What was Chaco Canyon?
Most likely: the seat of a hereditary elite whose house at Pueblo Bonito controlled ritual and long-distance exchangeAhead on the evidence, not yet confirmed. It needs two reviews to be accepted.
Where it stands
Five answers have been proposed. A ceremonial and pilgrimage centre with a small permanent population, filled at gatherings and supplied from… leads, with evidence 2 for, 1 against: partly supported by its tests. Four are still possible. Of the one narrower question under it, one is answered.
Why it matters
Chaco is the largest and most elaborate Ancestral Puebloan centre, and how it is read shapes the account of Puebloan society as a whole: a gathering place, a ruling house, a town, or the capital of a regional polity. The readings differ in what they predict about residents, storage, imports and burials[1][2][3].
Answers 5
History
- English et al.: all the great-house timber and much other material was brought from 75 to 100 km away.For: A ceremonial and pilgrimage centre with a small permanent population, filled at gatherings and supplied from…
- Crown & Hurst: cacao was drunk from cylinder jars almost unique to Pueblo Bonito, a Mesoamerican-style ritual.For: The seat of a hereditary elite whose house at Pueblo Bonito controlled ritual and long-distance exchange.
- Plog & Heitman puts forward: the seat of a hereditary elite whose house at Pueblo Bonito controlled ritual and long-distance exchange.
- Plog & Heitman: radiocarbon dates place marked social differentiation in Room 33 150 to 200 years earlier than once thought.For: The seat of a hereditary elite whose house at Pueblo Bonito controlled ritual and long-distance exchange.
- Watson et al.: scarlet macaws were brought from Mesoamerica from about 900 onward, mostly before the 1040 to 1110 peak.For: The seat of a hereditary elite whose house at Pueblo Bonito controlled ritual and long-distance exchange.
- Guiterman et al.: timber came first from the Zunis and then, from about 1060, from the Chuskas, where Chuskan tools and pottery…For: The centre of a populous regional polity that expanded rapidly after 1040, with roads, shrines and outliers…
- Lentz et al. puts forward: a ceremonial and pilgrimage centre with a small permanent population, filled at gatherings and supplied from…
- Lentz et al. puts forward: a lived-in farming town of ordinary households that also hosted ceremonies.
- Lentz et al.: pollen and plant remains point to centuries of continuous local farming and woodcutting, which Lentz and…Against: A ceremonial and pilgrimage centre with a small permanent population, filled at gatherings and supplied from…
- Lentz et al.: the canyon's woodland was cut back continuously from Late Archaic times to the Bonito phase, consistent with…For: A lived-in farming town of ordinary households that also hosted ceremonies.
- Kohler et al. puts forward: the centre of a populous regional polity that expanded rapidly after 1040, with roads, shrines and outliers…
- Kohler et al.: an Ideal Free Distribution model puts the regional population above even the highest earlier estimates.For: The centre of a populous regional polity that expanded rapidly after 1040, with roads, shrines and outliers…
- Asked on this site