Culture and Ecology of Chaco Canyon and the San Juan Basin

242 Chaco Project SynthesisValley, a number of Chaco and Mesa Verde greathouses extended along the San Juan River from Blancoto Shiprock, as well as on the Animas and La Platarivers (Stein and McKenna 1988:Figure 13). Most ofthese sites are attributed to the late eleventh andtwelfth centuries. They found a large communityaround Aztec Ruins National Monument, and perhapsa similar large community at the Kello Blancett site tothe southwest.Like Gwinn Vivian (1990), McKenna (1991)thought that changes in subsistence (i.e., more relianceon small mammals and turkeys and a shift from flintto flour com) were taking place; he therefore concludedthat there were definite alterations in thesubsistence strategies that had earlier beginnings. Bythe Mesa Verde phase, Chaco Canyon could haverepresented an alternative to the more denselypopulated riverine communities along the San Juan; itcould have been an alternative planting area for asmall population. McKenna considered the San Juanas the regional center, with Chaco as a location withreduced population and an altered communitystructure. He could not determine whether the MesaVerde phase in the canyon represented reorganizationor increased use by additional groups, or a combinationof both. For McKenna, the Mesa Verdephase was not representative of a migration of peopleinto the Chaco area. Rather, the Mesa Verde potterythat has been found was part of an ongoing developmentand use of a regionally distinct black-on-whitehorizon style. A major problem still exists because ofthe lack of dates for excavated sites and lack ofassociation of Mesa Verde Black-on-white withconstruction.Stein and Fowler (1996) supported the idea ofcontinued use of the San Juan Basin until finalabandonment in the middle A.D. BOOs. Theyproposed that the great house complexes (with greatkivas and roads) do not represent normal living spacesfor people who had been organized in communitiesfrom the seventh through fourteenth centuries.Instead, they represent integrative architecture foreither a community or a region. In this scenario, thearchitectural manifestations have specific functionalroles in the local community. The complex in ChacoCanyon would represent a set of regional integrativearchitecture that during the early A.D. 1100s clearlyshifted away from Chaco Canyon and ended up soonthereafter in the Totah region, north of the San JuanRiver. Using data from several subareas, theyindicated the continued presence of big houses orcompounds throughout the region, and cited severalinstances in which newly constructed big houses aretied to older compounds by road segments. They didnot see a displaced Chacoan population, but rather aplanned renewal of "ritual" facilities. This renewalwas undertaken at a community and a regional scale.While older elements of the culture were important,new architectural styles (beginning with the McElmostyle of construction by A.D. 1100 to 1140) denotethe beginning of this shift. The continuity thatMcKenna argued for black-on-white ceramic types(with Mesa Verde Black-on-white being the last of thisseries) is also apparent in the architecture throughoutthe San Juan Basin and its periphery.On the basis of stylistic ceramics, architecture,and settlement patterns, Roney (1995, 1996) documentedchanges from the A.D. 1100s through 1350 inthe larger region of the San Juan Basin. Divergencefrom the Chacoan regional network began during theearly A.D. 1100s, when northern sites adopt carbonpaint (the McElmo and Mesa Verde black-on-whites),while the south retains mineral-painted ceramics(Tularosa Black-on-white) and demonstrates a gradualevolution of sites. Thus, the earlier system thatevidenced more uniform use of Gallup and Escavadablack-on-white types and the construction of publicarchitecture (great houses, greatkivas, often connectedby roads) slowly disintegrated.During the drought from A.D. 1130 to 1180, theRed Mesa Valley, the Dutton Plateau, and the floor ofthe San Juan Basin are mostly abandoned. A numberof communities that are defined by the presence ofMesa Verde ceramics are found along the Rio Puercoat this time. Three communities that had been establishedearlier (Chaco Canyon, and the Guadalupeand Salado communities) continued, albeit withgreatly reduced populations. Roney (1996) consideredthe possibility that these were abandoned by A.D.1150. Between A.D. 1150 and 1200, however, newsettlements were begun (e.g., at Torreon and JonesCanyon, and possibly at Ojito and Coots Ridge).Separated from these communities by vast distancesare others that survived on Chacra Mesa, along theSan Juan River, and in the Chuska Valley, and a fewto the east of the Rio Puerco Valley. Based on