Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2brh9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-02T18:02:59.847Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

On the Trail of the Lonesome Pine: Archaeological Paradigms and the Chaco “Tree of Life“

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

W. H. Wills
W. H. Wills*
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87131
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The great houses of Chaco Canyon (ca. A.D. 850–1150) are widely assumed to represent cosmological meaning through the orientation of walls and other features to celestial events. Archaeological models of such relationships are considered cosmographic. A prominent feature of these models is a lone pine tree at Pueblo Bonito that has been interpreted as a “tree of life” symbolically connecting the physical and heavenly worlds. This study suggests that this interpretation is inconsistent with contextual data and should be dismissed. Future cosmographic research in Chaco should endeavor to develop methods of independent verification that will strengthen inferences about cosmological symbolism in architecture.

Resumen

Resumen

Es ampliamente asumido que las grandes casas de Chaco Canyon (850 a 1150 d.C.) tienen un significado cosmológico debido a la orientación de sus muros y otros rasgos que supuestamente dan referencia a eventos celestiales. Se considera que los modelos arqueológicos de tales representaciones son cosmográficos. Un rasgo clave de estos modelos es la presencia de un árbol de pino solitario en el sitio Pueblo Bonito que ha sido interpretado como un “árbol de la vida” conectando simbólicamente el mundo físico con el celestial. Este estudio sugiere que esta interpretación es inconsistente con los datos contextúales y debería de ser descartado. Investigaciones cosmográficas futuras en Chaco deberían esforzarse en desarrollar métodos de verificación independientes que fortalezcan las inferencias acerca del simbolismo cosmológico en la arquitectura.

Type
Articles
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 77 , Issue 3 , July 2012 , pp. 478 - 497
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for American Archaeology 2012

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

References Cited

Ashmore, Wendy 2007 Building Social History at Pueblo Bonito: Footnotes to a Biography of Place. In The Architecture of Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, edited by Stephen H. Lekson, pp. 179–198. University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City.Google Scholar
Basso, Keith H. 1996 Wisdom Sits in Places: Landscape and Language Among the Western Apache. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Barrett, John C, and Ko, Ilhong 2009 A Phenomenology of Landscape: A Crisis in British Landscape Archaeology? Journal of Social Archaeology 9:275–294.Google Scholar
Bernardini, Wesley 1999 Reassessing the Scale of Social Action at Pueblo Bonito, Chaco Canyon, New Mexico. Kiva 64:447–470.Google Scholar
Brody, J. J. 1997 The Rhetoric of Formalism: Interpreting Anasazi Architecture. In Anasazi Architecture and American Design, editedy Baker H. Morrow and V. B. Price, pp. 5–15. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Brugge, David 1986 Tsegai: An Archaeological Ethnohistory of the Chaco Region. National Park Service, Washington, D.C.Google Scholar
Cordell, Linda S., and James Judge, W. 2001 Perspectives on Chaco Society and Polity. In Chaco Society and Polity: Papers from the 1999 Conference, edited by Linda S. Cordell and W. James Judge, pp. 1–12. New Mexico Archaeological Council Special Publication No. 4. Albuquerque, New Mexico.Google Scholar
Crown, Patricia L, and Wills, W. H. 2003 Modifying Pottery and Kivas at Chaco: Pentimento, Restoration, or Renewal? American Antiquity 68:511–532.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dean, Jeffery S., and Warren, Richard L. 1983 Dendrochronology. In The Architecture and Dendrochronology of Chetro Ketl, edited by Stephen H. Lekson, pp. 105–240. Reports of the Chaco Center No. 6, National Park Service, Albuquerque, New Mexico.Google Scholar
Dornan, Jennifer L. 2004 Beyond Belief: Religious Experience, Ritual, and Cultural Neuro-phenomenology in the Interpretation of Past Religious Systems. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 14:25–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Doxtater, Dennis 2003 Parallel Universes on the Colorado Plateau: Indications of Chacoan Integration of an Earlier Anasazi Focus at Canyon de Chelly. Journal of the Southwest 45:33–62.Google Scholar
Dozier, Edward P. 1970 Making Inferences from the Present to the Past. In Reconstructing Prehistoric Pueblo Societies, edited by William A. Longacre, pp. 202–213. School of American Research Press, Santa Fe.Google Scholar
Drager, Dwight 1976 Anasazi Population Estimates With the Aid of Data Derived from Photogrammetric Maps. In Remote Sensing Experiments in Cultural Resource Studies, assembled by Thomas R. Lyons, pp. 157–172. National Park Service, Washington, D.C.Google Scholar
Fagan, Brian 2005 Chaco Canyon: Archaeologists Explore the Lives of an Ancient Society. Oxford University Press, Oxford.Google Scholar
Farmer, James D. 2003 Astronomy and Ritual in Chaco Canyon. In Pueblo Bonito: Center of the Chacoan World, edited by Jill E. Neitzel, pp. 61–71. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, D.C.Google Scholar
Fowler, Andrew P., and Stein, John R. 1992 The Anasazi Great House in Space, Time, and Paradigm. In Anasazi Regional Organization and the Chaco System, edited by David E. Doyel, pp. 101–122. Anthropological Papers No. 5. Maxwell Museum of Anthropology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Fritz, John M. 1978 Paleopsychology Today: Ideational Systems and Human Adaptation in Prehistory. In Social Archaeology: Beyond Subsistence and Dating, edited by Charles L. Redman, Mary Jane Berman, Edward V. Curtain, William T. Langhorne, Nina M. Versaggi, and Jeffery C. Wanser, pp. 37–59. Academic Press, New York.Google Scholar
Geertz, Clifford 1973 The Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays. Basic Books, New York.Google Scholar
Geller, Pamela L. 2009 Identity and Difference: Complicating Gender in Archaeology. Annual Review of Anthropology 38:65–81.Google Scholar
Hall, Stephen 1997 Pollen Analysis and Woodrat Middens: Re-Evaluation of Quaternary Vegetational History in the American Southwest. Southwestern Geographer 1:25–43.Google Scholar
Hamilton, Sue, Whitehouse, Ruth, Brown, Keri, Combes, Pamela, Herring, Edward, and Thomas, Mike Seager 2006 Phenomenology in Practice: Towards a Methodology for a “Subjective” Approach. European Journal of Archaeology 9:31–71.Google Scholar
Hewett, Edgar Lee 1930 Ancient Life in the American Southwest. The Bobbs-Merrill Company, Indianapolis.Google Scholar
Janes, Stephen D. 2005 Geomorphology, Geology, and Hydrology of the Standing Rock Great House Community. Kiva 71:37–55.Google Scholar
Joyce, Rosemary A. 2005 Archaeology of the Body. Annual Review of Anthropology 34:139–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Judd, Neil M. 1925 Everyday Life in Pueblo Bonito. National Geographic Magazine 48:227–262.Google Scholar
Judd, Neil M. 1954 The Material Culture of Pueblo Bonito. Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections Vol. 124, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.Google Scholar
Judd, Neil M. 1964 The Architecture of Pueblo Bonito. Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections Vol. 147, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D. C.Google Scholar
Kantner, John 1997 Ancient Roads, Modern Mapping: Evaluating Chaco Anasazi Roadways Using GIS Technology. Expedition 39:49–62.Google Scholar
Kincaid, Chris (editor) 1983 Chaco Roads Project Phase I: A reappraisal of Prehistoric Roads in the San Juan Basin. Bureau of Land Management, Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Kluckhohn, Clyde 1939 The Place of Theory in Anthropological Studies. Philosophy of Science 6:328–344.Google Scholar
Kroeber, Alfred V. 1918 Tuni Kin and Clan. Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History, vol. XVIII, part II, pp. [iii], 39–204. American Museum of Natural History, New York.Google Scholar
Lekson, Stephen H. 1999 The Chaco Meridian: Centers of Political Power in the Ancient Southwest. Altamira Press, Walnut Creek, California.Google Scholar
Lekson, Stephen H. 2007 The Archaeology of Chaco Canyon: An Eleventh-Century Pueblo Regional Center. School of American Research Press, Santa Fe.Google Scholar
Lekson, Stephen H. 2007 Chaco Matters. In The Archaeology of Chaco Canyon: An Eleventh Century Pueblo Regional Center, edited by Stephen H. Lekson, pp. 3–44. School of American Research Press, Santa Fe.Google Scholar
Lekson, Stephen H. 2009 A History of the Ancient Southwest. School for Advanced Research Press, Santa Fe.Google Scholar
Lekson, Stephen H., and Cameron, Catherine M. 1995 The Abandonment of Chaco Canyon, the Mesa Verde Migrations, and the Reorganization of the Pueblo World. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 14:184–202.Google Scholar
Lekson, Stephen H., Windes, Thomas C., Stein, John R., and James Judge, W. 1988 The Chaco Canyon Community. Scientific American 259:100–109.Google Scholar
Lewis-Williams, David 2004 Constructing a Cosmos: Architecture, Power and Domestication at Çatalhöyük. Journal of Social Archaeology 4:28–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lightfoot, Ricky 1988 Roofing an Early Anasazi Great Kiva: Analysis of an Architectural Model. Kiva 53:253–272.Google Scholar
Lister, Robert H., and Lister, Florence C. 1981 Chaco Canyon: Archaeology and Archaeologists. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Longacre, William 1970 Archaeology as Anthropology: A Case Study. University of Arizona Press, Tucson.Google Scholar
Lyons, Thomas R., and Hitchcock, Robert K. 1977 Remote Sensing Interpretation of an Anasazi Land Route System. In Aerial Remote Sensing Techniques in Archaeology, edited by T. R. Lyons and R. K. Hitchcock, pp. 111–134. National Park Service, Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Marshall, Michael P. 1997 The Chacoan Roads: A Cosmological Interpretation. In Anasazi Architecture and American Design, edited by B. H. Morrow and V. B. Price, pp. 62–76. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Mindeleff, Cosmos 1891 A Study of Pueblo Architecture: Tusayan and Cibola. Bureau of American Ethnology, Washington, D.C.Google Scholar
Mills, Barbara 2002 Recent Research on Chaco: Changing Views on Economy, Ritual, and Power. Journal of Archaeological Research 10:65–117.Google Scholar
National Park Service 2007 Foundation for Planning and Management. Chaco Culture National Historical Park, Nageezi, New Mexico.Google Scholar
Neitzel, Jill E. 2003 The Organization, Function, and Population of Pueblo Bonito. In Pueblo Bonito: Center of the Chacoan World, edited by Jill E. Neitzel, pp. 143–150. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, D.C.Google Scholar
Ortiz, Alfonso 1969 The Tewa World. University of Chicago Press, Chicago. 1972 Ritual Drama and the Pueblo World View. In New Perspectives on the Pueblos, edited by Alfonso Ortiz, pp. 135–162. School of American Research Press, Santa Fe.Google Scholar
Panofsky, Erwin 1951 Gothic Architecture and Scholasticism. Archabbey Publications, Latrobe, Pennsylvania.Google Scholar
Panofsky, Erwin 1991 Perspective as Symbolic Form. Zone Books, Brooklyn, New York.Google Scholar
Pauketat, Timothy R. 2004 Archaeology without Alternatives. Anthropological Theory 4:199–203.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pepper, George H. 1920 Pueblo Bonito. Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History, Vol. XXVII. New York.Google Scholar
Plog, Stephen 2010 Reflections on the State of Chacoan Research: A Review Essay. Kiva 75:377–395.Google Scholar
Powers, Robert P., Gillespie, William B., and Lekson, Stephen H. 1983 The Outlier Survey: A Regional View of Settlement in the San Juan Basin. Reports of the Chaco Center No. 3, National Park Service. Albuquerque, New Mexico.Google Scholar
Preucel, Robert W. 2006 Archaeological Semiotics. Blackwell Publishing, Malden, Massachusetts.Google Scholar
Rapaport, Amos 1969 House Forms and Culture. University of Wisconsin Press, Madison.Google Scholar
Reynolds, Amada C, Betancourt, Julio L., Quade, Jay, Jonathan Patchett, P., Dean, Jeffrey S., and Stein, John 2005 7Sr/86Sr Sourcing of Ponderosa Pine Used in Anasazi Great House Construction at Chaco Canyon, New Mexico. Journal of Archaeological Science 32:1061–1075.Google Scholar
Redman, Charles L. 1989 Distinguished Lecture in Archaeology: In Defense of the Seventies– The Adolescence of New Archeology. American Anthropologist 93:295–307.Google Scholar
Renfrew, Colin 2001 Production and Consumption in a Sacred Economy: The Material Correlates of High Devotional Expression at Chaco Canyon. American Antiquity 66:14–25.Google Scholar
Reyman, Jonathan E. 1976 Astronomy, Architecture, and Adaptation at Pueblo Bonito. Science 193:95–962.Google Scholar
Roberts, Frank H.H. 1921 The Ceramic Sequence in the Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, and Its Relation to the Cultures of the San Juan Basin. Harvard University Ph.D., published in 1991 by Garland Publishing, Inc., New York.Google Scholar
Roney, John R. 1992 Prehistoric Roads and Regional Integration in the Chacoan System. In Anasazi Regional Organization and the Chaco System, edited by D. Doyel, pp. 123–131. Anthropological Papers No. 5. Maxwell Museum of Anthropology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Sebastian, Lynne 1992 The Chaco Anasazi: Sociopolitical Evolution in the Prehistoric Southwest. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Smith, Michael 2008 Did the Maya Build Architectural Cosmograms? Latin American Antiquity 16:217–224.Google Scholar
Sofaer, Anna 1997 The Primary Architecture of the Chacoan Culture: A Cosmological Expression, in Anasazi Architecture and American Design, edited by Baker H. Morrow and V. B. Price, pp. 88–132. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Stein, John R., and Lekson, Stephen H. 1992 Anasazi Ritual Landscapes. In Anasazi Regional Organization and the Chaco System, edited by David E. Doyel, pp. 87–100. Anthropological Papers No. 5. Maxwell Museum of Anthropology, Albuquerque, New Mexico.Google Scholar
Stein, John R., Ford, Dabney, and Friedman, Richard 2003 Reconstructing Pueblo Bonito. In Pueblo Bonito: Center of the Chacoan World, edited by Jill E. Neitzel, pp. 33–60. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, D.C.Google Scholar
Stein, John, Friedman, Richard, Blackhorse, Taft, and Loose, Richard 2007 Revisiting Down Chaco. In The Architecture of Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, edited by Stephen Ft. Lekson, pp. 199–224. University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City.Google Scholar
Stein, John R., Suiter, Judith E., and Ford, Dabney 1997 High Noon in Old Bonito: Sun, Shadow, and the Geometry of the Chaco Complex. In Anasazi Architecture and American Design, edited by Baker H. Morrow and V. B. Price, pp. 133–148. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Tilley, Christopher 1993 A Phenomenology of Landscape: Places, Paths, and Monuments. Berg Publishers, Oxford.Google Scholar
Upton, Dell 1991 Architectural History or Landscape History? Journal of Architectural Education 44:195–99.Google Scholar
Upton, Dell 1998 Architecture in the United States. Oxford University Press, Oxford Google Scholar
Van Dyke, Ruth 2007 The Chaco Experience: Landscape and Ideology at the Center Place. School for Advanced Research Press, Santa Fe.Google Scholar
Vivian, Gordon, and Mathews, Tom W. 1964 Kin Kletso: A Pueblo III Community in Chaco Canyon, New Mexico. Southwest Parks and Monument Association Technical Series, Vol.6 (Parts 1 and 2), Globe, Arizona.Google Scholar
Vivian, R. Gwinn 1990 The Anasazi Prehistory of the San Juan Basin. Academic Press, New York.Google Scholar
Vivian, R. Gwinn 1997 Chacoan Roads: Function. Kiva 63:35–68.Google Scholar
Ware, John A., and Gumerman, George J. 1977 Remote Sensing Methodology and the Chaco Canyon Prehistoric Road System. In Aerial Remote Sensing Techniques in Archeology, edited by T. R. Lyons and R. K. Hitchcock, pp. 135–168. National Park Service, Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Williamson, T., and Bellamy, E. 1983 Ley Lines in Question. London, Heinemann.Google Scholar
Wills, W. H. 2000 Political Leadership and the Construction of Chaco Great Houses. In Alternative Leadership Strategies in the Prehispanic Southwest, edited by Barbara J. Mills, pp. 19–44. University of Arizona Press, Tucson.Google Scholar
Wills, W. H. 2009 Cultural Identity and the Archaeological Construction of Historical Narratives: An Example from Chaco Canyon. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 16:283–319.Google Scholar
Windes, Thomas C. 1984 A New Look at Population in Chaco Canyon. In Recent Research on Chaco Prehistory, edited by W. James Judge and John D. Schelberg, pp. 75–87. National Park Service, Albuquerque, New Mexico.Google Scholar
Windes, Thomas C. 1987 Investigations at the Pueblo Alto Complex. National Park Service, Albuquerque, New Mexico.Google Scholar
Windes, Thomas C, and McKenna, Peter J. 2001 Going Against the Grain: Wood Production in Chacoan Society. American Antiquity 66:119–140.Google Scholar