PREFACE

Shelley (1994) has proposed a general model of Archaic land use for the Llano Estacado and adjacentPecos Valley. He suggests that in these areas, the limited occurrence of reliable surface water incombination with the relative homogeneity of the environment results in an oasis type landscape in whichplant and animal resources tend to be clumped and separated by broad expanses of less hospitable land(Shelley 1994:373). Given these conditions, Shelley argues that hunter-gatherers moved seasonally fromnode-to-node, and that this pattern would have produced “relatively continuous and intensivearchaeological deposits at the nodes with transient and extensive deposits between nodes” (1994:383).Although lacking in specifics, the “oasis” model probably provides a general description of themovements of hunter-gatherer groups in the areas east of the Pecos River, and possibly in the broadstretches of grassland in the northern part of the region. In the latter area, Mobley (1979, 1981) arguesthat, during both the Archaic and Ceramic periods, hunter-gatherers established semi-permanentbasecamps in rockshelters along the Pecos River and its major tributaries. He suggests that foragers fromthose basecamps collected a variety of plant and animal resources from four vegetation zones: riparian,mixed shrub, pinyon-juniper, and grassland. As all four of these vegetation zones are within closeproximity to the river, Mobley contends that the annual movement of these groups was probably restrictedlargely to a core area within a radius of 10-12 miles from the basecamp.Schelberg and Akins (1987) challenge this interpretation, arguing that the faunal materials from the threerockshelter sites investigated by Mobley suggest a late spring through early fall occupation. Based on thisand other evidence, they provide a convincing argument that there is no evidence for a semi-permanentoccupation at the Los Esteros sites and that the area was used by hunter-gatherers on a seasonal oroccasional basis. As Mobley’s (1981) survey data also document short-term residential occupation atplaya basins in the grasslands, the available data suggest that hunter-gatherer groups in this areaemployed a more mobile foraging strategy.In the southwestern and west-central parts of the region of the Pecos, vegetation communities are arrayedalong an elevation gradient rising from the Pecos River to the crests of the Guadalupe, Sacramento, andCapitan Mountains. These communities are cross-cut by riparian vegetation along the major tributaries ofthe Pecos. For these areas, seasonal moves along the drainages to exploit resources at different elevationsis the more likely pattern. Although Katz and Katz (1985) argue that the late Archaic settlement patternin the Brantley Reservoir area was riverine focused, those sites together with Honest Injun Cave(Applegarth 1976) and Hooper Canyon Cave (Roney 1995), are consistent with this suggested pattern ofmovement. The Archaic occupations at the Sunset Archaic Site and Tintop Cave (Wiseman 1996), LosMolinos (Wiseman 2004), and Townsend West (Akins 2003) may indicate a similar pattern for theRoswell area.Sebastian and Larralde (1989:85) suggest that intensification of wild resource procurement near the endof the late Archaic and into the Ceramic period was accompanied by a shift toward a collector strategy;that is, toward a strategy emphasizing logistical mobility. This postulated shift in the settlement patternmay have been facilitated by a reduction in the size of the territories utilized by hunter-gatherers as aresult of increased population packing. Decreased residential mobility may also have been a necessaryprecursor to the adoption of cultivation as an alternative intensification strategy (Wills 1988:41).4-51