Extensive and Long-Term Specialization: Hohokam Ceramic Production in the Phoenix Basin, Arizona

The ceramic evidence from 10 sites in the lower Salt River valley, Arizona, represents the entire temporal interval defined as the pre-Classic era of Hohokam prehistory. These data indicate that nearly all of the clay pots consumed in the valley over a period lasting six centuries were manufactured by just a few potter groups. The uninterrupted duration, high volume, and the large variety of vessel forms and wares produced for exchange may have been unparalleled in the prehistoric Southwest. A temporally comprehensive model of pottery manufacture in the Phoenix basin is presented, its implications for the origins of specialization, and the influence of intensive irrigation are discussed. In addition, the implications are considered for a previously published model of the Hohokam economy centered on marketplace transactions (Abbott, Smith, and Gallaga 2007).

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Robustness, institutions, and large-scale change in social-ecological systems: the Hohokam of the Phoenix Basin

Journal of Institutional Economics ◽

10.1017/s1744137406000312 ◽

2006 ◽

Vol 2 (2) ◽

pp. 133-155 ◽

Cited By ~ 30

Author(s):

JOHN M. ANDERIES

Keyword(s):

Formal Model ◽

Irrigation System ◽

Ecological Systems ◽

Short Term ◽

Social Ecological Systems ◽

Social Ecological ◽

Term Change ◽

Phoenix Basin ◽

The Phoenix

Societies frequently generate public infrastructure and institutional arrangements in order to mediate short-term environmental fluctuations. However, the social and ecological consequences of activities dealing with short-term disturbances may increase the vulnerability of the system to infrequent events or to long-term change in patterns of short-term variability. Exploring this possibility requires the study of long-term, transformational change. The archaeological record provides many examples of long-term change, such as the Hohokam who occupied the Phoenix Basin for over a thousand years and developed a complex irrigation society. In the eleventh and fourteenth centuries, the Hohokam society experienced reductions in complexity and scale possibly associated with regional climatic events. We apply a framework designed to explore robustness in coupled social-ecological systems to the Hohokam Cultural Sequence. Based on this analysis, a stylized formal model is developed to explore the possibility that the success of the Hohokam irrigation system and associated social structure may have increased their vulnerability to rare climactic shocks.

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Ballcourts and Ceramics: The Case for Hohokam Marketplaces in the Arizona Desert

American Antiquity ◽

10.2307/40035856 ◽

2007 ◽

Vol 72 (3) ◽

pp. 461-484 ◽

Cited By ~ 29

Author(s):

David R. Abbott ◽

Alexa M. Smith ◽

Emiliano Gallaga

Keyword(s):

High Volume ◽

Central Component ◽

Market Place ◽

Pottery Production ◽

Large Numbers ◽

Arizona Desert ◽

Salt River ◽

Phoenix Basin ◽

Production And Distribution ◽

Reliable Mechanism

During the middle Sedentary period (ca. A.D. 1000-1070) in the deserts of southern and central Arizona, crowds from near and far regularly gathered at the centers of Hohokam villages to participate in ritual ballcourt festivities. These events were ideal venues for barter and exchange, leading some theorists to hypothesize that periodic marketplaces were associated with the ritual ballgames. Recent ceramic provenance and vessel-form evidence from the Phoenix basin have shown that the production of decorated and utilitarian pots was highly concentrated during this time and large numbers of bowls and jars were evenly distributed to far flung consumers. These findings have supported the marketplace hypothesis, suggesting that an efficient and reliable mechanism was available for moving large numbers of commodities across the region. The high volume of ceramic transactions, however, seems to have placed the Hohokam case beyond the capabilities of nascent marketplaces documented from ethnohistoric and ethnographic evidence. In this paper, we support the idea that market-place barter was a central component of the Hohokam economy by presenting new ceramic data from the lower Salt River valley, which temporally links the demise of the ballcourt ceremonialism with a transformation in the organization of pottery production and distribution. We then examine some unusual circumstances pertaining to the Hohokam regional system that may help to explain how consumers could have so heavily depended on a network of horizontally organized, periodic marketplaces for basic necessities like earthenware containers.

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Hohokam to Akimel O’Odham: Obsidian Acquisition at the Historic Period Sacate Site (GR-909), Gila River Indian Community, Arizona

American Antiquity ◽

10.7183/0002-7316.78.2.266 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 78 (2) ◽

pp. 266-284 ◽

Cited By ~ 15

Author(s):

Chris R. Loendorf ◽

Craig M. Fertelmes ◽

Barnaby V. Lewis

Keyword(s):

Temporal Trends ◽

Cultural Patterns ◽

Historic Period ◽

South Central ◽

Phoenix Basin ◽

Long Term Trends ◽

Akimel O'odham ◽

The Relationship ◽

The Phoenix

AbstractObsidian provenance studies within the Phoenix Basin of south-central Arizona have become increasingly comprehensive during the last four decades. As a result, broad regional and temporal trends have been defined regarding Preclassic (ca. A.D. 650–1150) and Classic period (ca.A.D. 1150–1450) socioeconomic interactions in the Hohokam core area. However, Historic period patterns are still poorly understood, and these data are essential for understanding the relationship between the prehistoric Hohokam and historical Akimel O’Odham. The association between the Akimel O’Odham and Hohokam has been debated since Euro-Americans first visited the area in the late 1600s, yet this issue is still not fully resolved. This article presents analyses of historical obsidian from the Sacate site that suggest that long-term trends in cultural patterns within the Phoenix Basin continued unbroken into the Historic period. These continuities provide another line of evidence that the Akimel O’Odham are the direct cultural descendants of the Hohokam.

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Extended Burials in the Prehistoric Southwest

American Antiquity ◽

10.2307/278274 ◽

1963 ◽

Vol 28 (3) ◽

pp. 308-319 ◽

Cited By ~ 12

Author(s):

Michael B. Stanislawski

Keyword(s):

Cultural Change ◽

American Southwest ◽

River Valley ◽

Chaco Canyon ◽

Salt River ◽

Prehistoric Southwest ◽

The Common ◽

The Dead ◽

Salt River Valley

AbstractThe burial of the dead is a conservative trait in all cultures, and thus the diffusion and spread of the rare extended burial pattern in the American Southwest provides excellent evidence of cultural contacts and cultural change. Prior to A.D. 1000, the common Southwestern burial pattern is seen to be that of flexure of the dead, with a few rare extended burials known. Concentrations of extended burials first appear at Chaco Canyon sites dating about A.D. 1050, and the pattern seems to spread from there first to the Sinagua region and to nearby Mogollon groups, then to the Hopi and Zuni regions, and finally, with the Sinagua and Salado migrations, into the Gila-Salt River Valley. The complex may ultimately be of Mesoamerican origin. Some data on grave types and burial covering are also discussed.

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