Chaco Canyon

Archaeologists have discovered that the Anasazi civilization of present-day southwestern United States flourished even after environmental problems had reduced crop production and virtually eliminated timber supplies in Chaco Canyon,the center of the Anasazi population.Despite these problems,or because of the solutions the Anasazi found to them,the canyon’s population continued to increase,particularly during a big spurt (sudden and brief increase)of construction that began in A.D.1029.Such spurts went on especially during wet decades,when more rain meant more food,more people,and more need for buildings.A dense population is attested not only by the famous great houses (such as Pueblo Bonito)spaced about a mile apart on the north side of Chaco Canyon,but also by holes drilled into the northern cliff face to support roof beams,indicating a continuous line of residences at the base of the cliffs between the great houses,and by the remains of hundreds of small settlements on the south side of the canyon.The size of the canyon’s total population remains unknown and much debated. Many archaeologists think that it was less than 5,000 and that those enormous buildings had few permanent occupants except priests and were just visited seasonally by peasants at the time of rituals.Other archaeologists note that Pueblo Bonito,which is just one of the large houses at Chaco Canyon,by itself was a building of 600 rooms and that all those post holes suggest dwellings for much of the length of the canyon,thus implying a population much greater than 5,000. Such debates about estimated population sizes arise frequently in archaeology.

Whatever the number,this dense population could no longer support itself but was subsidized by outlying satellite settlements constructed in similar architectural styles and joined to Chaco Canyon by a radiating regional network of hundreds of miles of roads that are still visible today.Those outliers had dams to catch rain,which fell unpredictably and very patchily:a thunderstorm might produce abundant rain in one desert area and no rain in another area just a mile away.The dams meant that when a particular area was fortunate enough to receive a rainstorm,much of the rainwater became stored behind the dam,and people living there could quickly plant crops, irrigate,and grow a huge surplus of food at that area in that year.The surplus could then feed people living at all the other outliers that did not happen to receive rain then.

Chaco Canyon became a black hole into which goods were imported but from which nothing tangible was exported.Into Chaco Canyon came tens of thousands of big trees for construction;pottery (all late-period pottery in Chaco Canyon was imported,probably because exhaustion of local firewood supplies precluded firing pots within the canyon itself);stone of good quality for making stone tools; turquoise from other areas of New Mexico for making ornaments;and macaws (parrots),shell jewelry,and copper bells from the Hohokam and from Mexico,as luxury goods.Even food had to be imported from places as far as 50 to 60 miles away,as shown by a recent study tracing the origins of corncobs excavated from Pueblo Bonito.

Chaco society turned into a mini-empire,divided between a well-fed elite living in luxury and a less well-fed peasantry doing the work and raising the food.The road system and the regional extent of standardized architecture testify to the large size of the area over which the economy and culture of Chaco and its outliers were regionally integrated.

Why would outlying settlements have supported the Chaco center, dutifully delivering timber,pottery,stone,turquoise,and food without receiving anything material in return?The answer is probably the same as the reason why outlying areas of Italy and Britain today support cities such as Rome and London,which also produce no timber or food but serve as political and religious centers.Like the modern Italians and British,Chacoans were now irreversibly committed to living in a complex,interdependent society.They could no longer revert to their original condition of self-supporting mobile little groups,because the trees in the canyon were gone,irrigation was impossible,and the growing population had filled up the region and left no unoccupied suitable areas to which to move.?

1.

?Archaeologists have discovered that the Anasazi civilization of present-day southwestern United States flourished even after environmental problems had reduced crop production and virtually eliminated timber supplies in Chaco Canyon,the center of the Anasazi population.Despite these problems,or because of the solutions the Anasazi found to them,the canyon’s population continued to increase,particularly during a big spurt (sudden and brief increase)of construction that began in A.D.1029.Such spurts went on especially during wet decades,when more rain meant more food,more people,and more need for buildings.A dense population is attested not only by the famous great houses (such as Pueblo Bonito)spaced about a mile apart on the north side of Chaco Canyon,but also by holes drilled into the northern cliff face to support roof beams,indicating a continuous line of residences at the base of the cliffs between the great houses,and by the remains of hundreds of small settlements on the south side of the canyon.The size of the canyon’s total population remains unknown and much debated. Many archaeologists think that it was less than 5,000 and that those enormous buildings had few permanent occupants except priests and were just visited seasonally by peasants at the time of rituals.Other archaeologists note that Pueblo Bonito,which is just one of the large houses at Chaco Canyon,by itself was a building of 600 rooms and that all those post holes suggest dwellings for much of the length of the canyon,thus implying a population much greater than 5,000. Such debates about estimated population sizes arise frequently in archaeology.?

完整版題目和答案:

http://223.26.51.48/