The Southwest is an area which includes New Mexico and Arizona as well as parts of Texas, Colorado, Utah, Nevada, Chihuahua, and Sonora. This is a region which has a long history of agriculture based on maize (corn), beans, squash, cotton, and other plants.
In her chapter in North American Archaeology, Michelle Hegman writes:
“The region is broadly divided into three general culture areas: Hohokam/Salado in southern Arizona; Mogollon, across much of the southern and central Southwest; and Ancestral Pueblo (formerly called Anasazi) in the north.”
There is a great deal of variation in the environments found in the Southwest. Richard Woodbury, in his chapter on prehistory in the Handbook of North American Indians, writes:
“This encouraged and even necessitated the development of greatly differing lifeways in different locations, each adjusted to the resources available and taking advantage of several distinctive micro-environments.”
The fifty-year period between 1375 and 1425 CE is in the era which some archaeologists call “Aggregation” and others call the “Culminant period”. It is a period of environmental deterioration, drought, abandonment, migration, and aggregation into new communities.
Hohokam
The Hohokam, often considered the ancestors of today’s O’odham people, occupied the Phoenix and Tucson basins in southern and central Arizona. In his chapter in the Dynamics of Southwest Prehistory, Paul Fish writes:
“The Hohokam are the prehistoric farmers in central and southern Arizona below the Mogollon Rim, from the Dragoon Mountains on the east to the Growler Mountains on the west.”
Paul Fish also reports:
“Villages consist of dispersed houses and house clusters. Larger settlements are often organized around formal arrangements of plazas, ballcourts, and platform mounds.”
In their chapter on the Hohokam in the Handbook of North American Indians, George Gumerman and Emil Haury describe the Hohokam this way:
“The Hohokam lived in villages of scattered perishable brush structures constructed in shallow elongated pits with no apparent formalized village plan. Many of these villages were sustained by extremely large and complex canal systems, and the larger settlements usually had a ball court.”
In an article in American Antiquity, John McClelland writes:
“Perhaps the greatest technological achievement of the Hohokam consisted of extensive irrigation systems fed by perennial rivers in the Phoenix Basin.”
Regarding the environment of the Hohokam area, Richard Woodbury writes:
“The Hohokam area consists of low deserts except for interspersed isolated mountain areas. Extremely hot summers with long rainless periods give way to mild to cool winters with light rains. The dominant vegetation is an abundant growth of thorny shrub, cactus, and hardy trees such as mesquite, adapted to extreme dryness”
The designation Hohokam seems to be from the O’odham term Huhugam. John McClelland reports:
“The O’odham of southern Arizona have long used the term Huhugam to refer to the people who inhabited their region and who are now ‘all gone.”
During this time period (1375-1425), many of the Hohokam towns started to be abandoned. In his book Exploring Ancient Native America: An Archaeological Guide, archaeologist David Hurst Thomas notes that “once-flourishing towns were stripped and burnt.” The reason for this change is not known, but environmental problems (including the build-up of salt in the soil from irrigation) and civil warfare have been suggested. According to Gregory Schaaf, the director of the Center for Indigenous Arts and Culture, in his book Ancient Ancestors of the Southwest:
“Pima oral history tradition describes how elite Hohokam leaders became oppressive and locals drove them back to the south, as part of a liberation movement.”
At the beginning of this decline, the population of the Phoenix basin is estimated at 40-50,000. During the next 200 years, it would drop to 5,000.
Patayan
During this period, the Patayan culture flourished along the Colorado River area. This cultural tradition included permanent villages with subsistence based on flood-water agriculture. While the Patayan seemed to have developed out of Hohokam, they did not have the technological nor architectural complexity of other southwestern sedentary traditions.
Anthropologist Edward Dozier, in his chapter on the American Southwest in North American Indians in Historical Perspective, writes:
“The present Yuman-speaking populations along the lower Colorado—the Havasupai, Yavapai, Walapai, and the Yuman proper—are also believed to demonstrate a continuity of Patayan cultural characteristics; but not all authorities are agreed.”
Sinagua
The prehistoric Sinagua culture, usually dated to 700-1450 CE, was located in the Arizona mountains from present-day Flagstaff south along the Verde River Valley and its northeastern tributaries. The Sinagua people are probably among the ancestors of the Hopi.
In Arizona, the Sinagua people abandoned the Verde Valley. They migrated north and east to Anderson Mesa, Chavez Pass, and the Hopi mesas.
Pecos Pueblo
Pecos Pueblo is situated on a small mesa in the upper Pecos Valley of New Mexico. It is at an elevation of 6,950 feet.
In New Mexico, a multi-story building was constructed around the central plaza of the Pueblo of Pecos.
Poshuouinge Pueblo
In New Mexico, the Tewa constructed Poshuouinge Pueblo. The pueblo would eventually grow to about 700 ground floor rooms with two large plazas. The pueblo is mostly one- and two-stories, but there is one three-story section. The walls were built from adobe mixed with river cobbles.
With regard to farming, the people were using grid gardens: plots which are delineated by river cobbles and covered with gravel. According to David Noble, in his book Ancient Ruins of the Southwest: An Archaeological Guide:
“This stone mulch helped to conserve moisture, moderate soil temperatures, and keep down weeds. It was a clever local adaptation to farming in high, arid conditions.”
Mogollon
The Mogollon area is on the southern edge of the Colorado Plateau and extends from north-central Arizona to southwestern New Mexico.
In Arizona, the cultural sequence called Mogollon by archaeologists ends as the people abandon their homes in the mountains.
Fourmile Ruin
In Arizona, the Anasazi pueblo at Fourmile Ruin was abandoned.
Pottery
In New Mexico, Indian potters in the Tewa Basin area began making Abiquiu Black-on-gray pottery.
In New Mexico, Zuni potters began making a style of pottery known as Kechipawan Polychrome. The pottery style stems from the earlier Pinnawa Glaze-on-white style with the addition of red in the designs. According to Dwight Lanmon and Francis Harlow, in their article in American Indian Art:
“Kechipawan Polychrome vessels are decorated with very precisely drawn decorations, which include birds, much like those rendered on some contemporaneous Sikyatki Polychrome vessels from the Hopi Pueblos.”
Hopi
In Arizona, the Hopi once again abandoned their pueblo at Jackrabbit. They also abandoned their pueblo at Chevelon.
More Ancient America
Ancient America: The Richey-Roberts Clovis site (museum diary)
Ancient America: A very short overview of Clovis
Ancient America: American Indians at Rancho La Brea
Ancient America: The Great Basin Archaic
Ancient America: Colorado Prior to 6000 BCE
Ancient America: Stone Quarries
Ancient America: Florida, 1 CE to 940 CE
Ancient America: Aboriginal Mining
