Utah Archaeology 1990

Pre-formative cultural affiliation in Glen Canyon - A response to Reed

COMMENTS 141 Utah Anthropological Papers No. 110.. Salt Lake City. Jennings, Jesse D. 1978 Prehistory of Utah and the Eastern Great Basin. University of Utah Anthropological Papers No. 98. Salt Lake City. 1980 Cowboy Cave. University of Utah Anthropological Papers No. 104. Salt Lake City. Morris, Earl H., and Robert F. Burgh 1954 Basket Maker II Sites Near Durango, Colorado. Carnegie Institution of Washington, Publication 604. Washington, D.C. Reed, Alan D., and Ronald E. Kainer 1988 The Tamarron Site, 5LP326. Southwestern Lore 44 (1 and 2): 1-47. Reed, Alan D., and Stan A. McDonald 1988 Archaeological Investigations at Three Lithic Scatters and Eight Culturally Peeled Tree Sites Along the West Dolores Road, Montezuma and Dolores Counties, Colorado. Submitted to the National Park Service, Interagency Archaeological Service, Denver. Richens, Lane, and Richard K. Talbot 1989 Sandy Ridge: An Aceramic Habitation Site in Southeastern Utah. Utah Archaeology 1989 2(l):77-88. Thomas, David Hurst 1978 Arrowheads and Atlatl Darts: How the Stones Got the Shaft. American Antiquity 43:461-472. PRE-FORMATIVE CULTURAL AFFILIATION IN GLEN CANYON: A RESPONSE TO REED Phil R. Geib, Navajo Nation Archaeology Department, Northern Arizona University, Post Office Box 6013, Flagstaff, Arizona 86011 PRE-FORMATIVE BOW AND ARROW TECHNOLOGY Reed (1990) questions the vattdity of using arrow points in pre-Formative contexts to make cultural (ethnic) assignments, and in so doing casts doubt upon Geib and Bungart's (1989) claim that an ancestral Fremont cultural group occupied the Sunny Beaches site in the central Glen Canyon region. Reed's (1990) critique is based on several recently accumulated archaeological facts: the recovery of arrow points from two aceramic sites in southwestern Colorado (Reed and Kainer 1978; Reed and McDonald 1988), and the finding of arrow points from a pre-Formative period pithouse near Moab, Utah (Richens and Talbot 1989). From these findings, Reed concludes that the bow and arrow cannot be used to distinguish between ancestral Fremont and ancestral Anasazi (i.e., Basketmaker II), and consequently that the cultural affiliation of the Sunny Beaches site should be regarded as unknown. As Reed observes, the Tamarron Site (Reed and Kainer 1978) is undated. Lacking secure chronological placement, this site does not necessarily support Reed's argument that Basketmaker II people used the bow and arrow, despite the presence of probable arrow points. Granted, there are architectural simUarities between the Tamarron pithouse and the weU-dated structures of Talus VUlage and the Fatts Creek shelters (Morris and Burgh 1954). Since abundant dart points but no arrow points or remains of bows or arrows came from these sites, however, it could be argued that the Tamarron site postdates Talus VUlage and the FaUs Creek shelters and represents a continuation of house construction technique into Basketmaker III. Site 5DL896 provides more convincing evidence for bow and arrow use during Basketmaker II, with eight arrow points from a stratum radiocarbon dated between A.D. 130 and 430 (the calibrated date range of two averaged determinations, Reed and McDonald 1988:88-89). A potential point of contention with this evidence is the "old wood problem" since the dating is based on wood charcoal (a hearth sample and loose charcoal from the stratum). SmUey's (1985) investigation of 142 UTAH ARCHAEOLOGY 1990 Basketmaker II chronometrics on Black Mesa reveals that age overestimation is endemic to radiocarbon dates on wood and cannot be easUy dismissed. For discussion purposes, let us assume that all dating problems have been resolved and it is indeed that case that the bow and arrow was in use by Basketmaker II groups in southwestern Colorado during the later part of the pre-Formative period (ca. A.D. 200-500). Matson (n.d.) questions whether the Durango Basketmaker II material (by which he means the remains reported by Morris and Burgh [1954] as well as the Tamarron Site) should be classified as part of the core Basketmaker II culture or as a related variant. Matson argues that the projectUe points (dart-sized forms), basketry, sandals, and houseforms distinguish the Durango Basketmaker II from the Basketmaker II of the Cedar Mesa-Marsh Pass-Black Mesa region, which he refers to as the "White Dog" Basketmaker II Mowing Lipe (1970:93-94). In this context, pre-Formative use of the bow and arrow in southwestern Colorado might denote another regional difference within Basketmaker II materials. Thus, the general claim that the Basketmaker II Anasazi did not use the bow and arrow would be incorrect. A more restricted claim, that the White Dog Basketmaker II in particular did not employ the bow and arrow appears vaUd. If this restricted claim holds true, then bow and arrow technology might still be used to differentiate ancestral Fremont sites from Basketmaker II sites in the Glen Canyon region. What about the arrow points from the pre-Formative pithouse of Sandy Ridge (Richens and Talbot 1989)? Although favoring a Basketmaker II affiliation, the authors leave this issue open, stating that "the site presents interesting data for future research on contacts between, or development of, early Fremont and Anasazi groups of the northern Colorado Plateau" (Richens and Talbot 1989:87). Setting aside the bow and arrow issue for now, I wUl examine another aspect of material culture that might be informative of cultural differences during the pre-Formative period. PRE-FORMATIVE BASKETRY Assuming for the sake of argument that bow and arrow technology cannot be used to differentiate ancestral Fremont and Basketmaker II groups, then who where the pre-Formative occupants of the Sunny Beaches site? I wUl examine this question using basketry from sites adjacent to Sunny Beaches and in nearby canyons of the Escalante River basin. Reed (1990) acknowledges that basketry technology should be used in future efforts to distinguish Proto-Fremont from Basketmaker II occupations. Although no basketry was recovered from the open Sunny Beaches site, two protected sites in the same canyon yielded pre-Formative period basketry. One of these sites is Bechan Cave, located about 1.2 km east of Sunny Beaches. Cultural Period III at this site is bracketed by dates of 2640 ± 50 and 2080 ± 140 years B.P. (Agenbroad et al. 1989:343, 350). Based on the caUbrated 2 sigma age ranges, this period could extend from B.C. 900 to A.D. 230. Cultural remains attributable to this layer are few, but include a coUed basket fragment with a whole-rod and bundle stacked foundation (Agenbroad et al. 1989:343). The second site, 42Ka2737, is a smaU alcove located about 1.7 km upstream from Sunny Beaches. A basket fragment with a split-rod and bundle stacked foundation was recovered from the surface of this site. This fragment has a C-13 corrected radiocarbon age of 1720 ± 140 years B.P. (Beta-31974). The possible caUbrated midpoints for this sample are A.D. 265, 281, or 333, whUe the 1 sigma age range is A.D. 130-440 and the 2 sigma age range is A.D. 0-620. Additional radiocarbon dated pre-Formative basketry assemblages come from two sites in nearby canyons of the Escalante River basin. Triangle Cave in Harris Wash (Fowler 1963:33-38) has an aceramic cultural stratum that yielded two complete bowl-shaped baskets: one with a half-rod foundation and the other with a half-rod and bundle stacked foundation (Fowler 1963:62). A recently submitted sample of corn from this stratum has a caUbrated radiocarbon age of A.D. 244, with a 1 sigma range of A.D. 128-382, and a 2 sigma range of A.D. 60-440 (Geib 1990). Level II of the Alvey Site in Coyote Gulch contains both aceramic and ceramic strata from which 13 close coUed COMMENTS 143 baskets or basketry fragments were recovered (Gunnerson 1959:50-109). The foundations of this coUection include: five with half-rod and bundle stacked, three with one-rod and bundle stacked, one with two-rod and bundle, one with two whole rods, and two unidentified. A corn sample from this level has a caUbrated radiocarbon age of A.D. 367, with a 1 sigma age range of A.D. 244-425, and a 2 sigma age range of A.D. 130-540 (Geib 1990). Pre-Formative basketry from sites south and east of the Escalante River basin on the opposite side of the Colorado River is generally distinctive. At these other sites, such as Sand Dune Cave (Lindsay et al. 1968:97), the Moqui Canyon sites of Rehab Center, Bernheimer Alcove, and Honeycomb Alcove (Sharrock et al. 1963:208-209), and sites in Grand Gulch (Morris and Burgh 1941; Weltfish 1932a, 1932b), the basketry technology is dominated by a two-rod and bundle bunched foundation typical of White Dog Basketmaker III technology. These sites also yielded other typical Basketmaker II remains. Pre-Formative basketry technology of the Glen Canyon region reveals a marked boundary along the Colorado River. Basketry technology of the Escalante River basin is simUar to the basketry technology of Unit V at Cowboy Cave that Hewitt (1980:57) concludes may "represent the transition to the Fremont culture." The two rod and bundle bunched foundation basketry that is ubiquitous south and east of the Colorado River in Glen Canyon, is poorly represented north of this river. The Sunny Beaches site occurs in an area with basketry that represents a continuation and elaboration of Archaic basketry technology for Utah (Adovasio 1975, 1980:39). To the extent that basketry provides a useful ethnic indicator (see Adovasio 1980, 1986), then the late pre-Formative occupation of the Escalante River basin, including Sunny Beaches, is believed to have been by people ancestral to the Fremont of south-central Utah. CONCLUSIONS Reed's evidence that the bow and arrow was used by Basketmaker II groups of southwestern Colorado during the late pre-Formative period is provocative and could wett be verified by future research. If confirmed, this finding could denote another material culture difference between the Durango Basketmaker II and the White Dog Basketmaker II as Matson (n.d.) has argued. Since bow-and-arrow technology is unknown from Basketmaker II sites of this latter region, then arrow points at pre-Formative sites in Glen Canyon might still signify a Proto-Fremont occupation. The pre-Formative basketry technology of the Escalante River basin clearly supports the notion of an ancestral, preceramic Fremont occupation north of the Colorado River in portions of Glen Canyon. The concern with culture history expressed in Geib and Bungart's 1989 article and in this response stems from trying to understand whether the transition from a hunting-gathering to a horticultural lifeway in south-central Utah involved the adoption of agriculture by local Archaic populations, or the territorial expansion of horticulturaUsts as argued by Berry and Berry (1986:319). O'ConneU et al. (1982:230) maintain that identifying diffusion or migration as processes involved in the sudden appearance of cultigens "begs all the critical questions." Answers to their critical questions, however, such as why hunter-gatherers should adopt agriculture or why exotic agriculturalists should displace resident hunter-gatherers (O'Connell et al. 1982:230), requires an accurate description of past events and, when necessary, an identification of the "cultures" or "ethnic groups" involved in those events. It seems that a considerable amount of basic archaeological research remains to be done before we can move on to "processual" interpretations for the Archaic-Formative transition in Utah. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I thank Joel Janetski for providing the opportunity for this response. The helpful suggestions of R. G. Matson and Jim Wilde are greatly appreciated. Alan Reed kindly sent me a copy of the excavation report for site 5DL896. REFERENCES CITED Adovasio, James M. 1975 Fremont Basketry. Tebiwa 17(2):67-76. 144 UTAH ARCHAEOLOGY 1990 1980 Fremont: An Artifactual Perspective. In Fremont Perspectives, edited by D. Madsen, pp. 35-40. Antiquities Section Selected Papers, Vol VII, No. 16. Utah State Historical Sodety, Salt Lake City. 1986 Artifacts and Ethnicity: Basketry as an Indicator of TerritoriaUty and Population Movements in the Prehistoric Great Basin. In Anthropology of the Desert West. Essays in Honor of Jesse D. Jennings, edited by C. J. Condie and D. D. Fowler, pp. 43-88. University of Utah Anthropological Papers No. 110. Salt Lake City. Agenbroad, Larry D., Jim I. Mead, EmUee D. Mead, and Diana Elder .1989 Archaeology, AUuvium, and Cave Stratigraphy: The Record from Bechan Cave, Utah. Kiva 54:335-351. Berry, Claudia F., and Michael S. Berry 1986 Chronological and Conceptual Models of the Southwestern Archaic. In Anthropology of the Desert West. Essays in Honor of Jesse D. Jennings, edited by C. J. Condie and D. D. Fowler, pp. 215-327. University of Utah Anthropological Papers No. 110. Salt Lake City. Fowler, Don D. 1963 1961 Excavations, Harris Wash, Utah. University of Utah Anthropological Papers No. 64. Salt Lake City. Geib, PhU R. 1990 Early Formative (BMIII-PI) Occupation of Glen Canyon. Paper presented at the 63rd Annual Pecos Conference, Blanding, Utah. Geib, PhU R., and Peter W. Bungart 1989 ImpUcations of Early Bow Use in Glen Canyon. Utah Archaeology 1989 2(l):32-47. Gunnerson, James H. 1959 1957 Excavations, Glen Canyon Area. University of Utah Anthropological Papers No. 43. Salt Lake City. Hewitt, Nancy J. 1980 Fiber Artifacts. In Cowboy Cave, by J. D. Jennings, pp. 49-74. University of Utah Anthropological Papers No. 104. Salt Lake City. Lindsay, Alexander J., Jr., J. Richard Ambler, Mary Anne Stein, and Philttp M. Hobler. 1968 Survey and Excavations North and East of Navajo Mountain, Utah, 1959-1962. Museum of Northern Arizona Bulletin No. 45. Flagstaff. Lipe, WiUiam D. 1970 Anasazi Communities in the Red Rock Plateau, Southeastern Utah. In Reconstructing Prehistoric Pueblo Societies, edited by WiUiam A. Longacre, pp. 84-139. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque. Matson, R. G. n.d. The Origins of Southwestern Agriculture. University of Arizona Press, in press. Morris, Earl H. and Robert F. Burgh 1941 Anasazi Basketry, Basket Maker II through Pueblo III, A Study Based on Specimens from the San Juan River Country. Carnegie Institution of Washington, PubUcation No. 533. Washington, D.C. 1954 Basket Maker II Sites near Durango, Colorado. Carnegie Institution of Washington, PubUcation No. 604. Washington, D.C. O'Connell, James F., Kevin T. Jones, and Steven R. Simms 1982 Some Thoughts on Prehistoric Archaeology in the Great Basin. In Man and Environment in the Great Basin, COMMENTS 145 edited by David B. Madsen and James F. O'Connell, pp. 227-240. SAA Papers No. 2. Society for American Archaeology, Washington, D.C. Institution MisceUaneous Collections, Vol. 87, No. 7. Washington, D.C. Reed, Alan D. 1990 Evidence of Arrow Points from Basketmaker II Sites in Southwestern Colorado. Utah Archaeology 1990. (Complete when pagination is done.) Reed, Alan D., and Ronald E. Kainer 1978 The Tamarron Site, 5LP326. Southwestern Lore 44(1 and 2): 1-47. Reed, Alan D., and Stan A. McDonald 1988 Archaeological Investigations at Three Lithic Scatters and Eight Culturally Peeled Tree Sites along the West Dolores Road, Montezuma and Dolores Counties, Colorado. Report on file, National Park Service, Interagency Archaeological Service, Denver. Richens, Lane D., and Richard K. Talbot 1989 Sandy Ridge: An Aceramic Habitation Site in Southeastern Utah. Utah Archaeology 1989 2(l):77-88. Sharrock, Floyd W., Kent C. Day, and David S. Dibble 1963 1961 Excavations, Glen Canyon Area. University of Utah Anthropological Papers No. 63. Salt Lake City. Smttey, Francis E., IV 1985 The Chronometrics of Early Agricultural Sites in Northeastern Arizona: Approaches to the Interpretation of Radiocarbon Dates. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Michigan. University Microfilms, Ann Arbor. Weltfish, Gene 1932a Problems in the Study of Ancient and Modern Basket Makers, American Anthropologist 34:108-117. 1932b Preliminary Classification of Prehistoric Southwestern Basketry. Smithsonian COMPREHENSIVE ROCK ART LITERATURE SEARCH THROUGH THE FILES OF THE DIVISION OF STATE HISTORY, A SUMMARY Steven J. Manning, Salt Lake/Davis Chapter, Utah Statewide Archeological Society, 791 Nancy Way, North Salt Lake, Utah 84504 INTRODUCTION One of the first steps in conducting many archaeological research projects is a Uterature search. The purpose of a Uterature search is to locate aU known information relative to the goals of the research project. This is accompUshed so that time and resources wUl not be unjustifiably expended repeating previous research. Literature searches are also conducted when a defined geographical area is to be surveyed. All known records are examined for previously recorded sites in the area. This not only eliminates dupUcate work, but provides surveyors an understanding of the type and density of sites that may be found in the survey area. In Utah, site specific information currently exists in a computerized data set called the Intermountain Antiquities Computer System (IMACS). The data set that is IMACS grew out of a desire by the Bureau of Land Management, University of Utah, Utah State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO), and the Intermountain Region of the U.S. Forest Service to create a computerized inventory of archaeological sites for cultural resource management and historic preservation purposes (Lichty 1986). The development process began in 1979 and the first IMACS form appeared in 1981. The bulk of the information from the Utah SHPO was entered into the IMACS data set in 1982 and 1983. The procedure that was used to enter data into IMACS from the SHPO files was