To Fight or Not to Fight: Comparing Evidence of Violence on Human Skeletal Remains at Sites in and around Chaco Canyon and the Mimbres Region

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The intent of this presentation is to compare patterns of violence on human skeletal remains recovered from archaeological sites in the San Juan Basin associated with Chaco Canyon and the Mimbres region in the US Southwest. The Chaco sites date to AD 850–1300, while the Mimbres sites date to AD 650–1300. Bioarchaeological signatures of violence on the remains have been identified and standardized methodologies have been developed by the authors as part of a collaborative effort. The patterns of traumatic injury are compared in each region to assess similarities and differences in the approach to violent interaction during times of stress. At Chaco, 28.6% of those studied had at least one healed cranial injury with evidence of lethal violence, while 10.5% of those studied had healed trauma at Mimbres with no lethal violence. Additionally, 33.0% of females had trauma at Chaco and only 5.0% did at Mimbres, indicating differences in gendered participation in conflict. Harrod suggests that violence in Chaco Canyon was used as a means of social control, while Baustian suggests that socially sanctioned cultural practices helped to prevent or at least reduce violence among the Mimbres people.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts   •
• Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)

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Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 37201.0