ABSTRACT
Highland Mesoamerica is not a land of large majestic rivers. In contrast to the lowlands of the Pacific or Gulf Coast, there are relatively few stream reaches that are navigable. In this chapter, the authors present the discovery of a site that is named Yuzanu 36 and some of their initial thoughts regarding its interpretation. They are convinced of its high research potential because it falls in several of the site categories that are argued to be underrepresented in the archaeological record of Archaic Mesoamerica: it is open-air, situated on a former floodplain, large complex, and blessed with exceptional stratigraphic integrity thanks to burial at a depth of ca. 5 m. Yuzanu 36 is located in the state of Oaxaca, in the temperate highland region known as the Mixteca Alta. The persistent paradox in the Preceramic archaeology of Mesoamerica is that residential bases, the places where people spent a large share of their lives, rarely left behind conspicuous archaeological sites.
