Using Remote Sensing to Re-evaluate Prehistoric Land Use in Chaco Canyon, New Mexico

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Remote sensing has been used extensively the past several years to study prehistoric land use in Chaco Canyon, New Mexico. Previous land use models for Chaco predict economic activities such as agriculture and water management near some of the major sites within the canyon, and these models have been critical to understanding how land use contributed to the rapid social transformation of Chacoan society. Remote sensing methods, including ground-penetrating radar (GPR), magnetic gradiometry, LiDAR, low-altitude aerial photography, and structure-from-motion photogrammetry, have produced new information about these economic activities, including evidence of buried and remodeled land use features. The results from our remote sensing investigations point to a much more complex land use history than suggested by previous models. This poster highlights some of these recent results and interpretations.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 23661