Results from Ground Surveys in the Southern San Juan Basin and the Identification of Additional Chacoan Regional Roads

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Several ongoing large-scale ground surveys in the southern San Juan Basin suggest that previously unmapped Chacoan roads may cross from Chaco Wash to Lobo Mesa. In addition to the South Road three more roads have been identified. One road extends from Chaco Canyon through South Gap and an additional 40 km southwest to the Dalton Pass great house community. The second road is approximately 30 km long and connects the Kin Bineola and Standing Rock great house communities. The third is the Kin Hochoi East Road which is now thought to extend to the northeast from the Kin Hochoi community 55 km to the Peach Springs community. These long regional roads are defined by the alignment of numerous large and small architectural sites and long linear sherd scatters. The Kin Bineola to Standing Rock Road does not lead directly to the great houses and recently collected data suggests that it is considerably longer. In addition, it does not enter Chaco Canyon. A hypothetical projection of the Kin Hochoi East Road also indicates it would not enter Chaco Canyon. These roads and other east to west oriented roads indicate that roads to Chaco may be limited to those already known.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 86th Annual Meeting, Online (2021)   •
• SAA 2021: General Sessions

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 32260