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At El Coyote, I am interested in the ways in which feasts articulated with the ancient political economy, and the extent to which they served as inducements for their participants to engage in more significant social, political, economic, and religious activities. In order to investigate these relationships, I conducted excavations in and around the main plaza at the site during two field seasons (2000 and 2001). Excavation of the plaza surface consisted of forty 2 m by 2 m test units arranged in a hexagonal 100 m by 50 m grid. This work yielded fragments of burnt comals (ceramic griddles), large plainware and polychrome bowls and jars, red monochrome plates, and groundstone implements, as well as a variety of obsidian and chert tools, suggesting the production and consumption of food. All of these items were found resting on the plastered surface of the plaza, and cluster around a small platform in the approximate center of the plaza and in the plaza's southeast corner. The figure below is an isoline distribution plot of artifact density in the plaza, which is generally low (an average of 58 ceramic sherds/cubic m, 4 obsidian fragments/cubic m, and 2 chert flakes/cubic m) compared to residential areas at the site that yielded nearly three to five times as many artifacts per cubic m of excavated soil.
Ceramic vessel forms represented include bowls, jars, plates, and censers. Combining large plates (with rim diameters generally larger than or equal to .25 m) and large bowls (with rim diameter ranges equal to those of large plates) from this assemblage, serving vessels account for an estimated 50-75% of the ceramic sherds encountered in plaza excavations; ceramic analysis is on-going. In contrast, comparable assemblages (in terms of the volume of excavated soil) from elite residential contexts (patios and middens) at other nearby centers, La Sierra, La Ceiba, and Copán, yielded only 10-30% serving vessels, the most highly represented forms being large, undecorated cooking and storage jars.
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