The Geoarchaeology of Late Prehistoric Irrigation in Central Utah

Summary

In 1928, Harvard archaeologist Noel Morss observed ancient irrigation systems in central Utah during fieldwork that first defined the Fremont culture. Instances of Fremont irrigation are known, but perceptions of the Fremont as a small-scale society of indigenous mixed foragers and farmers delayed empirical evaluation of Morss’s report. Fieldwork, beginning in 2010 and continuing, now identifies a complete irrigation system 4.5 miles long bringing water from 8,500’ to a 90-acre field at 7,100’ on the east slopes of Boulder Mountain, overlooking Capitol Reef National Park. Fieldwork includes excavations exposing subsurface canals, experimental archaeology on the costs of system construction and maintenance, magnetometer imaging, and dating of ditch sediments using optically stimulated luminescence (OSL). Exposures dated thus far identify irrigation and construction episodes from A.D. 1500 – 1700 during the Late Prehistoric period, well after the presumed demise of the Fremont. No Spanish entered Utah until A.D. 1776, and our research area did not see Euro-American settlement until A.D. 1880. The implications of our findings offer support for Fremont - Late Prehistoric continuity, and perhaps post-Fremont integration among Fremont and Puebloan histories and peoples: the Fremont of the Southwest.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage