Thesis
How great were Cedar Mesa great house communities, A.D. 1060-1270?
Washington State University
Master of Arts (MA), Washington State University
2012
Handle:
https://hdl.handle.net/2376/103978
Abstract
Questions about the structure of ancient communities and the socially constructed landscape have been explored and explained in other parts of the northern Southwest (e.g. Cameron 2009; Gilpin 2003; Kantner and Mahoney 2000; Varien and Wilshusen 2002), but until recently, the size and structure of Pueblo period communities on central Cedar Mesa in southeast Utah have not been intensively investigated. Two great houses --the Et Al and Owen sites-- other landscape features (such as shrines, great kivas, and roads), and numerous residential sites suggest the presence of a substantial ancient community on the mesa, which was part of a larger network of communities in southeast Utah and the Northern San Juan region. This thesis examines three scales of the Pueblo II and Pueblo III period (A.D. 1060-1270) community associated with the Et Al great house-- the first-order community, the community of participation, and the regional community" and proposes that Et Al functioned as a symbol and locus of integration for the Et Al community. Et Al and Owen may also be the material remnants of competition among individuals vying for political power and personal prestige on the mesa top and across the region. Evidence of feasting at publicly used sites provides evidence for both community integration and individual competition. Using previous research in the Northern San Juan, known sites on Cedar Mesa, and site data gathered during the summer of 2011, I describe aspects of the community that utilized the Bullet Canyon drainage and surrounding areas and argue that the inhabitants of Cedar Mesa constructed landscape features which connected them to more widely held Puebloan ideology and cosmology. Et Al and Owen were not anomalous great houses on the margin of the Mesa Verde region, but represent structures used by a substantial community, which was part of a larger network of great house communities in the prehispanic Pueblo world.
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Details
- Title
- How great were Cedar Mesa great house communities, A.D. 1060-1270?
- Creators
- Natalie Rochelle Fast
- Contributors
- Andrew I. Duff (Degree Supervisor)
- Awarding Institution
- Washington State University
- Academic Unit
- Anthropology, Department of
- Theses and Dissertations
- Master of Arts (MA), Washington State University
- Publisher
- Washington State University; [Pullman, Washington] :
- Identifiers
- 99900525107801842
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Thesis