[1] Situated in the Tequila Valleys of Jalisco, the Teuchitlán culture shared in the tradition of burying some of their dead in shaft and chamber tombs.

Archaeological work from the past few decades have demonstrated that West Mexico was not occupied by one homogeneous culture, historically referred to as the shaft tomb tradition, that stretched from Nayarit, Jalisco, and Colima.

[9] The toponym for the town of Teuchitlán dates to the Late Postclassic/Conquest period and could have its origins in one of several Nahuatl speaking migrations to the region after 500 CE.

During the Late Formative period, the Tequila Valleys experienced a surge in population density resulting in the proliferation of surface and subsurface architecture.

Looters focused on shaft and chamber tombs to retrieve the hollow and solid ceramic figures sometimes placed within as mortuary offerings to the deceased.

As one moves away from Los Guachimontones, ruling elites that managed a smaller population and site, were able to exert a greater degree of control.

Archaeologists in the Tequila Valleys have documented some of the deepest and most richly furnished shaft and chamber tombs in West Mexico.

[36] While archaeologists in both Nayarit and Colima have documented more shaft and chamber tombs than in Jalisco, none are as elaborate, deep, or large as those found in the Tequila Valleys.

A typical guachimonton (colloquially called a circle in both English and Spanish) consists of four basic architectural features: the patio, the banquette, the altar, and the platforms.

Kelley also suggested that the altar of a guachimonton might represent an artificial mountain, a cosmologically significant feature to Mesoamerican beliefs.

Christopher Witmore[38] interprets the form of the guachimonton, with the altar in the center and platforms arranged around the patio space, to represent the sun.

The ceramic models without a pole in their center often depict the spaces as a hub of activities from marriage ceremonies, to food preparation, to music making and dancing, and even warfare.

The ceramics found at Huitzilapa outside of the tomb tend to be serving ware and their distribution suggests feasting was an important activity.

A similar model is viable for Los Guachimontones despite its larger size and lack of documented elaborate shaft tombs.

Guachimontones located outside of the Tequila Valleys are then considered peripheral regions that exploited rare resources for the core.

Smaller sites were hypothesized act as loci for minor elite control or as a way to promote population cohesion.

Lorenza Lopez Mestas in 2011 proposed that the Teuchitlán culture consisted of a collection of lineage or clan-based chiefdoms.

Lopez Mestas argued the primary mechanism of power that chiefs relied upon was their ability to engage in trade for exotic or prestigious goods, like jadeite and shell, from outside of the Tequila Valleys.

Lopez Mestas suggests that elites would try to convince commoners to donate artisan goods or domestic surplus to increase chiefly wealth and status.

[31] In 2008 he suggested a model in which Teuchitlán culture centers were ruled by corporate groups composed of multiple lineages, clans, or elite families.

Beekman’s model is based on his excavations at two smaller sites, Llano Grande and Navajas, and his examination of the architecture.

Food remains recovered archaeologically are somewhat sparse in the Tequila Valleys because of limited excavations focused on other contexts.

In the Autlán-Tuxcacuesco area to the south of Tequila Valley, Kelly remarked how indigenous peoples in the region in 1525 relied heavily on the maguey plant.

[42]: 6  Maize and chili were important crops as well as guamúchil, plum, copal jocote, guaje, arrayán, sapote, and guava.

Turning a critical eye to the ceramic models from West Mexico, Butterwick notes that food is depicted as either cylindrical, globular, discoid, or lump.

[30][49] Hollow figurines often depict warriors, ball players, high status individuals, and people holding vessels.

[50] The history for the Mesoamerican ball game in West Mexico dates back to the Early Formative period (1500 – 900 BCE) with the site of El Opeño.

It is possible that this particular location held some sort of significance from one period to the next despite dramatic social and political changes experienced within the region.

[62]: 75  The relatedness and status of the individuals suggests that power and authority may derive from elite lineages that have long histories at their site.

This chronology allowed some changes in ceramic vessels and figures to be tracked through time, though this may be limited to just the Magdalena Lake Basin region.