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Hispanic American Historical Review 84.1 (2004) 136-137



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Conquest and Catastrophe: Changing Rio Grande Pueblo Settlement Patterns in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries. By Elinore Barrett. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2002. Maps. Tables. Appendixes. Notes. Bibliography. Index. xi, 180 pp. Cloth, $39.95.

The Spanish conquest and colonization of New Mexico first received scholarly attention in the late nineteenth century and continues to interest scholars today. The purpose of this study is to document shifts in settlement patterns in the sedentary Pueblo communities of the Rio Grande Valley and nearby regions, from the first Spanish incursion through the reconquest of New Mexico by Diego de Vargas in the 1690s. Barrett combines archaeological site records with Spanish historical accounts to show changes in the location of settlements, particularly refugee communities, along with the abandonment of many village sites. Tables correlate archaeological site record data with historical accounts, and maps identify the communities abandoned and the ones still extant at the end of the seventeenth century.

Barrett provides a convenient summary of the information on settlement [End Page 136] occupation, abandonment, and temporary or permanent relocation. However, the book lacks sufficient explanation for the causes of changing settlement patterns, even though the author dedicates a chapter to this topic. Barrett is most effective in describing the sequence of drought in the region, which she links to the limited information on famine. She makes use of previously published estimates of rainfall levels based on the tree ring data. However, she fails to explain the methodology used to extrapolate rainfall levels and temperatures from tree rings and expects the reader to accept this information without question.

Barrett enumerates other factors for shifts in settlement patterns, including the disruption of the traditional Pueblo economy caused by labor and tribute demands, raids by hostile groups such as the Apaches, and disease. Although there are studies of the historical demography of the Pueblo and other native peoples in the Southwest and the Americas, Barrett does not avail herself of them, and her discussion of disease and depopulation as a cause for the contraction in the number of Pueblo communities is correspondingly inadequate.

On balance, this is a useful, if flawed, book that will appeal primarily to specialists in the study of colonial New Mexico. Barrett has brought together important information in a convenient format. However, it will be up to others to interpret the data.



Robert H. Jackson
Texas Faculty Association

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