A Comparison of Ceramic Function between the Virgin Branch and Kayenta Ancestral Puebloan Cultures

Summary

The Virgin Branch culture is the least understood of the Ancestral Puebloan branches. It is considered most similar to the Kayenta branch; however, there are significant differences between the two, particularly for the Virgin Branch settlements located in the lowland region of southern Nevada. Compared to the Kayenta people, who lived primarily in small settlements and relied on dry farming techniques, the lowland Virgin people occupied more aggregated settlements and relied on irrigation farming. In this poster, we compare data obtained from whole vessels recovered from both the lowland Virgin and Kayenta regions, to explore how these differences in settlement and subsistence patterns are reflected in the ceramic assemblages, and what the ceramic data can tell us about how these differences impacted their social organizations.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 81st Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL (2016)   •
• Archaeology of the Virgin Branch Puebloan Culture

Keywords

Spatial Coverage