The Archaeology of Regional Interaction: Religion, Warfare, and Exchange across the American Southwest and Beyond

12: Life at the Edge

257 12 LIFE AT THE EDGE PUEBLO SETTLEMENTS IN SOUTHERN NEVADA Margaret M. Lyneis Prehistoric Pueblo settlements in southern Nevada form the westernmost tip of the traditional Southwest. On its western edge the boundary of the Southwest is sharper than on most of its periphery. In southern Nevada traditional southwestern horticulture encountered the aridity of the Mojave Desert. Here the margins of the Muddy and Virgin Rivers (Map 12.1) supported Pueblo settlements; farther west, where the desert lacks permanent streams and dependable summer rainfall, was the domain of mobile foragers. In this chapter I discuss the areas on each side of the border in southern Nevada. The record of Pueblo settlement probably begins in Basketmaker II times (Lyneis 1995), but I address subsequent periods— Basketmaker III through Pueblo II—from before A.D. 800 to about A.D. 1200. I characterize the settlements and their network of linkages in Pueblo II times and then turn to the Bonelli site, dated about A.D. 800, which demonstrates that the principal economic and social ties of the southern Nevada settlements to upland Pueblo communities to their east were long lasting. I then turn to evidence for Pueblo exploitation of the desert to the north and west of the riverine settlements and raise issues regarding the nature of their interactions with the more mobile people of the Mojave Desert. 258 Archaeology of Regional Interaction PUEBLO ARCHAEOLOGY IN SOUTHERN NEVADA: A BRIEF HISTORY Southern Nevada is not always considered part of the northern Southwest. Early synthesizers such as Harold S. Colton (1943), Winifred and Harold S. Gladwin (1934), and John McGregor (1941) were familiar with Mark Raymond Harrington’s excavations of the 1920s and 1930s in this area, although Harrington produced no detailed reports of his findings. Irwin Hayden (1930) described the excavation of Mesa House, but his report and Harrington’s shorter notes and papers (1927, 1937) soon ceased to be cited outside the region. Shutler (1961) synthesized Harrington’s work, including Civilian Conservation Corps excavations under his general supervision, undertaken before the filling of Lake Mead. Shutler encountered difficulties in locating collections and plans of sites, and he provides no easy entrée into the archaeology of the area. Many Pueblo settlements remained upstream of Lake Mead on the Muddy and Virgin Rivers after the filling of Lake Mead, but almost no work was done from the 1940s through the 1960s. In the Map 12.1. The Virgin region and its areas 259 Pueblo Settlements in Southern Nevada 1970s small-scale investigations resumed, and a new literature began (Larson and Michaelsen 1990; Lyneis 1992). SETTLEMENT PATTERNS AND PUEBLO II COMMUNITIES The southern Nevada settlements are part of the Virgin region of the northern Southwest. The Virgin region is north of the Colorado River, situated to the west of the northern part of the Kayenta region. The Virgin region includes three areas: (1) a portion of the western Colorado Plateaus, (2) the St. George Basin in southwestern Utah, and (3) the Lowland Virgin area, which includes the southern Nevada settlements (Map 12.1). The Virgin River links these areas and gives the region its name. The Pueblo settlements of the Lowland Virgin area are at low elevations , 350–550 meters, in the Mojave Desert, where they were sustained by cultivation of the floodplains of the Muddy and Virgin Rivers. Average annual rainfall is only 3–4 inches per year, of which about half falls in the winter. Neither dry farming nor runoff manipulation could sustain cultivators in the Lowland Virgin area, yet maize, squash, beans, and cotton were grown by Pueblo II times (Lyneis 1992: 72). No evidence of water management has been found, but prehistoric farmers must have used the rivers’ waters through diversion or some other form of water manipulation. These year-round streams and a growing season of more than 180 days supported their horticulture. Like other southwestern peoples, farmers supplemented their crops with wild foods, including mesquite beans, pine nuts, cactus fruits, and yucca. Their meat sources included deer, bighorn, rabbit, and a Mojave Desert specialty— desert tortoise. The nearby Virgin Mountains supported stands of pinyon , and the flanks of the Virgin, Muddy, and Mormon Mountains were cloaked with agave and yucca. The Muddy River Valley had stands of mesquite and screw-bean (Harrington 1930: 10). The habitation sites along the terrace edges and margins of the floodplains usually include the habitation and storage structures for...