Culture and Ecology of Chaco Canyon and the San Juan Basin

Basketmaker III to Pueblo I 115people living in different sites specialized in theprocurement and utilization of their products-ideasthat were being fully explored during the 1980s, whenmost of the analyses were completed.Were the horticultural and hunting strategiesadequate to sustain the populations estimated to havelived in the canyon at this time? Schelberg (1982a:115-118) reviewed population estimates compiled byseveral investigators. He used Gwinn Vivian's(1974b) estimates of the amount of irrigable land,Loose and Lyon's (1976a) estimates of the productivityof Chaco fields, and Jorde's (1973) estimateof the number of acres needed to support a person,plus models for fallow, to propose that a population ofaround 2,013 to 2,416 could have been supportedwithin the canyon. Based on these estimates, bothHayes's (1981) Basketmaker III popuiation estimate of1,053 and Pueblo I estimate of 1,674 people couldhave been supported by agriculture. There wouldhave been no need to rely on outsiders to supplementagricultural production unless there was an unforeseenincrease in population, a crop disaster, or some fluctuationin climatic factors that affected soils and/or theamount of available water. In contrast, Akins (1985:404) suggested that the prehistoric popUlations probablyneeded to procure animal resources from outsideof the canyon at all times. She estimated that only702 persons could have been sustained by exploitinglocal rabbits and artiodactyls. Even during theBasketmaker III period, local inhabitants would havehad to look outside the canyon for additional meat.Dried meat could have been brought into the canyonfrom the larger region, either through trade or morefrequent hunting trips.Interaction with people living in the largerregion is evident. Artifacts for this period (ceramics[H. Toll and McKenna 1997], chipped stone[Cameron 1997b; Lekson 1997], bone tools [Miles1989], faunal remains [Akins 1985], ground stone[Bretemitz 1997; Wills 1997], and ornaments andminerals (Mathien 1997]) were analyzed separately.Some artifact categories suggest limited interaction;others imply more frequent communication. Analysesof construction wood, household goods, and luxuryitems shed some light on the frequency and possiblereasons for trade or long-distance procurement tripsduring the Basketmaker III-Pueblo I period.For house construction, M. Toll (1985, 1993a)found that 88 percent of the wood used was coniferous;it included a large pifion component. Theconifers tend to be local species, probably obtainedfrom side canyons and nearby mesa tops. A smallnumber of riparian species were identified. Yet onlya few of the tools used to cut these trees wererecovered; Bretemitz (1997) assigned only twogreenstone axes to this period. Greenstone is animported material, found in the Brazos Uplift ofnorth-central New Mexico, which indicates aconscious choice of an imported material for the axes.Heating pits within structures contained mostlynonconiferous species (mostly shrubby types, especiallysaltbush and greasewood), which are locallyavailable(M. Toll. 1985, 1993a). Coniferous remains(mostly juniper) rnade up less than half of the materialrecovered from these pits.Food was prepared by grinding on locallyavailable sandstone metates (Schelberg 1997), usingboth one- and two-hand manos (Cameron 1997a). Allbut five of the one-hand manos were sandstone pieces;the five quartzite manos indicate a choice of adifferent, but still local, material.Pounding tools (e.g., mauls [Bretemitz 1997])tend to be made of local sandstones. About onequarterof the hammerstones, however, were madefrom imported materials (Wills 1997). There was agradual increase in the amount of local chert and darkwood (type 1112) among these artifacts until thetransition between Basketmaker III and Pueblo I, afterwhich they decrease in number. Wills thought thatthese changes might be related to technologicalchange, population growth, diversity in materialculture, and experimentation that was taking place atthat time. The Basketmaker III-Pueblo I sites also hadmore quartzite hammerstones, which then decreased infrequency through time. In contrast, the relative useof petrified wood was lower in these early times, butincreased through time.Wills proposed a correlation between the use ofthese two types of materials. Quartzite is a toughermaterial and would be excellent for the initial flakingof cores to prepare other tools made of chert orchalcedony. Some petrified wood may have been used