Chaco Canyon Project Publications

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To improve management and interpretation of Chaco Canyon National Monument (now Chaco Culture National Historical Park) and to increase knowledge about the environment and its effects on cultural adaptations in the Chaco drainage of northwestern New Mexico (Figure l.l), a multidisciplinary research project was initiated in 1969 by the National Park Service, in cooperation with the University of New Mexico (Maruca 1982). Fieldwork began in 1971 with a sample transect survey, followed by a...

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To improve management and interpretation of Chaco Canyon National Monument (now Chaco Culture National Historical Park) and to increase knowledge about the environment and its effects on cultural adaptations in the Chaco drainage of northwestern New Mexico (Figure l.l), a multidisciplinary research project was initiated in 1969 by the National Park Service, in cooperation with the University of New Mexico (Maruca 1982). Fieldwork began in 1971 with a sample transect survey, followed by a...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Frances Joan Mathien.

To improve management and interpretation of Chaco Canyon National Monument (now Chaco Culture National Historical Park) and to increase knowledge about the environment and its effects on cultural adaptations in the Chaco drainage of northwestern New Mexico (Figure l.l), a multidisciplinary research project was initiated in 1969 by the National Park Service, in cooperation with the University of New Mexico (Maruca 1982). Fieldwork began in 1971 with a sample transect survey, followed by a...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Thomas C. Windes. S. Berger. D. Ford. C. Stevenson.

The relationship of the small houses or villages to the contemporary large towns or greathouses of the Bonito phase (A.D. 900-1150) has long provoked discussion among archeologists (e.g., Kluckhohn 1939; Vivian 1970b. 1989, 1990) and was no less intriguing to the Chaco Project staff. Although attention has generally focused on greathouses as pivotal for deciphering sociopolitical complexity during the Chacoan Phenomenon, small-house occupation and the communities in which both large and small...

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The relationship of the small houses or villages to the contemporary large towns or greathouses of the Bonito phase (A.D. 900-1150) has long provoked discussion among archeologists (e.g., Kluckhohn 1939; Vivian 1970b. 1989, 1990) and was no less intriguing to the Chaco Project staff. Although attention has generally focused on greathouses as pivotal for deciphering sociopolitical complexity during the Chacoan Phenomenon, small-house occupation and the communities in which both large and small...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Marcia L. Truell.

Site 29SJ 627 is located on the west side of Chaco Canyon, directly opposite the Park's Visitor Center and just north of the Chaco and Fajada (Vicenti) wash confluence (Figures 1.1-1.3). The site is situated in the middle of an alluvial plain in an area referred to as Marcia's Rincon, bounded on the west by South Mesa and limited on the north and south by two, low, unnamed ridges (Figure 1.4). During the Chaco Project's 1974 and 1975 excavations, 25 rooms, portions of seven pit structures,...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Frances Joan Mathien.

The excavation and analyses of material culture remains from site 29SJ627 provide a wealth of data upon which to base interpretations of life in a small site in Chaco Canyon, especially during the A.D. 800s through mid A.D. 1100s. The 7,401 field specimen numbers assigned to the artifacts and samples only hint at this unusual volume of material. These data were recovered from all areas of the site (Figure 1.1) and represent several construction and use periods. Because of the size of the site...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Peter J. McKenna. H. Wolcott Toll. Catherine M. Cameron. William B. Gillespie. Judith Miles.

Chaco Canyon, located in the approximate center of the San Juan Basin of northwestern New Mexico (Figure 1.1), has been the focus of archeological research for nearly a century. Many large and small sites have been investigated. Figure 1.2 indicates the location of sane of the large sites within and just outside Chaco Culture National Historical Park. Research carried out by the Chaco Project focused on the development of the Chaco Anasazi from the earliest appearance of nan through the...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Thomas C. Windes.

Pueblo Alto is one of 13 or 14 greathouses in Chaco Canyon in which the Bonito phase had been widely identified. Altos classification as Chacoan greathouse includes the complex of traits that Powers et al. (1983:15-16) have used to classify “Chacoan structures.” These traits include large site, size large rooms with high ceilings, massive stone, core and veneer walls, and construction of large-scale units indicative of complex planning efforts. In this report, the Bonito phase is not restricted...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Thomas C. Windes. H. Wolcott Toll.

This volume is devoted primarily to the description of the field work conducted at Pueblo Alto (Figure 1.1). Over 4,700 pages of field notes and 5,500 photographs cover the excavation of 13 rooms and 2 kivas at Pueblo Alto along with the description of all tests. These investigations have been reorganized and distilled here. To the interested reader some idea of the magnitude of the notes for Pueblo Alto is suggested by comparison with Judd’s work at Pueblo Bonito that netted two shoe boxes full...

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Analyses of the material culture and ethnobotanical materials recovered from the excavations at Pueblo Alto are presented here, with the exception of the coprolite, pollen, and human parasite results, which were published previously (Clary 1984; Cully 1985; Reinhard and Clary 1986; respectively). These analyses covered span of many years and were interspersed with reports and field work involving other sites of the Chaco Project. For the most part, analyses of the Pueblo Alto materials were...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Thomas C. Windes. H. Wolcott Toll.

This volume is devoted primarily to the description of the field work conducted at Pueblo Alto (Figure 1.1). Over 4,700 pages of field notes and 5,500 photographs cover the excavation of 13 rooms and 2 kivas at Pueblo Alto along with the description of all tests. These investigations have been reorganized and distilled here. To the interested reader some idea of the magnitude of the notes for Pueblo Alto is suggested by comparison with Judd’s work at Pueblo Bonito that netted two shoe boxes full...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Thomas C. Windes. Frances Joan Mathien.

This document provides a microfiche version of all appendixes from volumes I-III of the "Investigations at the Pueblo Alto Complex, Chaco Canyon, New Mexico" publications.

DOCUMENT Full-Text Thomas C. Windes.

Analyses of the material culture and ethnobotanical materials recovered from the excavations at Pueblo Alto are presented here, with the exception of the coprolite, pollen, and human parasite results, which were published previously (Clary 1984; Cully 1985; Reinhard and Clary 1986; respectively). These analyses covered span of many years and were interspersed with reports and field work involving other sites of the Chaco Project. For the most part, analyses of the Pueblo Alto materials were...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Nancy J. Akins.

The study of human remains offers a unique perspective on prehistory. Environmental reconstructions can approximate the constraints of life in a particular area, but the examination of the human remains can measure the success of a population's adaptation to those conditions. Mortuary practices are a part of the cultural system that has seldom been studied by Southwestern archeologists. Too often biological and cultural aspects are treated as independent topics. The biological analyses do not...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Peter J. McKenna. Marcia L. Truell.

Chaco Canyon was made a national park to preserve and protect its spectacularly large ruins. There are about a dozen large sites in the central park area--" about a dozen," because there is considerable disagreement about the line separating the named tourist attractions ("towns") from the thousand or more smaller, largely anonymous Anasazi ruins ("small sites") that are also part of Chaco's archaeology. Some sites with names and interpretive trails are actually not that large; some of the...

DOCUMENT Full-Text David M. Brugge.

This report on the Navajo archeology of the Chaco region was planned as the final major contribution deriving from the Navajo studies conducted by the Division of Chaco Research. There is some work not finished as this is written. Whether it will see print before or after this is an imponderable, but it cannot be taken into account in my final summation in Part III, Concluding Remarks. Part III will have to stand as the primary effort at synthesis of the Navajo studies accomplished under the...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Frances Joan Mathien.

This paper is conceived as a summary and review of recent paleoenvironmental research in Chaco. While the orientation is toward reviewing information of potential significance in modelling past human adaptations, discussion of archeological evidence of past adapt ions is minimal. The focus is on characterizing the general climatic and environmental framework, which confronted human populations at different times in the past, and on suggesting revisions of previous interpretations where...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Peter J. McKenna. H. Wolcott Toll.

In the summer of 1974, the Chaco Center, now the Division of Cultural Research, National Park Service, began its second season of field excavations in Chaco Canyon. The inventory survey of the canyon was essentially complete, and research emphasis had shifted to the study of Pueblo I sites. Excavation of 29SJ1360 (hereafter called 1360) was undertaken as part of an effort to examine the full temporal range of the canyon's Anasazi occupation. As it happened, excavations at 1360 did not produce...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Stephen H. Lekson. William B. Gillespie. Thomas C. Windes.

After a century of excavation and survey in Chaco Canyon, a new study of Chacoan architecture should be redundant. Oddly enough, this is not true. The most extensive field studies of Chacoan building were the earliest (Holsinger 1901; Jackson 1878), undertaken before the development of tree-ring dating; while the most important dendrochronological studies (Bannister 1965; Robinson et al. 1974) were accomplished without the benefit of concurrent fieldwork. Chaco's archaeological literature,...

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This entire volume is devoted to research undertaken on the Chaco Phenomenon. Most of the papers herein were presented at two symposia sponsored by the National Park Service's Chaco Center at the Society for American Archaeology Annual Meetings in San Diego in May 1981. The symposia were titled "Past Environment and Subsistence at Chaco Canyon, New Mexico," chaired by William Gillespie, and "Chacoan Prehistory: The Implications of a Regional Perspective, chaired by myself. The purpose of the...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Jeffery S. Dean. Peter J. McKenna. Richard L. Warren. Florence Hawley Ellis.

Chetro Ketl is one of the largest ruins in Chaco Culture National Historical Park, New Mexico. The visible architecture of Chetro Ketl dates from the early eleventh to the early twelfth centuries A. D. The rear wall of the building is about 480' long. The ruins cover almost 3 acres, with almost half of that area consisting of enclosed plaza. Chetro Ketl, at its largest, had between 200 and 225 ground-floor rooms, and a total of 450 to 550 rooms on all stories. Twelve kivas are currently visible,...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Robert P. Powers. William B. Gillespie. Stephen H. Lekson.

Outside Chaco Canyon, in the expansive San Juan Basin, Chacoan students have long noted the presence of sites exhibiting architecture and ceramics characteristic of the major Chaco Canyon sites. Chacoan architecture also occurs at sites with assemblages dominated by San Juan and Chuskan series ceramics. More recently, it has become apparent that many of these outlying sites occur within major Anasazi site aggregations or communities and are linked to Chaco Canyon via prehistoric roads. The term...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Mary Maruca.

This report describes development of the Chaco Project, a long-term program of archaeological and historical research centered on the cultural resources in Chaco Canyon, New Mexico. The text summarizes the goals and objectives of the program and how it came to be managed. The early years of the project are described, including information from interviews with some of the individuals who shaped the project. Also described are problems which later emerged as the program grew and changed. This...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Alden C. Hayes. David M. Brugge. James W. Judge.

The Chaco Center became operational in 1971 as a joint venture of the U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service, and the University of New Mexico. Both organizations had been involved with the Chaco for many years prior to that time. Chaco Canyon National Monument was established in 1907 to protect and preserve its numerous, outstanding archeological resources for the benefit of the public. It has been administered by the National Park Service since 1916. The University of New...

DOCUMENT Full-Text David M. Brugge.

The prehistory of the Chaco country will always remain a sphere dominated by the anthropological approach, for no contemporary written records of the human occupation were ever made. Any attempt to discern what took place must be reconstructed from the campsites, ruins, potsherds, and legends that supply a cloudy picture of developments and events seemingly lost in the passage of centuries. Each new generation is able to bring new tools and concepts into play in our efforts to produce an account...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Thomas C. Windes.

In the summer of l972, the Chaco Center, a research facility of the National Park Service and the University of New Mexico, implemented a proposal to intensively survey the 32 square miles composing Chaco Canyon National Monument. During the course of this survey a number of unusual sites for which there had been little previous documentation were recorded. A limited number of these sites were later classified as shrines belonging to a visual-communications network, skillfully placed to link...

DOCUMENT Full-Text James I. Ebert. Melvin L. Fowler. George J. Gumerman. Elmer Jr. Harp. Laurence D. Kruckman. Thomas R. Lyons. Allan D. Marmelstein. William Meyer. Gary W. North. Henry T. Svehlak. Louis James Tartaglia. John A. Ware. Robert K. Hitchcock.

Today the term remote sensing is generally understood as a technique for the acquisition of environmental data by means of non-contact instruments operating in various regions of the electromagnetic spectrum from air and space platforms. The resultant information may be in the form of a pictorial record or digitized data on tape. In a larger context, however, remote sensing can be considered as a discipline in and of itself with its own peculiar methods, objectives and goals. In this...