Fortified Settlements as Forces of Social Change Among the Ancestral Pueblo Peoples of the Northern San Juan Region

Summary

The sociopolitical landscape of the ancestral Pueblo peoples residing in the northern San Juan region of the American Southwest was influenced and shaped in significant ways by a variety of pressures associated with the construction and habitation of fortified communities during periods of heightened social tensions and increased violence. Evidence of the formation of fortified communities and the implementation of various defensive strategies dates from at least three major periods of occupation within this region: the Basketmaker III period (A.D. 500 ̶ 750), the Pueblo II period (A.D. 900 ̶ 1150), and the Pueblo III period (A.D. 1150 ̶ the early A.D. 1280s).

This paper explores the societal effects of defensive strategies employed during these periods, which, during the earlier periods, included the construction of wooden stockades that surrounded individual farmsteads or hamlets and, during the final period, included the aggregation of populous communities and the construction of fortified villages near springs in protective alcoves and on canyon rims. Among ancestral Pueblo communities of this region, diverse environmental and societal pressures necessitated the construction and habitation of fortified settlements, an adaptation that, in turn, strained existing social systems and forced the development of more complex and integrated sociopolitical organization.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)   •
• The social lives of forts: Reconsidering the social construction of ancient fortified settlements and their diverse roles in political organization

Keywords

Spatial Coverage