Temporal evidence in this area came principally from three radiocarbon dates acquired from the workshop test unit [Q02-2u3] that placed activities in the workshop area between the Terminal Archaic and the Middle Formative. These dates are important because they are earlier than evidence of discrete production activity has been found elsewhere in the region, and furthermore it serves to explain the dearth of ceramics in the workshop area because the activities begin during the Preceramic period.

Unfortunately, quarrying at the Q02-2 quarry pit itself was not able to be directly dated because no datable organic materials were encountered in the Q02-2u2 test unit. Inference from three possible lines of evidence suggests that the excavation of this quarry pit occurred during the Early Formative Period (2000 - 1300 cal BCE). These lines of evidence include:

(1) Analysis of the workshop Q02-2u3 test unit, 600m downslope of the quarry pit in question, shows evidence of the arrival of larger cores and intensification of production in a distinct event during the Early Formative.

(2) The total lack of ceramics associated with the quarry pit itself, the aceramic ancient road "Camino Hornillo" [A03-268] leading away from the quarry, and the sites in the immediate vicinity of the quarry are consistent with the early dates of activity at the workshop as ceramics should not be expected.

(3) The only diagnostic artifact found along Camino Hornillo [A03-268] was an obsidian projectile point in the 4f style that is diagnostic to the Terminal Archaic.

It is possible that obsidian hydration dating may provide evidence linking obsidian flakes excavated from the quarry pit Q02-2u2 with obsidian from dated layers in the workshop Q02-2u3 unit through relative dating. Brooks (1998: 447-451) ran obsidian hydration on ten samples with Glascock from MURR on obsidian from Juscallacta, but the resulting dates were far older than expected, confirming a general skepticism among archaeologists regarding hydration dating as an absolute dating method. An application of hydration dating at the Maymeja quarry would have to overcome two principal obstacles. First, hydration dating has been shown to be unreliable in areas with large temperature fluctuations and particularly in places where there are diurnal temperature changes (Anovitz, et al. 1999) as is certainly the case in the Chivay source area. Second, the samples from the two contexts may not be comparable because the obsidian flakes from the workshop unit Q02-2u3 are often in saturated soils as they are adjacent to a bofedal, while in contrast the obsidian at the quarry pit Q02-2u2 is in very dry sandy ash, and therefore environmental moisture is much greater in one circumstance than in another. Obsidian hydration rates are sensitive to the amount of moisture in the vicinity of the obsidian sample.