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Journal of Archaeological Research [jar] pp419-jare-368297 March 25, 2002 19:2 Style file version Nov. 19th, 1999

Journal of Archaeological Research, Vol. 10, No. 2, June 2002 (C© 2002)

Understanding Abandonments in the NorthAmerican Southwest

Margaret C. Nelson1,2 and Gregson Schachner1

The North American Southwest is renowned for its rich archaeological record.Thousands of prehistoric houses and ceremonial centers remain partially stand-ing or form mounds that mark prehistoric villages that were once actively occupiedand remain important to the descendants. The visibility of archaeological remainshas sparked interest in questions of abandonment among archaeologists and thelay public. We explore reasons for this interest, how it is manifest in archaeolog-ical research, and how perception of that research influences popular views ofthe past and of native people. Our focus is on explanations for the causes of siteand regional abandonment as well as on explications of the processes by whichabandonments occur. Essential to our perspective is the view that abandonmentis a process that involves decisions to move, which may be promoted by dire cir-cumstances, but which are most often settlement strategies. The process of movingrequires economic, social, and political decisions about the places from whichpeople move and to which they move.

KEY WORDS: North American Southwest; abandonment; migration; environment.

INTRODUCTION

The issue of abandonment is prominent in archaeological research conductedin the North American Southwest. Why? We believe the answer lies in the popularas well as academic domains of Southwest archaeology. From a popular perspec-tive, there are thousands of abandoned prehistoric villages in the arid plateau,mountain, and desert landscapes of the Southwest. Many of these are made fromstone, so substantial portions of their structures remain standing, and the rubble

1Department of Anthropology, Arizona State University Tempe, Arizona.2To whom correspondence should be addressed at Department of Anthropology, Arizona StateUniversity, Tempe, Arizona 85287-2402; e-mail: [email protected].

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168 Nelson and Schachner

forms significant mounds. Nearly every person who visits or lives in the NorthAmerican Southwest has seen an archaeological site and been curious about itsoccupants. Public curiosity is often framed in the following questions: What hap-pened to these people? Where did they go? From an academic perspective, twoaspects of the prehistoric North American Southwest lend themselves to an em-phasis on abandonment. First, the arid to semiarid climate offered a challenge tohunting, gathering, and particularly farming. Movement was frequent. The causesof abandonment are often seen in characteristics of the environment or human im-pacts on it. Second, social practices evolved in contexts lacking institutionalizedhierarchy. Social organization is viewed as flexible; social, economic, and politicalpressures were addressed often by movement. Thus abandonment was a frequentoccurrence that deserves explanation.

How Southwest archaeologists have explained abandonment is the focus ofthis paper, but we seek also to consider the public perception of our work and howit impacts native people. Recent research addresses the complexity of the interplaybetween push and pull factors, considering factors as different as climate andideology. Explanations for abandonments at all scales are viewed as multicausal. Inaddition, research has shifted away from a focus on social systems and institutionsto the thoughtful actor or agent. Strategies and practices are considered importantin explanations of abandonment and are viewed as highly variable within regions,communities, and settlements. Public perception of abandonment research does notinclude these nuanced understandings of push and pull, ideology and climate, andvariable practice and strategy. The current public interpretation of abandonment ascatastrophic failure, promoted in public contexts and often tapped by archaeologistsas an entr´ee into public attention, must be replaced with an appreciation of thecomplexity of explanations and processes of abandonment, which is more often amovement strategy that promotes continuity of groups, ideas, and homelands.

We begin by discussing how the term “abandonment” is used in academic andpublic contexts. We then explore the key issues of cause and process in archaeo-logical research on abandonment in the North American Southwest and offer threecase studies to illustrate current research structured by the themes outlined above.Finally, future directions are suggested with an eye to the impact of the languageof archaeological research on public perceptions. We limit our discussion to theperiod after the development of domestication economies and focus on site, local,and regional abandonment, excluding treatment of structure abandonment (seeCameron, 1991a; Cameron and Tomka, 1993). Henceforth, we refer to the NorthAmerican Southwest simply as the Southwest (Fig. 1).

THE CONCEPT OF ABANDONMENT

Abandonment is commonly used by Southwest archaeologists to refer to“the absence of evidence for habitation of any magnitude or duration in a locus



Understanding Abandonments in the North American Southwest 169

of previous habitation” (Fishet al., 1994, p. 136). It entails movement that maybe part of an ongoing strategy of shifting residence, a reorganization of localsocial and economic patterns, or a migration. Abandonment is not to be confusedwith relinquishment of ownership or disappearance of a people. The latter is amodern, western view of abandonment that unfortunately has been misconstruedin public understanding of archaeological interpretations of the past (Lekson andCameron, 1995; Nelson, 1999, 2000). Abandonment can be “a negative, dramaticword and, in speaking of the Pueblo past, settlement history should not be viewedin those lurid Hollywood lights. Ancient Pueblo places—buildings and villagesarchaeologically abandoned—continue to influence the lives of Pueblo peoples.This is true today, and it surely was true in the past” (Lekson and Cameron, 1995,p. 184). The prehistoric people of the Southwest did not disappear. Their manymovements created a record of abandoned residences but not relinquished places.

To explain and understand the process and scale of residential movement isessentially the study of abandonment. In foraging societies, mobility is studied asa strategy (e.g., Binford, 1980; Kelly, 1983), whereas in state-level societies thedepopulation of centers is studied as collapse (Yoffee and Cowgill, 1988; for anexample of mobility in the context of an empire see Sinopoli, 1994). Both mobilityand collapse may apply to understanding movement in the prehistoric Southwest,but small-scale hunting–gathering–farming groups are neither as small or sociallyfluid as foraging societies nor as large and institutionally structured as states. Muchof their residential movement is conditioned by ecological and social dynamicsquite different from those of foraging societies or states (Feinman and Neitzel,1984; Nelson, 2000; Tomka and Stevenson, 1993; Varien, 1999). This differenceis referable to the co-occurrence of two essential aspects of small-scale farmingsocieties: the commitment of people to place and the flexibility of social forms.

Mobility is essential in the land use strategies of foragers and small-scalefarmers in arid landscapes, but farmers use mobility differently from foragers.Among foragers, population densities are usually low, food is not produced, andstrategies for resource use are extensive (Cashdan, 1983, 1984, 1990; Halstead andO’Shea, 1989; Kelly, 1983). Farming may increase population packing and aggre-gation, encourage the targeting of specific places, and promote a degree of landownership and residential stability (Bender, 1990; Horne, 1993; Kohler, 1992a;Kohler and Matthews, 1988; Preucel, 1988; Tomka and Stevenson, 1993; Varienet al., 2000; Wallace and Doelle, in press). These conditions are especially pro-moted by limited distribution of arable land and by technological investments inpreparing land for cultivation (Adler, 1996; Netting, 1993; Varien, 1999). Thus,among farmers, moving residence may involve considerations of ownership, in-vestment (time, energy, resources), and access specifically with respect to places.Although foragers are not unattached to places, we expect place-focus to be moredominant with the increasing technological and labor investment of food produc-tion, the potential for intensification of procurement made possible by farming,and the increased length of residential aggregation in favored locations.




Fig. 1. The North American Southwest showing the location of sites and areas discussed in the text.




The kinds of access and ownership questions that arose for prehistoric South-west farmers may have been complicated to resolve in the context of limitedinstitutionalized leadership. The population levels of some sites, communities,and regions made face-to-face interaction and decision making difficult (Johnson,1982). Among prehistoric Southwest farmers, social arrangements were relativelyflexible and kin-based (Adler, 1990; Fishet al., 1994; Reidet al., 1996; Schlegel,1992; Upham, 1984). We assume, following Netting (1993), that people wererelatively autonomous and able to employ movement as a strategy for address-ing various economic and social issues (e.g., Deanet al., 1994; Fishet al., 1994;Halstead and O’Shea, 1989), although the extent and kind of autonomy varied overtime and space in the prehistoric Southwest. Movement at times was limited notonly by commitments to a place but by circumscription and commitments to ideo-logies. Circumscription was promoted by regional population packing and threatsof conflict, which in turn may have encouraged formation of increasingly largecorporate groups less capable of fissioning (Fishet al., 1994; Kohler and Matthews,1988; Reidet al., 1996). Commitments to the ideas that successfully held groupstogether may have limited movement because people were disinclined to sever tiesor reject ideas that had been important (Lipe, 1995; Orcutt, 1991; Whiteley, 1988).Some movements may have been promoted by emerging ideological changes inthe abandoned region (Schachner, 2001) or may have entailed the creation of newideological or social forms facilitating the integration of people in new social andresidential settings (Adams, 1991; Fishet al., 1994; Lipe, 1995). The flexibility ofsocial forms in nonstate societies makes these changes possible.

Thus the study of abandonment of sites and regions by small-scale farmersoffers insights into the complicated interplay between factors promoting locationalstability of residence and those promoting movement. It encourages attention tothe variable ways in which people strategize and act in relation to these factors.The Southwest is an excellent context for exploring this interplay because of thediversity of economic and social forms and the cycles of population growth anddecline of prehistoric farmers. Individual and household movement was frequentbecause, as Johnson (1989) argues, mobility is an important strategy to accessland and labor in marginal environments (e.g., Cameron, 1995a; Cordell and Plog,1979; Deanet al., 1994; Fishet al., 1994; Hard and Merrill, 1992; Reidet al.,1996; Schlanger, 1988; Varien, 1999; Zedeno, 1994).

We begin our review of Southwest studies of abandonment by discussingexplanations of cause and process. The specific causes and processes addressedin abandonment research depend on the scales of analysis (Adler, 1993, 1996;Cameron, 1991a, 1993; Cameron and Tomka, 1993; Cordell, 1984; Deanet al.,1994; Fishet al., 1994, p. 136). At the broadest scale, causes for depopulation ofregions or reorganization of regional settlement are embedded in social relation-ships not only within villages, but within regional networks, and are tied to thephysical and social conditions of the regional landscape (Varien, 1999). They can




more easily be related to broad-scale climatic changes than to the local degradationeffects that influence site-level abandonments (Deanet al., 1994). At the oppositeend of the spatial scale, causes of intrasite abandonments may be much moreidiosyncratic; “abandonment of structures or activity areas is a constant process inmany settlements.” (Cameron, 1993, p. 5). Our discussions of cause and processgive attention to scale.

CAUSES OF ABANDONMENT

Abandonments at any scale may be seen as failed attempts to address changesin the natural environment and the social realm (Graveset al., 1982; Leksonand Cameron, 1995; Lipe, 1995). Alternatively, they may be seen as strategiesresponsive to changes or stresses (Fishet al., 1994; LeBlanc, 1998, 1999; Matsonet al., 1988; Reidet al., 1996; Schlanger, 1988; Stone, 1993) or as part of long-term land use (Cameron, 1993, 1995a; Cordell, 1975; Graham, 1993; Hegmonet al., 1998; Kohler and Matthews, 1988; Lipe, 1995; Naranjo, 1995; Nelson andAnyon, 1996; Nelson, 1999; Tomka, 1993; Upham, 1984; Varien, 1999). Recentresearch in the Southwest has shifted emphasis from addressing abandonment asfailure to viewing it as a strategy, although some movements are failed effortsin ecological relationships or social change. In line with this shift, attention hasbeen given to positive or pull factors that draw people to new places, as well as theconventional focus on negative or push factors. Social and environmental processesare both considered in the explanation of change, and many explanations attemptto consider multiple causes for abandonment and movement.

Push: Environment and Population

Environmental change has been a prominent variable in the explanation ofabandonments, as is reasonable in the study of small-scale farmers residing in anarid to semiarid landscape. Change in climate is considered in conjunction witha number of other related variables including resource productivity, the conditionof arable land, and human population size and distribution. In some research,emphasis is placed on changes in climate (e.g., Berry, 1982; Carmichael, 1990;Cordell, 1975; Euleret al., 1979; Graveset al., 1982; Mackey and Holbrook, 1978;Peterson, 1988; Schlanger, 1988; Tainter, 1988; Van West and Dean, 2000); inothers the human impacts on the natural landscape are emphasized (e.g., Kohler,1992b; Kohler and Matthews, 1988; Kohler and Van West, 1996; Matsonet al.,1988; Minnis, 1985; Schlanger and Wilshusen, 1993; Van West and Kohler, 1996).

At the broadest scale, Deanet al. (1994, pp. 75–77) argue that the overalldecline in Southwest population, from a high during theA.D. 1000s to Spanish con-tact atA.D. 1540, was caused by deteriorating climatic conditions (low frequencyand high frequency changes) in the context of relatively high levels of population;




“population growth rather than environmental degradation (due to human impacts)breached a systemic threshold” (Deanet al., 1994, p. 75, parentheses added).Environmental change has been deemed the primary factor in a number of regionalabandonments, the 13th century abandonment of the northern San Juan region be-ing the most prominent in archaeological and popular literature (Ahlstromet al.,1995; Van West and Dean, 2000; see case study below). Some have argued thatenvironmental change played a key role in the collapse of the largest regional sys-tems in the prehistoric Southwest, such as the Chacoan phenomenon (Judge, 1989;Sebastian, 1992; Tainter, 1988; Vivian, 1990; see Lekson and Cameron, 1995, fora critique) and the Classic Hohokam (Nialset al., 1989; Waters, 1989; see Deanet al., 1994; Doelle and Wallace, 1991; Fishet al., 1994, for alternative views).

Environmental explanations of local abandonments are often framed as re-sponses to subsistence stress rather than direct reactions to climatic conditions. Thelocality is considered an appropriate scale for examining population–environmentinteractions (Deanet al., 1994:85; Ploget al., 1988). For example, many largevillages in the Mimbres region were abandoned because of subsistence stress inthe mid-12th century (LeBlanc, 1989; Minnis, 1985); large settlements were aban-doned in the Mountain Mogollon region in the 14th century under conditions ofenvironmental degradation and subsistence stress (Fishet al., 1994, p. 162); sub-sistence and resource stress contributed to many site and local abandonments inthe Four Corners area of the northern Southwest (Ahlstromet al., 1995; Kohler andMatthews, 1988; Lipe, 1992, 1995; Van West, 1990; Wilshusen and Ortman, 1999);and competition over resources on the Pajarito Plateau led to its abandonment inthe mid-15th century (Orcutt, 1991). Many of these current studies of environmentemphasize the complexity of human–land relations and a combination of push andpull factors.

Push: Health, Nutrition, and Disease

Subsistence stress is cited often as an explanation for site abandonments, butmalnutrition and associated disease are rarely considered. Perhaps this is becausesubsistence stress did not lead to the extremes of malnutrition and disease at mostplaces and in most times (Martin, 1994, p. 92). Martin identifies aggregation andsedentism as primary factors contributing to poor health. Thus the role of poorhealth in promoting depopulation and abandonment is best considered for the lateprehistoric and protohistoric occupations in the Southwest when many settlementsheld hundreds and sometimes thousands of people.

In her overview of health assessments for various regions of the Southwest,Martin notes several cases of poor health related to regional abandonment, in-cluding declining health status in the Mesa Verde and Kayenta regions in the late13th century, and possibly in the Chaco region in the late 12th century. Similarly,poor health and disease may have played a role in Classic period site abandonments




in the Hohokam region (Roberts and Ahlstrom, 1997; Van Gerven and Sheridan,1994). Epidemic disease was probably not a factor in site, local, or regional aban-donments before European contact with the New World (Deanet al., 1994; Herrand Clark, 1997, p. 371; Roberts and Ahlstrom, 1997, pp. 119–120).

Push: Immigrant Pressure

Three studies pay particular attention to the role of immigration in circum-scribing mobility and causing the eventual abandonment of local areas and regions.These arguments recognize mobility, or site-level abandonment, as a frequent,effective strategy by small-scale farmer–hunter–gatherers in the arid Southwestfor adjusting to environmental and social dynamics. Any circumscription of thisresidential mobility eventually created a variety of problems. Migrations into east-ern Arizona in theA.D. 1200s decreased mobility and created uncertainty andcompetition over access to resources. This led to the abandonment of some sitesand areas and the occupation of large, aggregated settlements in others (Fishet al.,1994, pp. 157–161; Reidet al., 1996). In the Dolores area in the mid-9th century,immigration increased and circumscribed population movements. People intensi-fied food production, increased hunting, and enlarged their catchment areas, allof which altered the environment. With declining environmental conditions theheavily burdened and impacted local area was abandoned (Kohler and Matthews,1988). In some areas within the Hohokam region, immigration beginning in the12th century destabilized existing settlement organization, promoting aggregationand abandonment of sites and local areas (Wallace and Doelle, in press).

Push: Conflict

Conflict within and between settlements played a role in abandonments ofsites and regions. Intravillage conflict may have contributed to decisions to aban-don sites (e.g., Graveset al., 1982), although more often it was part of the cause forstructure abandonment as villages fissioned and members left (Cameron, 1991b,1999; Herr and Clark, 1997; Whiteley, 1987). The threat of intersettlement con-flict is seen by some as a cause for the abandonment of sites and localities,as vulnerable small groups of people aggregated in defense (Fishet al., 1994;Graveset al., 1982; Haas and Creamer, 1996; Kidder, 1924; LeBlanc, 1998, 1999;Lightfoot and Kuckelman, 1994; Lipe, 1995; Wallace and Doelle, in press; Wilcoxand Haas, 1994). Aggregation created the open space that some argue eitherdecreased conflict or was the consequence of regionwide conditions of warfare(Hunter-Anderson, 1979; LeBlanc, 1998, 1999; Wilcox and Haas, 1994).

Conversely, a relatively peaceful landscape may have provided its own impe-tus for site abandonments. Prior to the 13th century, the political entity representedby the Chacoan towns created, in Lekson’s view, a pax Chaco (see also LeBlanc,




1999) that allowed people to move freely within a broad portion of the northernSouthwest (Lekson, 1996). Peaceful relations over such a broad geographic areawould have allowed for the formation of unusually flexible settlement organization,able to change rapidly to accommodate environmental and social considerations,unhindered by defensive considerations. The sheer number and wide distributionof small habitations throughout the San Juan Basin and its surrounding environsattest to the relative ease of movement and abandonment.

The risk or danger posed by conflict may have created environmental andsocial stresses that in turn influenced decisions to abandon. Defensible locationson which to settle are limited in number, restricting the residential mobility neces-sary to sustain small-scale farming–hunting–gathering economies and increasingpotential human impact on resources much as did immigrant pressure, discussedabove. Haas’s and Haas and Creamer’s explanation of regional abandonment ofthe Kayenta area in theA.D. 1300s and Preucel’s treatment of the occupation andabandonment of the Pajarito Plateau consider the role that conflict played in cir-cumscribing mobility and its consequences in relation to human impacts, climatechange, and the increased cost of farming (Haas, 1989; Haas and Creamer, 1993;Preucel, 1988). Risk and danger have social and psychological implications aswell. Lipe (1995) argues that intercommunity conflict is destabilizing, both be-cause it increased stress through the threat of violence and because the strategy ofaggregation for defense posed other social problems. When mobility was reduced,people had to seek social solutions to problems of endemic conflict that could oncehave been solved by movement.

Some authors have argued that groups migrating into the Southwest promotedconflict and the abandonment of sites, local areas, and regions. These argumentshave primarily involved Numic (Ambler and Sutton, 1989) or Athabaskan (Jett,1964; Kidder, 1924) speakers moving into the northern San Juan region. Lipe(1995) counters the outsider explanations for abandonment of the Four Corners,noting that incoming groups would have to have been quite large to displace localPuebloan groups, and thus visible archaeologically, which they are not during the13th century abandonment (also see Litton, 1944). Both Numic and Athapaskanspeakers are evident during the protohistoric and historic periods, however, duringwhich time conflicts with Puebloan groups are well documented (Ferguson andHart, 1985).

Push: Ideology

Changes in productivity, population size, trade relationships, or the intro-duction of alternative ideas may promote regional abandonment by undercuttingthe ideological structure that guides community cohesion and decision making(McGuire, 1989; Kohler, 1993; Schachner, 2001). Fishet al. (1994, p. 149) notethe impact of abandonments on the maintenance of ideological systems, arguing




that for the Western Anasazi area “the complex social order that had developedsince theA.D. 1000s demanded a certain level of population density to be sustained.Once a critical portion of the population left, it was necessary for a complete exodusor the total transformation of the social form as it had developed.”

The relationship between abandonments and ideological change in the South-west has been relatively infrequently explored, despite the common assumptionthat a number of regional abandonments, such as those of the northern San Juandrainage in the 13th century, the San Juan Basin in the 12th century, and theHohokam area in the late 14th/early 15th centuries, were associated with signif-icant ideological shifts. In addition to viewing ideological changes as arising toaddress new social conditions created by migrations, we should explore the activerole of ideology in spurring and contributing to abandonment (Schachner, 2001).

Pull Factors

Most recently, Southwest archaeologists emphasize conditions in both home-land and destination locales that encourage abandonment of regions, locales, andsettlements (Ahlstromet al., 1995; Cameron, 1995a; Herr and Clark, 1997; Lipe,1995). Conditions in homelands are push factors, many discussed above, whileconditions in the destination locale are pull factors. Previous trade relationshipsand access to information about potential destinations play important roles in de-cisions concerning where and when to move (Anthony, 1990; Cameron, 1995a;Herr and Clark, 1997). Regional abandonments and migrations may have beenencouraged by conditions in destination locales, including recruiting from newcenters of population and power (Lipe, 1992), attractive environmental conditions(Ahlstrom et al., 1995; Cameron, 1995a; Crownet al., 1996; Lipe, 1995), andreligious developments (Lekson and Cameron, 1995; Lipe, 1992, 1995). Aban-donments of small settlements and regional reorganization toward aggregationmay have been encouraged by the defensive advantages of aggregates (see Push:Conflict above) and possible advantages of central decision making and alloca-tion of resources (Adler, 1996; Fishet al., 1994; Nelson, 1999). Reorganizationof settlements toward smaller residential clusters may have been promoted by thedispersed distribution of arable land and the decrease in intragroup social stressassociated with smaller settlements (Hegmonet al., 1998).

Fishet al. (1994, p. 137) suggest that large-scale regional abandonments inlate prehistory were due to the “development of organizational modes enablingrelatively denser, more integrated populations, and to. . .areally intensified pro-duction.” People were drawn into a few central places rather than driven thereby threat of conflict (contra LeBlanc, 1998, 1999; Wilcox and Haas, 1994). Fishet al.(1994) also argue for the benefit of highly clustered settlements in providingthe labor required for the intensive irrigation systems that developed late in theprehistory of the Southwest along the Rio Grande and earlier in the Sonoran Desert.




Discussion of Cause

Abandonments are rarely viewed as the result of a single cause. The themesoutlined in this section represent major foci of explanation, which may or maynot have interacted at different times or places in Southwest prehistory. Mostresearchers would agree with Lipe (1992, pp. 129–133) that the causes for aban-donment are complex and the scale of cause may be less dramatic than the scale ofthe events and the processes of abandonment. Large-scale regional abandonmentmay be best understood as the consequence of increased “complexity” or inter-connectivity (Lipe, 1992, p. 131, following Bak and Chen, 1991). Many large andsmall factors may have contributed to site, local, and regional abandonments—environmental degradation, increased or decreased population, social isolation,conflict, reduced mobility—but the pull of destination locations—larger or smallersettlements in a homeland, or a new homeland—are as essential to the causes forabandonment as are the factors in the place of origin.

In the popular press and often in public exhibits of archaeological research,the causes for abandonments are simplified and sensationalized. Although thisinterpretive strategy might draw attention to archaeology, it does not serve thelong-term interests of promoting an understanding of the past and does not givefair treatment to the reality of the continuity of native presence in the South-west. Current research can be presented in fascinating ways to nonarchaeologistswithout the need to misrepresent through sensationalizing. For example, popu-lar audiences are interested in issues of sustainability, the role of religion in so-cial change, and human impacts through farming to which abandonment researchapplies.

ABANDONMENT PROCESSES

Southwest archaeologists have placed great emphasis on the study of pro-cess, drawing inspiration from Binford (1980, 1981, 1982, 1983) and Schiffer(1972, 1976, 1985, 1987). This emphasis results from a shift away from con-ceptualizing abandonment as an event, responsive to a severe condition. Someabandonment strategies develop well before any actual move (see Anthony, 1990,on migration) and continue to impact people and modify landscape use well aftera move (Fishet al., 1994; Hegmonet al., 1998; Nelson, 1999; Rothschildet al.,1993). Residential abandonments vary in degree of permanence (or anticipatedreturn), anticipation or planning time, and distance of moves, among many othervariables (Baker, 1975; Binford, 1978; Brooks, 1993; Cameron, 1993; Joyce andJohannessen, 1993; Kent, 1992, 1993; Lightfoot, 1993; Schiffer, 1985; Stevenson,1982; Wilshusen, 1986).

Study of abandonment processes and development of middle range theoriesof abandonments have addressed both the effects of abandonment behavior on the




form of the archaeological record—assemblage composition, structure form, fillcomposition—and the links between the behavior and causes of abandonments.Recently, abandonment has been studied from the perspective of social agency(Hegmonet al., 1998; Varien, 1999). This approach has influenced how South-west archaeologists view abandonment behaviors, the composition of abandoninggroups, and social contexts of negotiating abandonment. As Varien notes “in theend it is people who make the decision to move or stay—and this decision isinfluenced by their social technology” (1999, p. 42). Abandoning one place foranother is a socially negotiated process. The occupants of a site have varied op-tions, networks, and priorities, and they employ different strategies, therefore, inthe process of moving (Cameron, 1991b; Joyce and Johannessen, 1993; Nelson,2000). Models of abandonment must contextualize the process of movement tothe level of household and individual, combined with a broader-scale analysis ofcommunity (Varien, 1999). Here we review treatments of both the social scale ofmovement and various behavioral dimensions linked to abandonment decisions.

Social Processes and Scales of Movement

Movement by individuals, households, and communities have been docu-mented in the Southwest. Greater attention has been directed at determining thesize of groups joining a settlement than at the size of groups abandoning a set-tlement, although some attention has been directed at the differential pattern ofabandonment of portions of sites. Individual moves must have been frequent be-cause most residential communities were too small to have been endogamous;individuals must have joined new communities by marrying into local households(Hegmonet al., 1998; Hegmonet al., 2000; Varien, 1999), although people mayhave moved for a myriad of economic and social reasons. The movement of in-dividuals is difficult to detect archaeologically, unless individuals moved to areasin which the technological or design styles of material production were differentfrom those they had learned in their home community. Household movementsare more visible than individual moves; for households, architectural units wereoften added to existing structures or settlements. Those households on the pe-riphery of communities may have moved more often than did core or first-comerhouseholds within communities because their access to land was limited, theirfarmland was less productive, and/or they had a broad mix of subsistence strate-gies (Shafer, 1996; Varien, 1999). Household moves from abandoned sites havebeen recognized by scavenging and trash filling of abandoned houses by thepopulation remaining in the village or local area (Lightfoot, 1993; Montgomery,1993). Community-level moves were less frequent in the Southwest than werehousehold moves (Duff, 1998; Herr and Clark, 1997), but they are quite visible.The joining of disparate groups to form new communities is documented in de-tail by Reid and others working in the Mountain Mogollon area through analysisof settlement, architectural, ceramic, and human skeletal remains (Birkby, 1982;




Graveset al., 1982; Longacre, 1975, 1976; Reid, 1973, 1989; Reid and Shimada,1982; Reidet al., 1996; Triadan, 1997; Zede˜no, 1994). In addition, intrusive settle-ments established by the movement of village-scale groups have been documentedespecially in the late periods of prehistoric occupation in the Southwest (DiPeso,1958; Haury, 1958; Lekson 2001; Lindsay, 1987; Wallace and Doelle, in press;Woodson, 1999), although the visibility of intrusive groups depends on the natureof the relationship between migrants and recipient groups (Cordell, 1995).

Some attention has been given to the specific question of what conditionsthe size of migrant groups during regional abandonment and migration. Cameron(1995a) argues, following Anthony (1990), Kopytoff (1987), and Schlegel (1992),that migration and regional abandonment probably was undertaken by groups ofpeople larger than the individual family or household. However, Herr and Clark(1997, pp. 379–380) note that, although historical migration stories of SouthwestPueblo people describe the movement of whole communities, there is only onedocumented case of an entire community abandoning their village—the residentsof San Juan pueblo resettled across the river when the Spanish governor boughttheir village from them. More often, communities fission and members move todifferent locations. In several studies, rapid declines in population levels have beenused to indicate large group decision making and abandonment of settlements.Fish et al. (1994, p. 153) argue for large group movement in the abandonmentof the Marana region; “the decision to abandon can be viewed as a social aswell as an economic choice among a large population whose interconnectionsare emphasized by such joint action.” Lipe’s estimates of population size and thetiming of population decline in the northern San Juan area of the Four Cornersregion during the lateA.D. 1200s (Lipe, 1995) necessitates an abandonment grouplarger than the individual or household. He suggests, based on estimates by others,that 5,000 to 10,000 people abandoned the area between theA.D. 1250s and theA.D. 1280s. Yet evidence from the Rio Grande for immigration from the FourCorners at this time suggests more variability in migrant group size, as there areindications of some immigrations by small groups and others by communities ofseveral hundred (Cameron, 1999; Roney, 1995). The size of the groups abandoningsites may have been influenced by the causes for abandonment (Cameron, 1995a),which can differ for individuals, households, or communities. In addition, theways that immigrants became integrated into new groups depended on existingrelationships between migrant and local groups, the organization of local groupswithin the new homeland, and the size of migrant groups (Fishet al., 1994, p. 143).Thus the study of abandonment group size may require both a consideration ofdeparting groups in the abandoned area and arriving groups in the destination area(Cordell, 1995). Changes in group size and composition offer insights into themigration process.

Limited attention has been given to the social processes involved in theabandonment of localities associated with regional reorganization. Although localmoves may have been an individual- or household-level strategy, decisions were




made and executed in the context of a broad, community-based social landscape.Hegmon and Nelson (Hegmonet al., 1998; Nelson, 1999; Nelson and Hegmon,2001) and Varien (1999) have focused attention on social processes of intraregionalmovement and reorganization. Both are discussed in the “Case Studies” section.However, two key aspects of these studies deserve mention. First, both argue thathouseholds moved frequently within their study region, especially under conditionsof low population density. Thus attention to the social contexts and negotiation ofmovement for households is essential to understanding this scale of abandonment.Second, movement in those regions was constrained by investment in farmlandand the importance of land tenure, a set of factors that we initially argued favors aplace-focused, residentially stable settlement pattern among small-scale farmingsocieties.

The question of group size is essential to understanding abandonment strate-gies and the social processes of negotiating movement. Not only do we need tointegrate various scales of movement in the study of abandonments, as Varien(1999) suggests, but we need more detailed data on how the movement processoccurred. Modern sampling has detracted from our ability to understand abandon-ments in this sense because whole household blocks, contiguous room blocks, andwhole settlements are rarely excavated (for an exception, see Lightfoot, 1994).These data are needed if we hope to understand how communities and householdsseparated from places and from each other.

Behavioral Strategies For Movement

From a behavioral perspective, abandonment is “the process whereby aplace—an activity area, structure, or entire settlement—is transformed to the ar-chaeological context” (Schiffer, 1987, p. 89). The transformation process involvesmany considerations. We focus on three that have received considerable attentionby Southwest archaeologists: the permanence of abandonments, the time depthof planning abandonment, and the distance of moves. Other processes not con-sidered also influence the record and our explanation of it: scavenging behavior,ritual behavior, natural processes of decay and change, and room use, among others(Schiffer, 1972, 1976, 1987).

Permanence of Move

The permanence of abandonment may have been categorical; people eitherbelieved they would never return or believed they would return to live at a site.However, even regional abandonments may not have had this kind of finality in theminds of people moving; people may have hoped to return, whether they actuallyreturned or not (Kent, 1992). For this reason, structures and artifacts may have




been treated in such a way that return was possible: items may have been cached inrooms or elsewhere on site; structures may have been left intact and features sealed(Lightfoot, 1993; Schlanger and Wilshusen, 1993; Stevenson, 1982; Tomka, 1993).Kent (1992) uses the concepts of “anticipated” and “actual” behavior to understandconstruction, use, and abandonment patterns on Pueblo II (A.D. 900–1100) sitesin the Mesa Verde area.

Several characteristics of archaeological deposits are used as indices of thepermanence of a move. Structure burning, as a method of “closure,” indicates noanticipated return (Adler, 1993; Schlanger and Wilshusen, 1993; but see Cameron,1990, for a critique of this view). Both the disassembly of structures and pre-abandonment accumulation of activity debris on structure floors also are seen asevidence for permanent moves away from sites (Bradley, 1992; Clark, 1998; Fishet al., 1994, p. 143; Lindsayet al., 1968; Wilshusen, 1986).

Temporary abandonments of Southwest residential sites or localities havebeen explained as responses to social stresses (Nelson, 1999), opportunities else-where (Rothschildet al., 1993), disease or food stress (Wilshusen, 1988), andas part of an annual or interannual cycle of land use (Windeset al., 2000). Twodimensions of cyclical movement contribute to the form of the record and our un-derstanding of cause: the length of time during which the structure or site was aban-doned and the frequency of reoccupation. Structures and sites may be seasonallyabandoned as part of an annual cycle (Cameron, 1991a; Graham, 1993; Hard andMerrill, 1992; Rocek, 1988; Windeset al., 2000) or abandoned periodically withina longer-term cycle of shifting residence (Nelson, 1999). These temporary aban-donments are recognized by maintenance of functional domestic assemblages ofartifacts in structures. Their occurrence in the archaeological record is presumedto result from a “change in plan” or “failure” to return. However, the maintenanceof domestic assemblages in structures also may be for reasons of ideology or landclaim, with no expectation of returning to reside in a structure.

Discontinuation of one kind of use need not imply discontinued use (Binford,1980; Schiffer, 1972, 1985, 1987). Although movement of residence may appearpermanent, use does not cease with residential abandonment. Claim to accessand/or ownership may have continued to motivate people to return to residentiallyabandoned places (Adams and Adams, 1993; Adler, 1996, p. 355; Fishet al., 1994,p. 145; Schwartz, 1970). Southwest farmers most often lived in close proximity totheir fields. Their residential structures could have served as markers of access andownership (Kohler, 1992a; Nelson, 1999; Rothschildet al., 1993; Varien, 1999),which continued to serve this purpose after they were residentially abandoned.Continued claim is especially important in the context of increased populationdensity and/or circumscription creating competition for productive land (Varien,1999). The practice of burying the deceased beneath room floors, in room fill,and in plazas adjacent to rooms may have marked the continued attachment ofpeople to places, as may paintings and carvings on rock formations associated




with residences. Modern Hopi and Zuni people visit villages in which they onceresided and use these localities for collecting resources and performing rituals(Ferguson, 1995). Hopi people visit distant boundary markers to retain connectionand claim to land no longer residentially occupied (Fishet al., 1994, p. 145). Tomany native people, prehistoric sites are not abandoned; their buried ancestors stilloccupy them. Return to those “living” places to communicate with ancestors andbury relatives may have been and continues to be common.

Planning Depth

The extent to which abandonments were planned depends on the causes of amove (Anthony, 1990; Cameron, 1995a; Lipe, 1995). Establishing planning depthshould help sort among possible explanations. Raiding and accidental structurefires, for example, caused rapid or unplanned abandonment. Environmental or so-cial stresses would have been felt and evaluated over a period of time, perhapsseveral years, influencing gradual abandonment. These different ends of a contin-uum produce different effects on the material record. Rapid abandonments do notallow for removal of valued items or the accumulation of domestic debris; thusdomestic assemblages in structures are relatively intact and floor-context trash israre (Brooks, 1993; Lightfoot, 1993; Stevenson, 1982). Gradual abandonmentsallow residents to remove valued materials, including the structure itself (Brooks,1993; Fishet al., 1994, pp. 142–143; Lightfoot, 1993; Stevenson, 1982), and maybe accompanied by considerable accumulation of trash from domestic activitiesthat is not cleared (Clark, 1998; Lightfoot, 1993; Schiffer, 1985; Stevenson, 1982).These patterns are, of course, influenced by other considerations such as distancemoved, presence of remaining population in a site or within the locality, ritualclosure practices, and permanence of move, among others.

Fishet al. (1994, p. 160; see also Graves, 1982, 1983) discuss an interestingcase of gradual, planned abandonment. Their point of reference is the site towhich people moved. In the mid-14th century, people were abandoning the largesettlements on the Grasshopper Plateau. One of the sites to which they moved wasCanyon Creek Pueblo, a cliff dwelling. Based on tree-ring dates, the authors arguethat timber for construction was stockpiled for several years in anticipation ofthe move that occurred in theA.D. 1320s. This gradual, anticipated abandonmentand resettlement is consistent with their model of gradual disintegration of largevillages due to the lack of institutionalized hierarchy needed to resolve the socialproblems of large, long-term population aggregates.

Distance Moved

Explanations for abandonment differ considerably between studies of long-distance and those of short-distance movement. The study of long-distance moves,




or migrations, forms a sizable body of literature concerned with large-scale causes(environmental, social, and political) for the residential abandonment of regionsand issues of resettlement and integration with local groups in new homelands(recently edited collections include Cameron, 1995b, and Spielmann, 1998). Re-search on short-distance moves addresses settlement reorganization in economic,social, and political terms (recently published books include Nelson, 1999, andVarien, 1999).

Short-distance movement within a homeland was probably common through-out prehistory (see Herr and Clark, 1997, for a similar statement about the historicperiod), as people sought opportunities to access land and labor (Varien, 1999)or avoided the economic and social stresses of their current residence (Nelson,1999). Kin-based information networks structured these movements and were themedium through which they were negotiated (Anthony, 1990; Varien, 1999). Siteabandonments with short-distance moves occurred in the process of aggregationwithin regions, particularly in the 13th century or later (e.g., Fishet al., 1994; Lipe,1992; Reidet al., 1996; Varien, 1999), as well as with dispersions from villagesto smaller settlements (e.g., Hegmonet al., 1998; Nelson, 1999; Upham, 1984).Common indices of short-distance movement have been the absence of usableartifacts in floor and roof contexts within domestic structures and in activity areas,and the dismantling of structures (Lipe, 1992, p. 130; Schlanger and Wilshusen,1993).

Migrations are moves across cultural boundaries (Anthony, 1990; Cameron,1995a), which archaeologically are recognized by distributions of architectural andceramic technological and design styles. The most extensively studied migrationis the late 13th century regional abandonment and southern migration of peoplefrom the Four Corners into the western Pueblo and Rio Grande Pueblo regions.Movement has been studied from the perspective of the region of departure as wellas from the perspective of the recipient regions. In the abandoned areas, migration isrecognized by the presence of sizable domestic assemblages containing all but themost valued and portable items and the presence of intact and/or burned structures(Adler, 1993). From the receiving end, considerable debate has ensued over how torecognize immigration (Cordell, 1995; Crownet al., 1996; Roney, 1995). Indicesrange from architectural unit intrusion to new or modified technological and designstyles.

Discussion of Abandonment Behavior

Individuals and households perceive their options differently, even in highlyintegrated communities. Variation in these perceptions would have influenced bothanticipation of moving and returning and the actual behaviors of abandoning. Thuswe should not expect villages to be homogeneous sets of similar abandonment pat-terns unless the causes for abandonment were rapid and catastrophic. Identifying




the possible role that anticipation of return, planning time, and movement distancehad in structuring abandonments can aid in understanding the dynamics of humanthought and action.

Many researchers consider combinations of behavioral factors in the aban-donment process. For example, Schlanger and Wilshusen (1993) combine distanceand anticipation of movement to construct a series of expectations for the characterof artifactual and architectural remains—correlates of abandonment process—forPueblo I (A.D. 750–900) settlements in the Dolores area. These are refined by Adler(1993) in his study of later 13th century abandonment of the Four Corners andreorganization of settlement in the Rio Grande. He adds the dimension of structurefunction to the formulation of these correlates. Their work and research by manyothers can be summarized in four basic premises that guide expectations aboutthe material consequences of abandonment behaviors: distance limits the amountthat can be carried; anticipated return results in storage behavior for artifacts andstructures; accessibility to scavenging reduces archaeological assemblages andstructure integrity; and ritual significance influences the closure of structures.

CASE STUDIES

Abandonment research in three regions of the North American Southwestexemplify a range of approaches that improve our understanding of the ecological,social, political, and ideological aspects of movement. In all three regions, researchemphasizes multiple causes for abandonment and variability in processes of move-ment. Movement is framed as strategic, and its explanation considers the role ofindividuals acting within a range of natural and social contexts. Equally important,both continuity and change of groups, social forms, and ideas are considered.

Mimbres

The question “What happened to the Mimbres people?” has dominatedarchaeological research in the Mimbres region for over 50 years. By the late10th century, populations of farmers were aggregated along the primary river chan-nels in southwestern New Mexico, beginning to construct the stone masonry pueb-los occupied until the early 12th century (LeBlanc, 1983). This Classic Mimbresperiod delimits the largest regional and largest site-level population of the Mimbrestradition (Blakeet al., 1986). Finely executed naturalistic and geometric designspainted in black on white vessels, a style referred to as Classic Mimbres Style III,have attracted professional, avocational, and public interest (Brody, 1977; Brodyet al., 1983). The cessation of their manufacture has begged the question of wherethe producers of this outstanding pottery went and why people stopped making suchexquisite pottery designs. Archaeologists generally agree that large, Classic period,




pueblo-like settlements were abandoned, in part or completely, in the 12th century.(Anyonet al., 1981; Hegmonet al., 2000; LeBlanc, 1983; Lekson, 1992; Nelson,1999; Shafer, 1990). Sites of earlier and later periods were residentially abandoned,as were localities and possibly valley systems, but no period has been dominatedby the abandonment issue as extensively as the Classic Mimbres period. Thus ourreview focuses on it.

The timing of the depopulation of Classic Mimbres villages is securely placedin the early 12th century, ca.A.D. 1130–1150 (Hegmonet al., 1999; LeBlanc,1983; Shafer, 1990). However, the processes of abandonment and its causes areless well established. Explanations of village depopulation and understanding ofthe processes are strongly influenced by different views of what happened afterthe abandonment of Classic villages.

The Mimbres Foundation project of the 1970s, one of the largest in theMimbres region, led to two perspectives regarding the abandonment of Classicperiod villages, both of which assumed regional-scale abandonment or a sig-nificant depopulation. The first emphasizes population growth, stress on localresources, and environmental degradation. Minnis (1985; Blakeet al., 1986) doc-uments degradation of local riparian species and extension of field areas into rela-tively marginal settings, which he interpreted as evidence for population–resourceimbalance. This condition in conjunction with the lack of extraregional exchangenetworks led, in Minnis’s opinion, to the abandonment of villages and the region.Nelson (1981) documents shifts in plant and animal resource use, which parallelMinnis’s results and support an argument of environmental causes for regionalabandonment. The second perspective emphasizes pulls from social developmentsoutside the Mimbres region. LeBlanc (1975, 1976, 1977, 1983, 1989) accepts theenvironmental argument, but emphasizes the broader social landscape in his expla-nation for abandonment. Arguing variously for regional abandonment and shiftingsettlement toward the south, LeBlanc views the rise of the center of Casas Grandesas pulling Mimbres people into a new social system, which he suggests could havebeen either voluntary or forced. Shafer (1990), also asserting regional abandon-ment at the end of the Classic Mimbres period, argues for population–resourceimbalance accompanied by reduced rainfall.

Recently, the idea of regional abandonment and discontinuity of cultural tra-dition has been challenged as researchers have explored evidence for both occupa-tional and social continuity. Postclassic continuity of some portion of the Classicperiod population has been documented in the continued occupation of domesticstructures in some villages in the Mimbres Valley, settlement reorganization oflocal population in the eastern Mimbres area, and the continued use of MimbresBlack-on-White-style ceramics afterA.D. 1130 (Hegmonet al., 1999). This evi-dence has led to a reinterpretation of village abandonment. Hegmon, Nelson, andtheir students, working in the eastern Mimbres area, argue for a shift in local set-tlement organization from aggregated village life to dispersed hamlet settlements




with limited emigration from the region. Excavation at the hamlet sites documentsthis shifting settlement focus, along with changes in social and economic patterns(Hegmonet al., 1998, 2000; Nelson, 1999; Nelson and Diehl, 1999; Nelson andHegmon, 1999). In their view, village abandonment and local reorganization repre-sents a shift from one set of advantages and disadvantages (aggregation) to another(dispersion) within a strategy of regional- rather than site-level occupational conti-nuity. Causes are explored from the point of view of identifying factors that shiftedthe balance between advantages and disadvantages. For example, aggregation hasas one of many advantages, the benefit of defense, while a significant disadvantageis the stress on locally available resources. When the latter outweighs the former (orother disadvantages outweigh advantages), dispersion may be expected, assumingthe social landscape allows for dispersed settlement organization. Migration mightbe expected if dispersed settlement is not an option for social, political, or eco-nomic reasons, an argument that has been made for many 13th century migrations(see Spielmann, 1998). From this perspective, movement is viewed as strategic ina long-term pattern of land use rather than as the result of a failed attempt to live ina particular settlement arrangement. Multiple scales of analysis that include struc-tures, sites, localities, regions, and macroregions make evident the reorganizationand continuity.

The social flexibility that makes cycles of aggregation and dispersion possibleis also seen in the variation of settlement strategies across the Mimbres region.Although a high degree of regional integration is evident in the homogeneity ofvarious aspects of material culture across the three major drainages of the Mimbresregion (Hegmonet al., 1998; LeBlanc, 1983; Minnis, 1985; Shafer, 1995), the pat-terns of site- and local-level abandonments vary across the major river systems.The Gila River Valley, Lekson (1992) argues, was completely depopulated by theend of the Classic period. The Mimbres Valley was depopulated entirely in thenorthern and middle portions, while in the southern portion some people remainedwithin villages, eventually establishing new villages adjacent to the old (Creel,1999; Hegmonet al., 1999). Along the tributaries of the Rio Grande, the numberof residents seems not to have been reduced substantially when villages were aban-doned (Nelson and Hegmon, 2001), but reorganized within the area. This regionalvariation may be explained in part by the differences in the environments of thethree valley systems (Nelson, 1999. pp. 43–44) and in part by changes occurringin the broad social landscape of the southern Southwest, with population shiftingto the east and exchange relationships broadening (Lekson, 1992; Nelson, 1999;Nelson and Hegmon, 1999; Nogue, 1999). Both variation in environmental con-ditions and changes in the social landscape created different contexts of decisionmaking and different options for individuals, households, and communities acrossthe three valleys. The nature of this intraregional variation in movement strategiesdeserves further attention in the Mimbres and other regions of the Southwest, asit is rooted in aspects of the flexibility in middle range societies.




Abandonment of the large, Classic period villages has been viewed by manyarchaeologists and nonarchaeologists as the end of the Mimbres people. Thisunfortunate view derives from the equation of people with ceramic styles. Althoughgroup identity can be represented in various material styles, including ceramicdesign styles, those symbolic images change along with the changing identityof people. The pace of change varies, depending on what is influencing groupidentity and cohesion. The Mimbres case documents a long period of slow changein black-on-white design during the 11th and 12th centuries (Shafer and Taylor,1986) with a rapid change not only in design but in technological style in the middleof the 12th century (Hegmonet al., 1998). The settlement reorganization in the12th century, with abandonment of large villages and settlement in hamlets, musthave been accompanied by substantial social reorganization and thus changes in theidentity of individuals and groups. People actively modified their social landscape,seeking new relationships with people to the north, east, and south that are evidentin the merging of local design and technological styles with newly acquired styles(Hegmonet al., 1998; Nelson and Hegmon, 1999). Representation of abandonmentas a mysterious disappearance or failure gives the false impression of demise of apeople and relinquishment of land, which denies the connection of the past to thepresent and shifts focus away from examining the dynamic social realms of the past.

Northern San Juan Region

For most of the world, Southwest archaeology begins and ends with the cliffdwellings of Mesa Verde National Park in southwest Colorado. To many peo-ple these vacant buildings are evidence for a vanished people: “the mysteriousAnasazi” of television, tourist brochures, and public consciousness. Early archae-ological work, presenting northern San Juan populations as struggling and failingto survive the Great Drought ofA.D. 1276–1299 (Douglass, 1929) or the onslaughtof marauding nomads (Kidder, 1924), contributed to the public fascination withdisappearance and failure. Recently, archaeologists have struggled to overcomethis view by emphasizing continuity between modern Native American and pre-historic populations (Lekson and Cameron, 1995). Additionally, native peopleshave begun to more directly address what they view as wrongheaded and detri-mental notions of their past histories, particularly in relation to abandoned sitesand regions (Naranjo, 1995). Archaeologists have begun to explore multicausalexplanations for the abandonment of the northern San Juan region at the end of thePueblo III period (A.D. 1150–1300), touching on many of the themes presented inour discussion of cause and process.

The singular focus on the Great Drought as the ultimate cause of regionalabandonment in the northern San Juan region has been increasingly questionedin recent years. Carla Van West and colleagues (Van West, 1990; Van West andDean, 2000; Van West and Kohler, 1996) have attempted to reconstruct the impact




of drought and other forms of environmental change on prehistoric agriculturaland food-sharing practices. They raise serious doubts that the Great Drought alonecould have resulted in the complete abandonment of the region. Their researchshows that despite the drought, at least some of the regional populations wouldhave been able to produce sufficient food supplies had social conditions enabledthem to do so (Van West and Kohler, 1996).

Recent explanations for the Pueblo III abandonment are multicausal, empha-size strategic action, and consider factors in both homeland and destination areas.Four factors are currently seen as key to explaining abandonment and migration inthe 13th century: environmental change (and opportunity), the pull of developingsystems to the south, the impact of preexisting settlement choices and structures,and increasing intraregional conflict. First, responses to environmental change aremodeled as choices structured by perceptions and options rather than by simplereaction (Ahlstromet al., 1995; Dean, 1988; Van West and Dean, 2000). For exam-ple, Ahlstrom, Van West, and Dean (1995) accept the dramatic effect of the GreatDrought on large portions of the Southwest, but argue that it would have accentu-ated preexisting differences in precipitation patterns, making the areas to the southand southeast of the northern San Juan more attractive. This perspective on theenvironment closely parallels the second major addition to discussions of northernSan Juan abandonment: that of the pull of social developments and systems outsideof the region (Lipe, 1995). Lipe cautions archaeologists that large-scale, regionalabandonments should not necessarily be perceived as failures and may not havebeen perceived by participants as failures. Northern San Juan residents were prob-ably aware of, and may have wished to participate in, the developing ritual systemsto the south (Adams, 1991; Crown, 1994). A third factor in current abandonmentdiscussions is an increasing awareness of the role of mobility, aggregation, andthe importance of place in structuring the residential choices of northern San Juanpeoples (Varien, 1999; Varienet al., 2000). By the time of the drought in the lateA.D. 1200s, northern San Juan communities were moving along a trajectory ofincreasing locational stability of community centers and aggregation into partic-ular points upon the landscape. Land tenure and agricultural investments werebecoming more structured and less flexible, precluding dispersal as a response tothe Great Drought (see Kohler and Van West, 1996). Finally, the role of conflictin shaping ancestral Puebloan responses to change cannot be underestimated. Sig-nificant evidence of ancestral Puebloan awareness of, and active participation in,violent events throughout the northern San Juan has become increasingly promi-nent in the last decade (Billmanet al., 2000; Kuckelmanet al., 2000). Conflictdoes not seem to have been a sufficient cause for regional abandonment, but itprobably did assure the total abandonment of the region, a prospect that none ofthe factors alone would necessarily assure (Lipe and Varien, 1999a, p. 341). Takentogether, these four factors provide an incredibly rich, multicausal explanation forthe northern San Juan abandonment in the lateA.D. 1200s. Although the details




may change, we expect these four factors to play major roles in future explanationsof abandonment in the region.

Current research focused on the northern San Juan Pueblo I period (A.D. 750–900) is revealing a similar pattern of regional abandonment, albeit at a slightlysmaller scale. Wilshusen and colleagues have convincingly argued that the latePueblo I period, at least in the northern San Juan, was characterized by the forma-tion of aggregated villages (Orcuttet al., 1990; Wilshusen, 1991, 1999; Wilshusenand Blinman, 1992). Virtually all of these villages appear to have been abandonedby A.D. 890, with only a sparse, poorly documented population residing in thenorthern San Juan for at least 60 and possibly as many as 100 years.

Previous explanations of Pueblo I abandonments parallel the Great Droughtmodel by focusing on the environment and another severe drought that spanned thelateA.D. 870s into theA.D. 890s (Peterson, 1988; Schlanger, 1988). Again, theseexplanations do not address the magnitude of abandonment, the lack of reorgani-zation in place, or cultural perceptions (Schachner, 2001). Recently, more nuancedenvironmental explanations have been proposed, with Schlanger and Wilshusen(1993) examining the role of macroregional differences in rainfall patterns in set-ting up an “environmental gradient” similar to that discussed by Ahlstromet al.(1995). Kohler and Matthews (1988) have explored the effects of environmentaldegradation resulting from depletion of local agricultural and wild resources bythe residents of the large Pueblo I villages. Additionally, Kohler (1992a) has high-lighted the formation of increasingly hierarchical and rigid land tenure systemsduring the Pueblo I period. These changes would have decreased the options forindividuals, households, kin groups, and communities responding to environmen-tal change (cf. Kohler and Van West, 1996). Developments external to the regionalso have been explored, as researchers shift attention to the pull of the emerg-ing Chacoan phenomenon to the south (Schachner, 2001; Wilshusen and Ortman,1999). Elements of symbolism used by northern San Juan Pueblo I populationswere incorporated into the Chacoan sphere. The depopulation and possible ideo-logical collapse in the northen San Juan may have played a role in the initiationof the Chacoan phenomenon (Schachner, 2001; Wilshusen and Ortman, 1999;Wilshusen and Wilson, 1995; Windes and Ford, 1992). Although there is somesporadic evidence for Pueblo I period conflict, it does not appear to have beennearly as intense or pervasive as during the later Pueblo III period abandonment(Lightfoot, 1992; Wilshusen, 1986; Wilshusen and Ortman, 1999).

The Pueblo I depopulation provides an interesting comparison to the Pueblo IIIabandonment. Similar processes influenced the choices made by residents result-ing in regional abandonment. Both abandonments were preceded by significantaggregation into large villages exhibiting some evidence of social differentia-tion and developing hierarchy (Pueblo I: Blinman, 1989; Kane, 1989; Kohler,1992a; Schachner, 2001; Wilshusen, 1989; Pueblo III: Lipe, 1992; Lipe and Varien,1999a). Additionally, these aggregates were clustered on the landscape, rendering




large portions of the region relatively unoccupied in comparison (Orcuttet al.,1990; Wilshusen and Ortman, 1999; Varien, 1999). In both cases, the tendencytoward clustered, large villages probably exacerbated the effects of environmentalchanges by precluding the possibility of movement on a densely occupied land-scape (Kohler, 1992a; Kohler and Van West, 1996; Varien, 1999). Although therewere significant areas of largely unoccupied land, movement into these areas doesnot appear to have been a viable option, probably because of endemic conflict.Finally, in both cases new, large-scale ritual systems were developing in the south,providing northern San Juan residents with favorable destinations for movement.

Perhaps the most important contrast between the two abandonment periodsis that the Pueblo I abandonment was incomplete; a few small groups of peopleremained in a radically different settlement structure (Lipe and Varien, 1999b,pp. 244–256). In the Pueblo III case, however, post–A.D. 1300 ancestral Puebloanhabitations are not present (see Adams and Adams, 1993, for a discussion ofhistoric Puebloan use of the area). We argue that the high levels of conflict inPueblo III, coupled with the nucleation of people into large, canyon-head villagesassured a complete rather than partial abandonment in the lateA.D. 1200s. Althoughmost of the Pueblo I population resided within a few large village clusters, smallersettlements remained a viable although minor part of the settlement system untilregional abandonment. Thus dispersion (or continued occupation) remained anoption for at least some of the population at the end of the Pueblo I period. Thelack of a post–A.D. 1300 population is strong indication that circumstances in thePueblo III villages significantly hampered the possibility of dispersion and remain-ing in the region. Future research addressing variations in the rates of depopulationand attempts to reorganize in place (Lipeet al., 1988) have the potential to improveour understanding of abandonment processes as well as to develop more generallyapplicable theories of regional abandonments.

Hohokam

Abandonment questions within the Hohokam culture area have received rela-tively little attention when compared to research in other portions of the Southwest.One reason for the lack of interest among Hohokam archaeologists may be thatsubsistence and settlement systems along the major rivers of the Phoenix andTucson Basin core areas were typified by infrastructure investment and stabil-ity unlike any other area of the Southwest, creating a radically different envi-ronment for residential abandonment and mobility strategies. The establishmentof large-scale irrigation systems in the late Pioneer and early Colonial periods(A.D. 500–850) (Cordellet al., 1994; Howard, 1994; Masse, 1991; Waters, 1989)initiated a long-term commitment to particular points on the landscape and struc-tured the settlement choices of future occupants of the region (Gregory, 1991,pp. 172–173). Irrigation technology along the major rivers provided a relatively sta-ble subsistence base, obviating the need for frequent residential mobility. Hohokam




farmers living along these rivers also exploited wild resources and nonriverine agri-cultural opportunities through logistical mobility (Fishet al., 1992; Masse, 1991).Hohokam villages, many of which were occupied by hundreds of people (Craig,2000; Gregory, 1991), persisted for much longer than comparable population ag-gregates anywhere else in the Southwest prior to historic times (Cordellet al.,1994; Gregory, 1991; Henderson, 1987; Wilcoxet al., 1981).

Although instances of large-scale intracommunity reorganization exist(Doelle and Wallace, 1991; Fishet al., 1994), regional abandonment does notplay as significant a role in the Hohokam area as elsewhere until late prehistory(ca.A.D. 1400), when many sites and localities were abandoned and populationsignificantly declined. Despite the large number of people who left the region—farmore people than in either the Mimbres or northern San Juan abandonments—thisabandonment has not sparked the interest of the public or much interest withinSouthwest archaeology.

In many ways, understanding the residential stability, population dynamics,and eventual regional abandonment by Hohokam populations is incredibly im-portant in reconstructing and explaining change in Southwest prehistory (Deanet al., 1994, pp. 73–74). The Hohokam case, characterized by relatively long-termresidential stability provides an important comparative case for other areas of theSouthwest. Rarely are the impacts of the abandonment of the Hohokam region di-rectly addressed in discussions of social and population developments in the northand east, a fact we find unfortunate. A brief discussion of the process of Hohokamregional abandonment, particularly in relation to northern populations, serves toillustrate this point.

Most of the recent discussions of Hohokam regional abandonment empha-size the impact of dramatic environmental change coinciding with the end of theHohokam Classic period (A.D. 1150–1400/1450) (Masse, 1991; Nialset al., 1989).Nials et al. (1989) reconstructed over 800 years of stream flow data for the SaltRiver using tree-ring samples from the surrounding watershed. This study revealsa key period of dry years in the earlyA.D. 1300s, culminating in a massive floodin A.D. 1358 (Nialset al., 1989, p. 69). The authors hypothesize that this flood,the largest in over 400 years, coupled with the preceding dry period, would havedamaged Hohokam canals within the geological floodplain of the Salt River tosuch an extent that it may have been impossible to rebuild the system (Nialset al.,1989, p. 69). Some evidence suggests that even more massive floods occurredduring three years in theA.D. 1380s (Nialset al., 1989, p. 75). TheA.D. 1358flood, as well as the possibleA.D. 1380s floods, are likely to have contributed tothe decline of Classic period populations along the Salt River. These significantevents most likely led to migration from the area (Crown, 1991; Masse, 1991)and the reorganization of some local populations to enable continued occupation,particularly along smaller drainages (Sires, 1984). Interestingly, a much largerflood occurred along the Salt River inA.D. 899, which some have linked to theexpansion of Hohokam core populations and traits into surrounding areas, as well




as internal reorganization (Nialset al., 1989, p. 66). If one accepts theA.D. 1358flood as a proximate cause of regional abandonment, it is an important contrastto theA.D. 899 flood, from which Hohokam populations were able to recover andrebuild. Nialset al. (1989) note that stream morphology was different inA.D. 899compared to theA.D. 1300s, which may have ameliorated the effects of the earlierflood. Unfortunately, the social circumstances and effects of theA.D. 899 flood arerelatively poorly known. However, the Classic Hohokam case of regional abandon-ment is similar to that of the northern San Juan; people living in relatively rigid,dense settlement systems were unable to adequately adjust in place to environ-mental changes, leading to large-scale depopulation. Additional evidence, derivedfrom both archaeology and oral tradition, suggests that conflict and external de-velopments also were important in decisions by people to leave the Hohokam areain the 14th century (see below).

A number of archaeologists working in the Hohokam area have developedincreasingly convincing arguments for the role of conflict in promoting movementwithin the area and the eventual depopulation of the region (Rice, 1998; Wallaceand Doelle, in press; Wilcox, 1989). Immigration, population packing, and the roleof force in regulating irrigation systems have all been cited as possible causes forincreased conflict during the Classic period. Immigration, particularly from thenorth, appears to have increased significantly in late prehistory, especially outsideof the Hohokam core in the Tonto Basin (Starket al., 1995) and southeasternArizona (Di Peso, 1958; Wallace and Doelle, in press; Woodson, 1999). Theseconditions may have exacerbated existing tensions (Wallace and Doelle, in press).O’Odham oral tradition contains detailed evidence of widespread conflict withinthe Hohokam region during Prehispanic times, culminating in decisive battlesassociated with particular Classic period platform mounds along the Salt and GilaRivers (Teague, 1989, 1993). The presence of remnant populations in the Hohokamarea probably attests more to the size and diversity of the area and its residentpopulations than to the presence of less conflict than in the northern San Juan.

Archaeologists also have documented increasing contact between Hohokamand ancestral Pueblo groups in the period approaching Hohokam regional aban-donment. A number of possible ancestral Puebloan sites have been identified insouthern Arizona (Di Peso, 1958; Wallace and Doelle, in press; Woodson, 1999).Additionally, Hohokam populations were participating in a widespread cult as-sociated with ancestor worship and represented by the distribution of SaladoPolychrome ceramics (Crown, 1994). At no other time in the Hohokam sequenceare ceramic styles so closely affiliated with populations to the north. This wide-spread ceramic style is strong evidence of increasingly close contact betweenHohokam and Puebloan groups, particularly in southeastern Arizona and alongthe Mogollon Rim (Crown, 1994; Starket al., 1995; Wallace and Doelle, in press).

A growing body of evidence suggests some Hohokam groups were the an-cestors of some modern Hopi and Zuni people. Teague (1993) noted a number




of parallels between Hopi oral traditions and those of the O’Odham concerningflooding and conflict in southern Arizona. Additionally, Teague documented simi-larities between some Hopi and O’Odham rituals. Recently, Shaul and Hill (1998),working with Piman speakers in Arizona and northwest Mexico, noted a numberof loan words indicating contacts between the ancestors of modern Piman andZuni speakers. Zuni oral tradition explicitly references the late arrival of immi-grants from the southwest (Cushing, 1896), which led Cushing to search for Zuniancestors among the ruins of the Salt River valley. Diverse strands of linguistic,ethnographic, and oral tradition evidence suggest that the Western Pueblo areawas an important destination area for some Hohokam populations migrating fromsouthern Arizona.

The importance of the Western Pueblos as a destination area indicates boththe strength of the link between the Hohokam and ancestral Puebloan world in lateprehistory and some of the factors influencing the abandonment decisions of peoplein the Hohokam region. Many groups likely remained in the area, some becomingthe ancestors of the modern peoples of southern Arizona, but others were attractedto ongoing ritual developments to the north. Thus although many push eventsand processes were affecting Hohokam populations, the possible pulls for move-ment also should be addressed. Future studies focusing on ancestral Puebloan andHohokam contact, particularly in late prehistory, will increase our understandingof the depopulation of the Hohokam region, as well as aid in archaeological recon-structions of the dramatic shifts in the north and east associated with Pueblo IV(A.D. 1300–1500) (Spielmann, 1998). Additionally, the social circumstances of thelate Hohokam Classic period should be further explored, explicitly with referenceto the interplay between social and environmental factors in spurring regional aban-donment. We suggest that discussions of the abandonment of the Hohokam areawill play a greater role in our understanding of late prehistory in the Southwestand provide an interesting arena for examining abandonment as a multicausal,strategic process. In addition, treatment of the Classic period site and regionalabandonment as a demographic shift, rather than as a disappearance, provides aplatform for examining both continuity and change in the prehistory and historyof the peoples of the Sonoran Desert and surrounding areas.

IMPLICATIONS AND DIRECTIONS

Abandonment research in the North American Southwest has contributed sub-stantially to our understanding of the dynamics of prehistoric farming societies inarid to semiarid plateau, mountain, and desert settings. Abandonment, when recon-ceptualized as movement, has been viewed as a strategy for addressing a range ofexternal and internal factors, including climate change, environmental degradation,social stress and conflict, and ideological change. Population movement, when notcircumscribed by population density or conflict, was an effective long-term strategy




for farming, hunting, and gathering in the variable environmental circumstancesof the Southwest. Flexible social relationships in small-scale farming societiesmade movement possible and contributed to varied strategies of land use evenwithin areas in which people shared traditions and styles. When populations werecircumscribed, movement seems to have been more dramatic and larger in scale,often resulting in the formation of radically different settlement systems.

We initially suggested that perceiving abandonment as failure can be and hasbeen detrimental to understanding the strategic aspects of movement and to rec-ognizing the continuity from past to present native populations. However, somemovements did involve failures. The essential question is “what failed?” At times,people may have failed to effectively provision themselves, although we are find-ing this to be an insufficient argument for regional abandonment. At other times,political structures may have failed to serve the needs (economic, social, ideo-logical) of people, leading them to seek new structures in new places. Similarly,ideologies may have failed to offer explanations for changes that were occurringand may have been “abandoned” by their practitioners. These economic, social,political, and ideological failures may have been associated with site and regionalabandonment. We emphasize, however, the importance of asking “what kind offailure” was involved rather than assuming that movement away from a settlementnecessarily entailed failure. Also, we urge the disentanglement of our study of“failed” practices, structures, and ideas from the disappearance of a people. Ar-chaeologists, including ourselves, have not taken sufficient care in communicatingthe complexity of our arguments to the public. As a result, many people do notunderstand that native people did not disappear and never relinquished their linksto their many villages and homelands.

Recent research on abandonments in the Southwest emphasizes the active de-cision making of social actors. People negotiated their movement with other indi-viduals within the context of recognized communities. Ideologies, social rules, andsocial boundaries conditioned, and were influenced by, the actions of individuals.In the Southwest, where leadership was rarely institutionalized, boundaries werepermeable, and community membership was ever changing, movement choicesmay have varied considerably among communities and within communities.

Although residential movement results in what appears to be the ruins ofvanished people, this view of the past is misleading. Residential moves do not im-ply relinquishment of connection to places. Although recent ethnography amongSouthwest native peoples has documented the use of places not residentially occu-pied, much archaeological research still needs to focus on continuity in the use offormerly occupied sites. Rock art, shrines, burials, and structures may both havemarked places for future use and directed people in how to use (how to act orbehave in) residentially abandoned places.

Abandonment research has begun to combine two essential elements: agentsof change and agents of continuity. These form a tension that governs daily life,individual decisions, and community-level decisions. Some people benefit most




when change is occurring and others benefit from stability or continuity. Somecontexts emphasize one over the other. Ideas, rules, and structures are differentiallyamenable to change. Understanding this tension between continuity and changeand the scale at which both were achieved will contribute to our understanding ofsmall-scale farming societies and of the human condition. Abandonment researchis an arena for investigating change and continuity that can build this understanding.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Many people contributed to this manuscript through discussions and by pro-viding us with manuscripts and reports. We would like to thank Jeff Altschul,Jennifer Brady, Tiffany Clark, Bill Doelle, Donna Glowacki, Michelle Hegmon,Ben Nelson, Steve Swanson, Henry Wallace, Richard Wilshusen. We thank MichaelAdler, Catherine Cameron, Gary Feinman, Jill Neitzel, and an anonymous reviewerfor their useful comments on our manuscript. Thanks to Linda Countryman, whodrafted the illustration.

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