| OCR Text |
Show 152 UTAH ARCHAEOLOGY 1990 by the ton. By not using this opportunity to create well-documented surface collections of artifacts, future researchers will have even larger data gaps than now exist as tourists continue to strip the park for souvenirs. In addition, as noted in the report, the accuracy of previous work cannot be checked since no coUections are avaUable. Data collected in the field without the benefit of laboratory facttities are often suspect. Too often the pubUc does not have any way to learn about the results of archaeological work on Federal lands. This pubUcation improves that situation. Now that the Park Service has joined the Bureau of Land Management in publishing a "Cultural Resource Series," it is time for the United States Forest Service to join them and provide the pubUc with information on cultural resources on national forest land in Utah. Who knows, some day we may be able to see the "Big Picture." Archaeological Data Recovery at Three Prehistoric Sites Located Along State Road 313, Grand County, Utah, by Alan D. Reed. Alpine Archaeological Consultants, Montrose Colorado. 292 pages (plus vtt); figures, tables, references, five appendices. No price given. Reviewed by: Kevin T. Jones Antiquities Section Division of State History 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake City, UT 84101 A persistent source of angst for many archaeologists is the often deep rift between the requirements of contract archaeology and the challenge of independent research. The pedestrian and often pedantic recording and reporting procedures demanded by private dients and ponderous bureaucracies rarely reward and frequently preclude taking the extra step to turn salvage into research. Contract reports usually contribute site forms and Usts of artifacts sorted into the same old tired cultural-historical categories, but Uttle to an understanding of the most unusual projects usually fade quickly into the "gray" Uterature, never seen, rarely referenced, soon forgotten. Alan Reed's report on excavations along the Dead Horse Point road is a pleasant departure from the everyday cultural resource management (CRM) report, and is an indication that things can be different. Prompted by a Request for Proposals from the Utah Division of Transportation specifying that the work be organized around a series of specific hypotheses to be stated beforehand and tested with data recovered during the project, the entire exercise was organized as a research project from the very beginning. The report details the investigation of three prehistoric sites (42Gr2212, 42Gr2232, and 42Gr2236) excavated to mitigate the adverse effect of State Road 313 construction. In most respects the report foUows a typical CRM format, reporting the details of the excavations, the stratigraphy, features, artifacts, and dates; and analyses of pollen, floral, faunal, and macrofossils. What sets this report apart is contained in the final two chapters, where the hypotheses posed long before the fieldwork began are evaluated. The hypotheses, generated prior to the initiation of fieldwork, were based on the kinds of questions excavation of the sites was likely to answer. In posing hypotheses and specifying the data necessary to test them, Reed set up a research program designed to address problems, not just dig up sites. Hypotheses were posed concerning culture history, site function, seasonably, subsistence, social organization, technology, extra-regional relationships, and site formation. For each hypothesis a test was specified, pertinent data identified, and an outcome predicted. Some of the hypotheses turned out to be moot, as relevant data were not recovered, but many were addressed, some with interesting and unexpected results. One of the more interesting findings involves an apparent need for revision of Reed's own Chipeta-CanaUa Phase ordering of Ute culture history. Site 42Gr2236 was found to contain ceramics approximately 100 years earUer than expected, in conflict with expectations of the phase sequence. By testing the hypothesis and carefully REVIEWS 153 considering the results, Reed was able to gain insight into this aspect of the Ute prehistory to add to his existing synthesis. Another telling analysis that might not have otherwise been attempted was to compare deposits inside and down slope of a rockshelter, to determine if they were discrete activity areas. They were not significantly different except in numbers of artifacts, and the hypothesis that they represented separate activities was discarded. Analysis of the distribution of artifacts around the hearth in 42Gr2236 was prompted by the hypothesis that activities would be segregated into zones, characterized by areas of primary and secondary refuse. The distribution of artifacts indicated that most refuse was likely in its primary context, perhaps due to a short span of occupation. Other hypotheses concerning artifact distribution, structures, artifact material and manufacture, and size sorting are presented, and each discussed. Some of the hypotheses are supported, some refuted, some not addressable due to lack of data, but as a whole, this section provides a look at the results of the excavations that is most unusual and welcome. By designing the project to answer a series of questions, Reed has produced a CRM report that actually answers some questions. This stands in contrast to the standard procedure of reporting the data recovered as though they were ready-made answers to as yet unspecified questions. Questions which rarely materialize. Designing a project to answer questions means that at the end, some answers, some synthesis, some knowledge is presented that may be of significance to our understanding of prehistoric human cultural behavior. And that is, after all, the reason for contract archaeology-mitigation of adverse effects to sites thought to contain significant information relating to prehistory. We should expect archaeologists to extract and present that significant information, and in my opinion, Alan Reed has done that. The Utah Department of Transportation and Alpine Archaeological Consultants are to be commended for making the excavation of these three small sites result in a contribution to Utah prehistory and the methods by which it is investigated. Archaeology of the Eastern Ute, edited by Paul R. Nickens. Colorado CouncU of Professional Archaeologists, Occasional Papers No. 1. Denver, Colorado. 1988. 233 pages, tables, references dted. $10.00 Reviewed by: David B. Madsen State Archaeologist Utah Division of State History 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake City, UT 84101 Archaeologists have always seemed to me to be the most backwards of people. They seem to be far more fascinated by matters of antiquity than by matters of substance. "Older" always seems to be better. This is, perhaps, the necessary result of archaeology practiced as culture history-the older things are the less remains, in terms of both objects themselves and their contexts, and hence, each item recovered becomes increasingly important. Yet when archaeology is practiced as anthropology, exactly the reverse is true. The younger things are, the more they can contribute to understanding why people do what they do. This is particularly true when they are young enough that physical remains can be directly related to the behaviors which caused them; that is, when it is possible to link the archaeological record to the ethnohistorical record. In short (and at the risk of sounding like a heretic), the archaeology of the Late Prehistoric and protohistoric cultures of Utah has much more to contribute to anthropology than does the investigation of the earliest Paleo-Indian groups. Yet we know virtuaUy nothing about them. This is something that is gradually being realized by archaeologists in the intermountain west. Steven Simms and Joel Janetski, among others, are making extensive efforts to understand the Late Prehistoric record in Utah, while the pubUcation of the Archaeology of the Eastern Ute: A Symposium, produced by the Colorado CouncU of Professional Archaeologists, is an important step in rectifying this problem in the Colorado area. The volume, dedicated to Omer C. Stewart, consists of twelve papers together with a short introduction by Paul Nickens and a more extended summary discussion by WiUiam Buckles. With the |
