The Ancestral Puebloan Community of Alkali Ridge: Investigating The "Prudden Unit" Paradigm

Summary

The 2017 Alkali Ridge Data Modernization Project completed an intensive survey of 10 Ancestral Pueblo habitation sites within the Alkali Ridge National Historic Landmark as part of the ongoing collaboration between NMSU and the National Park Service to modernize data and conduct research. The 2017 fieldwork season focused on recording small residential sites in close proximity to community centers to examine the role small satellite habitations played in the Pueblo II-III period landscape of Alkali Ridge. We speculate that there may have been a regional shift in architectural patterns of the Alkali Ridge community that differ from those seen in the Mesa Verde core region. By analyzing the "Prudden Unit" archetype at Alkali Ridge, there is potential to demonstrate variation that occurred amongst small residential sites of the same unit type. This would permit a better understanding of the differential placement and function of these sites within the local community landscape. This poster will summarize the 2017 project data collected, as well as provide the basis to future research in examining potential functional variability of "Prudden Unit" sites in relationship to the Alkali Ridge community landscape.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 83rd Annual Meeting, Washington, DC (2018)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 21424