The complex history of Pueblo Bonito and its interpretation

What’s new in Chaco research?

“…Many of the construction episodes for great houses within and outside of Chaco Canyon were planned in advance, with timbers procured over long distances and stockpiled before construction, and buildings were multi-storeyed (Lekson 2007). As Crown and Wills (2018) discuss in this special section, Pueblo Bonito was being remodelled almost constantly. Such extravagance can be interpreted as building to impress both community members and visitors (Van Dyke 2008).…”

“…Two papers in this special section directly address Chaco’s origins and diversity. Crown and Wills’s (2018) excavations at Pueblo Bonito, combined with their careful perusal of prior excavation records, point to an earlier Basketmaker III occupation underneath the building, suggesting local continuity. Mills et al .…”

Reconstructing sexual divisions of labor from fingerprints on Ancestral Puebloan pottery

“…Materials recovered from Blue J suggest a close affinity with Chaco Canyon, and the community's location places it in the midst of the Chaco Worldan area under the influence if not direct control of Chaco Canyon (31,49 Focusing on a community outside of the central canyon provides a number of advantages compared with analyses of materials from the monumental center itself. First, the occupational history of the canyon is complex, and associated deposits represent complex palimpsests of past behavior (30). Second, material culture from all over the Chaco World was brought to Chaco Canyon during its height, resulting in extensive mixed deposits reflecting a wide array of sources (47).…”

“…1), the monumental architecture of Chaco Canyon has earned it a designation as a UNESCO World Heritage Site (26). The buildings found there, many of which are up to five stories high and contain hundreds of rooms, were primarily constructed in the 10th and 11th centuries AD (27)(28)(29)(30). Surrounding Chaco Canyon itself were hundreds of contemporaneous farming communities spread across the northern US Southwest, most of which were tied socioculturally to the central canyon to such an extent that the region is often referred to as the "Chaco World" (31,32).…”