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3. History of Archaeological Investigations on the Pajarito Plateau
- University of New Mexico Press
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69 T he Pajarito Plateau has been home to ancestral Keresan and Tewa Indians for several centuries. Their oral history points to a prehistoric line dividing them somewhere north of the Rito de los Frijoles (Bandelier ; Harrington a:, –; Hewett :; Stevenson :–).Understanding the development of these two groups in an area that has had use from the Archaic period through the present is based on both ethnological and archaeological research. This chapter summarizes archaeological research carried out since the discovery of prehistoric occupation of the Pajarito Plateau and indicates changes in research perspectives during the past years. The area within nine .' USGS quads (Valle Toledo, Guaje Mountain, Puyé, Bland, Frijoles, White Rock, Cañada, Cochiti Dam, and Montoso Peak) defines the boundaries of interest in this chapter.Within this area are the Pajarito Plateau and part of the Caja del Rio Plateau along the eastern boundary of Bandelier National Monument (the portions of Map . south of Santa Clara Canyon and east of the center of Valles Caldera). In addition to published literature and unpublished reports on file with the NPS, files from the New Mexico Cultural Resources Information System (NMCRIS) were searched for information relating to surveys and excavations.Many of the small-scale cultural resources management studies, for example,timber sales (Santa Fe National Forest),road construction (New Mexico State Highway Department), C H A P T E R T H R E E History of Archaeological Investigations on the Pajarito Plateau Frances Joan Mathien or power lines (Public Service Company of New Mexico), covered limited acreage, and clearance reports were brief. This chapter concentrates on major archaeological projects , organized into several subsections based on types of work and eras of research. I describe, summarize, and briefly evaluate these investigations based on the success with which they met their goals relative to the context of contemporaneous knowledge and practice. Reconnaissance Investigations (1879–1905) Anthropological studies by the federal government, archaeological organizations, and interested individuals began three decades after the Territory of New Mexico was acquired by the United States in . The need to document contemporaneous Native American cultures and preserve evidence of their past was recognized by scholars and laymen alike (Powell :xv). Various groups worked through several channels to create the Antiquities Act of . The establishment of Bandelier National Monument in set aside a portions of the Pajarito Plateau to ensure the preservation of this cultural heritage. Several men deserve credit for collecting the initial data that led to this achievement. In , –, and James Stevenson included the area between Santa Clara Pueblo and Cochiti Pueblo in his explorations,sponsored by the Bureau of American Ethnology (BAE).Numerous and various types of archaeological sites, including large and small pueblos, cavate dwellings,associated shrines,petroglyphs and pictographs, as well as footpaths were located and mapped (Stevenson a,b).Observations during visits to Cochiti,Santo Domingo, and Santa Clara pueblos were compared with the archaeological remains. Stevenson (:–) recorded the Cochiti name“Gunuye”(place where customs and rites are prescribed) for the large site in the Rito de los Frijoles. He recognized his limited data did not warrant definitive inferences about prehistoric behavior. Documents written by early Spanish explorers and settlers up through Mexican governance provided considerable information that was examined, evaluated, and used by Adolph Bandelier, whose work was sponsored by the Archaeological Institute of America (AIA) from until (Bandelier ,,a,b).Bandelier’s informal survey and ethnohistorical interpretations covered the area from Chamita and San Juan Pueblo to Peña Blanca and Cochiti Pueblo (Bandelier ).Map . presents his sketch maps of the area, and Table . (pp. –) lists the sites he described. He recorded small mounds in the area of Puyé, on the Mesa del Pajarito, at the foot of Potrero del Alamo, on the Potrero de las Casas, and on Potrero Chato or Capulin near Ha-a-tze, or San Miguel. Many of the small sites had black-on-white, grayware, and corrugated sherds; Bandelier considered these sites to be older than the large pueblos where glazewares were found. He discounted an alternative explanation that these represented seasonal variation in settlement because he considered the different pottery styles found on their surfaces unlikely to have been used by a single population. Bandelier () noted that cavate-site (sites in which rooms had been excavated out of the cliff face) distributions correlated with the volcanic formations into which they had been carved. For the Puyé area, he concluded that both pueblo sites, Puyé and Shufinne, would have been occupied...
