Richard Stockton MacNeish (April 29, 1918 – January 16, 2001), known to many as "Scotty", was an American
archaeologist
Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...
. His fieldwork revolutionized the understanding of the development of agriculture in the
New World
The term ''New World'' is often used to mean the majority of Earth's Western Hemisphere, specifically the Americas."America." ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (). McArthur, Tom, ed., 1992. New York: Oxford University Press, p. 3 ...
and the
prehistory
Prehistory, also known as pre-literary history, is the period of human history between the use of the first stone tools by hominins 3.3 million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems. The use of ...
of several regions of Canada, the United States and Central and South America. He pioneered new methods in fieldwork and materials analysis and brought attention to the importance of interdisciplinary collaboration. His legacy has influenced generations of archaeologists.
Early life and education
Richard Stockton MacNeish was born April 29, 1918, in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
. His interest in archaeology started at a young age, sparked by a hastily created report on the
Maya
Maya may refer to:
Civilizations
* Maya peoples, of southern Mexico and northern Central America
** Maya civilization, the historical civilization of the Maya peoples
** Maya language, the languages of the Maya peoples
* Maya (Ethiopia), a populat ...
for an art history class when he was twelve. A year later he wrote to prominent Maya
archaeologist
Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...
Dr.
A.V. Kidder
Alfred Vincent Kidder (October 29, 1885 – June 11, 1963) was an American archaeologist considered the foremost of the southwestern United States and Mesoamerica during the first half of the 20th century. He saw a disciplined system of archaeolog ...
asking for a job at his dig at
Chichen Itza
Chichen Itza , es, Chichén Itzá , often with the emphasis reversed in English to ; from yua, Chiʼchʼèen Ìitshaʼ () "at the mouth of the well of the Itza people" was a large pre-Columbian city built by the Maya people of the Terminal ...
. Although his request was gently refused, Kidder encouraged MacNeish to study hard and become an archaeologist.
In 1936, MacNeish started his university career at Colgate College (now
Colgate University
Colgate University is a private liberal arts college in Hamilton, New York. The college was founded in 1819 as the Baptist Education Society of the State of New York and operated under that name until 1823, when it was renamed Hamilton Theologi ...
) and participated in several archaeological field schools in New York and Arizona where he learned important
excavation skills that he would later modify to create his own excavation techniques. Of this time, MacNeish writes: "My energy was boundless: I dug, I hiked, I climbed cliffs, I learned, I went to dances, I mixed cement by hand, I caught rattlesnakes, I packed mules. Most important, I did and talked archaeology morning, noon, and night – and loved every moment of it". He continued to be influenced by Dr.
Kidder, and refined his field archaeology methods under
George Brainerd
George may refer to:
People
* George (given name)
* George (surname)
* George (singer), American-Canadian singer George Nozuka, known by the mononym George
* George Washington, First President of the United States
* George W. Bush, 43rd President ...
, eventually forming his personal excavation technique
La Perre.
At the urging of several Southwestern archaeologists, MacNeish prepared to transfer to the
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...
to study under
Fay-Cooper Cole
Fay-Cooper Cole (8 August 1881 – 3 September 1961) was a professor of anthropology and founder of the anthropology department at the University of Chicago; he was a student of Franz Boas. Most famously, he was a witness for the defense for John ...
. Before doing so, however, he had an unrelated feat to achieve. As a child, his mother enrolled him in boxing lessons and he had become quite accomplished. Now, he wanted to win a
Golden Gloves
The Golden Gloves is the name given to annual competitions for amateur boxing in the United States, where they are awarded a belt and a ring. And the title of nations champion is awarded. The Golden Gloves is a term used to refer to the Nation ...
championship. He did so in New York in 1938, wearing a kilt in the final bout as a tribute to his Scottish ancestry. This skill continued to provide him with spending money during his student years.
At the
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...
, he participated in field schools that exposed him to the methods and theories of
James A. Ford
James Alfred Ford (February 12, 1911–February 25, 1968) was an American archaeologist. He was born in Water Valley, Mississippi, in February 1911. While growing up in the region, where ancient earthwork mounds are visible, he became interested ...
, William Haag, Jesse D. Jennings, John Cotter, Glen Black, Tom Lewis, and Madeline Kneberg. In addition, he was heavily influenced by Julian Steward's ''Basin-Plateau Aboriginal Sociopolitical Groups'' (1938). He earned his B.A. in 1940, his M.A. in 1944 and his Ph.D. in 1949. That same year, while working in the
Sierra de Tamaulipas
The Sierra de Tamaulipas is an isolated, semi-tropical mountain range in the Mexican state of Tamaulipas. Its highest point is . There are no cities or towns in the Sierra and the small population is largely agricultural. The higher elevations o ...
, Mexico, MacNeish discovered primitive
teosinte
''Zea'' is a genus of flowering plants in the grass family. The best-known species is ''Z. mays'' (variously called maize, corn, or Indian corn), one of the most important crops for human societies throughout much of the world. The four wild sp ...
corncobs
Corn on the cob is a culinary term for a cooked ear of sweet corn (maize) eaten directly off the cob. The ear is picked while the endosperm is in the "milk stage" so that the kernels are still tender. Ears of corn are steamed, boiled, or g ...
in context with human habitations dating back several thousand years. This achievement spurred his lifelong interest in the origins of
agriculture
Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people to ...
and society that would take him throughout Central and South America, eventually to China and, nearly, to Turkey. This last trip was put on hold when doctors ordered him to rest after a mild heart attack. After a long, varied and influential career, Richard MacNeish at age 83 died on January 16, 2001, in a car accident while touring Pre-Columbian Maya sites in Belize.
Academic career
Shortly before his transfer to Chicago, during continued fieldwork in Arizona, MacNeish set out his future goals. "First I would learn to dig well and skillfully, then I would become able to analyze archaeological findings, and finally I would become a theoretician". It was during his fieldwork as an undergraduate and graduate student that he worked on his first goal. At field schools across the United States, MacNeish absorbed the knowledge and techniques of anyone he worked with. Synthesis of this knowledge came to fruition during fieldwork in the state of
Tamaulipas
Tamaulipas (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Tamaulipas ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Tamaulipas), is a state in the northeast region of Mexico; one of the 31 states which, along with Mexico City, comprise the 32 Federal Entiti ...
in
Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
. Here MacNeish made one of his important contributions to the field methods of archaeologists, fulfilling his first goal. He pioneered a method of
excavating caves that involved the stripping the strata off alternate squares from a vertical profile. This allowed for greater detail and more meaningful divisions of an
excavation. Where many previous methods involved digging by arbitrary levels, the new method — dubbed the
La Perre technique after the cave in which it was first developed — dug each distinct strata, or floor, separately.
His discovery in these caves of very early
maize
Maize ( ; ''Zea mays'' subsp. ''mays'', from es, maíz after tnq, mahiz), also known as corn (North American and Australian English), is a cereal grain first domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 10,000 years ago. Th ...
domestication evidence also brought home to him the importance of interdisciplinary studies as he struggled to get dating and identification information on his samples. He realized that in getting an education archaeologists, "... spend much of their time learning phonemics, personality and culture, esoteric kinship systems, strange customs of primitive peoples, and so forth and do not have time for fields like
botany
Botany, also called , plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "botany" comes from the Ancient Greek w ...
,
zoology
Zoology ()The pronunciation of zoology as is usually regarded as nonstandard, though it is not uncommon. is the branch of biology that studies the Animal, animal kingdom, including the anatomy, structure, embryology, evolution, Biological clas ...
,
pollen analysis
Palynology is the "study of dust" (from grc-gre, παλύνω, palynō, "strew, sprinkle" and ''-logy'') or of "particles that are strewn". A classic palynologist analyses particulate samples collected from the air, from water, or from deposits ...
, soils, and
geology
Geology () is a branch of natural science concerned with Earth and other astronomical objects, the features or rocks of which it is composed, and the processes by which they change over time. Modern geology significantly overlaps all other Ear ...
– all disciplines they will have to use". In order to rectify this, MacNeish began to involve experts outside of archaeology in many of his field studies. This policy was very well demonstrated in his excavations in the
Tehuacan Valley and
Ayacucho
Ayacucho (, qu, Ayak'uchu) is the capital city of Ayacucho Region and of Huamanga Province, Ayacucho Region, Peru.
During the Inca Empire and Viceroyalty of Peru periods the city was known by the name of Huamanga (Quechua: Wamanga), and it c ...
, Peru which resulted in multi-volume publications which analyzed the sites "utilizing the skills of all appropriate scientific fields".
In 1949, MacNeish went to work for the
National Museum of Canada The national museums of Canada are the nine museums in Canada designated under the federal ''Museums Act'' and operated by the Government of Canada. The national museums are responsible for "preserving and promoting the heritage of Canada and all it ...
. With this he began a system of spending his summers surveying and
excavating in Northern and Western Canada and his winters searching for evidence of the origins of agriculture across Central America. "MacNeish enjoyed saying 'I have as much sense as a duck – I fly south in the winter'". Realizing that a random search for sites over these huge swathes of territory would be difficult and inefficient, he pioneered a five-step process that was based on making and then testing hypotheses about ancient environments and human behavior in them. These steps were:
# Initial background preparation on area to be surveyed
# Preliminary hypothesis ... based on background materials and cultural sequential generalizations ...
# Testing hypothesis in the field, modifying and setting up new hypotheses, testing them, and so on.
# Field analysis of artifacts from sites to establish preliminary chronology ... and to determine potential stratified sites or sites with special features.
# Resurvey for contextual data and special problems.
Using this process, he discovered hundreds of new sites and gained a reputation for "lucky" finds, while actually advancing the scientific foundation of archaeology.
MacNeish added to the understanding and analysis of archaeological materials through the championing of the interdisciplinary approach. In addition, his work on the standardization and computerization of
lithic
Lithic may refer to:
*Relating to stone tools
**Lithic analysis, the analysis of stone tools and other chipped stone artifacts
**Lithic core, the part of a stone which has had flakes removed from it
**Lithic flake, the portion of a rock removed to ...
-attribute terminology enabled more sophisticated statistical analysis and generalization of the results. His ceramic analysis helped to reevaluate the prehistory of the
Iroquois
The Iroquois ( or ), officially the Haudenosaunee ( meaning "people of the longhouse"), are an Iroquoian-speaking confederacy of First Nations peoples in northeast North America/ Turtle Island. They were known during the colonial years to ...
, disputing the idea that they had developed elsewhere and then migrated into their historic territory. His method of analysis demonstrated continuity between historic period groups and prehistoric complexes in the same areas.
In addition to the field and lab work MacNeish has been a professor at
Boston University
Boston University (BU) is a private research university in Boston, Massachusetts. The university is nonsectarian, but has a historical affiliation with the United Methodist Church. It was founded in 1839 by Methodists with its original campu ...
and the
University of Calgary
The University of Calgary (U of C or UCalgary) is a public research university located in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. The University of Calgary started in 1944 as the Calgary branch of the University of Alberta, founded in 1908, prior to being ins ...
, where he helped to found their Department of Archaeology. He was the
Whidden Lecturer at
McMaster University
McMaster University (McMaster or Mac) is a public research university in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. The main McMaster campus is on of land near the residential neighbourhoods of Ainslie Wood and Westdale, adjacent to the Royal Botanical Ga ...
,
Senior Archaeologist at the
National Museum of Canada The national museums of Canada are the nine museums in Canada designated under the federal ''Museums Act'' and operated by the Government of Canada. The national museums are responsible for "preserving and promoting the heritage of Canada and all it ...
, and was the director of the
Robert S. Peabody Museum of Archaeology
The Robert S. Peabody Institute of Archaeology, formerly known as the Robert S. Peabody Museum of Archaeology, is a learning center and archaeological collection in Andover, Massachusetts. Founded in 1901 through a bequest from Robert Singleton Pe ...
in Andover, Massachusetts. When he left the museum in 1983, instead of retiring, he established the
Andover Foundation for Archaeological Research (AFAR), named himself Director of Research and continued his work in the American Southwest and China.
Coxcatlan Cave
In the 1960s, MacNeish discovered the
Coxcatlan Cave
Coxcatlan Cave is a Mesoamerican archaeological site in the Tehuacán Valley, State of Puebla, Mexico. It was discovered by Richard MacNeish in the 1960s during a survey of the Tehuacán Valley. It was the initial appearance of three domesticated ...
in
Puebla
Puebla ( en, colony, settlement), officially Free and Sovereign State of Puebla ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Puebla), is one of the 32 states which comprise the Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided into 217 municipalities and its cap ...
,
Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
. This was a very important site of early maize domestication.
It is due to his extensive study that much of the historical and cultural record there was established, especially from the Archaic period when the cave was most active. The cave produced domesticated plants dated between 5,000 and 3,400 BC, including maize. At that time, the people and animals living in
Tehuacan Valley divided their time between small hunting encampments and large temporary villages.
Pendejo Cave
In 1990, while digging at
Pendejo Cave
Pendejo Cave is a geological feature and archaeological site located in southern New Mexico about 20 miles east of Orogrande. Archaeologist Richard S. MacNeish claimed that human occupation of the cave pre-dates by tens of thousands of years the ...
in southern
New Mexico
)
, population_demonym = New Mexican ( es, Neomexicano, Neomejicano, Nuevo Mexicano)
, seat = Santa Fe
, LargestCity = Albuquerque
, LargestMetro = Tiguex
, OfficialLang = None
, Languages = English, Spanish ( New Mexican), Navajo, Ker ...
, MacNeish discovered the remains of a prehistoric horse, which were found above several other cultural layers in the cave.
The cave, and its significance, occupied the rest of his career.
There was considerable controversy in regard to the very early dates of human presence there that he reported.
Awards and honors
MacNeish was awarded honorary degrees from the
Universidad de San Cristobal de Huamanga in Ayacucho, Peru and
Simon Fraser University
Simon Fraser University (SFU) is a public research university in British Columbia, Canada, with three campuses, all in Greater Vancouver: Burnaby (main campus), Surrey, and Vancouver. The main Burnaby campus on Burnaby Mountain, located from ...
in British Columbia, Canada. He was elected to the
National Academy of Sciences
The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...
,
British Academy of Science and the
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...
and was awarded a
Guggenheim Fellowship
Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...
. He served as President of the
Society for American Archaeology
The Society for American Archaeology (SAA) is a professional association for the archaeology of the Americas. It was founded in 1934 and its headquarters are in based in Washington, D.C. , it has 7,500 members. Its current president is Deborah L. ...
and has received numerous awards, including the Kidder Medal from the
American Anthropological Association
The American Anthropological Association (AAA) is an organization of scholars and practitioners in the field of anthropology. With 10,000 members, the association, based in Arlington, Virginia, includes archaeologists, cultural anthropologists, ...
, the Spinden Medal for Archaeology from the
Smithsonian Institution
The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...
, and the Fiftieth Anniversary Award for Outstanding Contributions to American Archaeology from the Society for American Archaeology. In 1977 he was awarded the
Cornplanter Medal
The Cornplanter Medal was named for the Iroquois chief Cornplanter and is an award for scholastic and other contributions to the betterment of knowledge of the Iroquois people. It was initiated by University of Chicago anthropologist Frederick S ...
for his work in
Iroquois
The Iroquois ( or ), officially the Haudenosaunee ( meaning "people of the longhouse"), are an Iroquoian-speaking confederacy of First Nations peoples in northeast North America/ Turtle Island. They were known during the colonial years to ...
research. In addition he has been honored by institutions for his work in Mexico and China.
Legacy
MacNeish's ultimate goal was to make archaeology more of a science. He was a
processual archaeologist who championed the necessity of
experimental archaeology
Experimental archaeology (also called experiment archaeology) is a field of study which attempts to generate and test archaeological hypotheses, usually by replicating or approximating the feasibility of ancient cultures performing various tasks ...
and hypothesis testing in the exploration of human
cultural ecology
Cultural ecology is the study of human adaptations to social and physical environments. Human adaptation refers to both biological and cultural processes that enable a population to survive and reproduce within a given or changing environment. Thi ...
. By adopting, creating or championing methods that made archaeological results more generalizable and amenable to hypothesis testing MacNeish was attempting to learn, and teach, about the broader patterns of social change that can inform our choices in the future; he wished to use archaeology to improve the human condition. "... laws of cultural change may be of use not only in explaining the past, but more important, in predicting the future or at least indicating the steps in cultural change we might take in the future". His ultimate legacy, the sum total of all of his individual accomplishments in methodology and theory, was his commitment to archaeology as a science that could produce laws and theories to aid humanity in the future. In his autobiographical discussion of American archaeology (1978), MacNeish writes, "We are still fumbling along, perfecting techniques as well as improving methodology, and our field – as well as I – have a long way to go".
MacNeish was constantly calling for others to question his conclusions and improve his methods to further advance the science of archeology and its ability to speak to society's needs. As a result, his greatest legacy is probably his influence on and encouragement of students, other archaeologists and professionals he worked with. One of these students,
Barry Rolett, recalls how "MacNeish encouraged and invested his time in students like me because he loved to share the excitement of archaeology" and "led by example and he used his considerable influence more to help others than for his own personal gain".
Published works
By his own accounting, Richard MacNeish "spent 8,071 days in the field and wrote more than 9 million words".
[As recounted by Flannery and Marcus (2001).] His many publications include:
*For information on his life and on ''American archaeology: The Science of Archaeology?'', 1978
*For his theories on agriculture and civilization worldwide: ''The Origins of Agriculture and Settled Life'', 1992 ()
*For reports on his big field projects: ''The Prehistory of the Tehuacan Valley'' Vol. 1-5, 1967–1972, or ''Prehistory of the Ayacucho Basin'', Peru Vol. 1-4, 1980-83 (Ed. by MacNeish)
*On the Iroquois: Iroquois pottery types: A technique for the study of Iroquois prehistory, 1952 (in the ''Bulletin of the National Museum of Canada'')
*On Chinese agriculture: ''Origins of Rice Agriculture: The Preliminary Report of the Sino-American Jiangxi (PRC) Project: SAJOR'', 1995 (with J.G. Libby, in ''Publications in Anthropology'', No. 13)
See also
*
Agriculture in Mesoamerica
Agriculture in Mesoamerica dates to the Archaic period of Mesoamerican chronology (8000–2000 BC). At the beginning of the Archaic period, the Early Hunters of the late Pleistocene era (50,000–10,000 BC) led nomadic lifestyles, relying on hu ...
*
Domesticated plants of Mesoamerica Domesticated plants of Mesoamerica, established by agricultural developments and practices over several thousand years of pre-Columbian history, include ''maize'' and ''capsicum''. A list of Mesoamerican cultivars and staples:
Maize
Maize was d ...
Footnotes
References
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Macneish, Richard
1918 births
2001 deaths
Pre-Columbian scholars
Mesoamerican archaeologists
American Mesoamericanists
20th-century Mesoamericanists
Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences
20th-century American archaeologists