Support Archaeological research within the Lake Pátzcuaro Basin, Michoacán, Mexico!!

Current donations will help fund the survey of Apupato

Apupato is a former island that has long been thought to be an important prehistoric location, most notably as the site of one of the royal Purepecha (Tarascan) treasuries, but it has never been investigated.  During the summer of 2006 a short reconnaissance of Cerro Apupato yielded evidence for at least one large settlement (~30 ha), agricultural terraces, platforms and room blocks on the summit that may be the remains of the treasury, and paleo-shorelines (strand-lines).

 For most of the post-contact period Apupato existed as an island limiting accessibility and serving to preserve the Prehispanic landscape to a much higher degree then the heavily impacted/eroded terrestrial portions of the Lake Basin. Thus Apupato can serve as an analog demonstrating the form and function of land-use and settlement in the region at the time of European contact (~A.D. 1520).

We have been issued permits to intensively survey and map Apupato during the months of December, 2007, and January, 2008.  Current donations will help support this important research. 

Please contact me for tax free and other options!!