use and pollution, and the effects of climate change (Ewel and Bigelow 1996; Kricher 2011; Marcus 2009; McNeill 2003; Orians et al. 1996; Power and Flecker 1996). Questioning the Potential of Tropical Ecosystems When the antiquarians of the 19th century first started to explore the “ruins” of the Maya center of Palenque, and the Khmer capital of Angkor, these “lost cities in the jungle” both amazed and ~ 2 ~ perplexed scholars and the general public alike, because they challenged our preconceived notion of what “civilization” was, and how and where it should develop. The great semi-arid riverine regions of Egypt and Mesopotamia were considered the fountains of complex society, whereas the tropics were considered places of cultural and economic underdevelopment. Well into the 20th century tropical environments were still being characterized as limited in terms of agricultural potential – other than small-scale swidden farming (slash-and-burn) – and thus unlikely places for state formation to occur (Meggers 1954). Betty Meggers (1954:817) concluded that: “the environments lack the resources to maintain so high a level of culture…[they thus] represent a decline or deculturation” (Meggers 1954:817). Ester Boserup (1965, 1981) underscored the limitations that extensive swidden agriculture placed on the development of complex societies (see also Redman 1999:166-168; Winzeler 1976:624-626). Still others posited that because tropical environments are exceptionally homogenous, and thus unlikely to stimulate the growth of urban centers, the recognized civilizations must have originated elsewhere (Sanders and Price 1968; Winzeler 1976). Finally, although Michael Coe (1961) did not doubt the existence of indigenous tropical civilizations, he did argue that tropical societies, such as the Khmer and Maya, were comparatively decentralized, non-urban, emerged in homogenous environments with little resource diversity or variation in agricultural production, had limited trade, and major transportation issues. We now know these assumptions are wrong. Tropical environments are quite heterogeneous (Scarborough and Burnside 2010:178), and they were often the settings for high populations, intensive agricultural regimes, complex water management systems, far-flung trade networks, and state formation. Tropical civilizations do, however, represent a distinct path to urban life and they appear to have shared a certain range of vulnerabilities that ultimately contributed to their “collapse” (Fletcher 2009:1). As defined by Young et al. (2007:450), a collapse is: “Any situation where the rate of change to a system:” 1) “has negative effects on human welfare, which, in the short or long term, are socially intolerable;” 2) “is more rapid and usually in the opposite direction to that preferred by at least some members of society,” 3) “will result in a fundamental downsizing, a loss of coherence, and/or significant restructuring of the constellation of arrangements that characterize the system;” and, 4) “cannot be stopped or controlled via an incremental change in behavior, resource allocation, or institutional values” FRAMING THE ANALYSIS The Initial Conditions Frame To fully grasp the complexities associated with socio-ecological dynamics in the tropics we need to develop a broad, comparative understanding of the similarities and differences between different tropical civilizations. The necessary starting point for the kind of research proposed here is a consideration of the initial conditions that socio-cultural systems had to adapt to. Tropical ecosystems occur between the Tropic of Cancer (23°27’N) and the Tropic