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Archaeology

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Popular notions of the Piro pueblos tend to be limited to the historical fact that several hundred Piros (as well as Tiwas and members of other Pueblo groups) ended up in the El Paso area during the Pueblo Revolt of 1680. It is often claimed that the reason for this relocation was pro-Spanish affinity on the majority part of the Piros. Such blanket assertions have little basis in the historical and archaeological record. Period documents instead show that many Piros and Tiwas were deported from their homelands in central New Mexico in two waves in the fall of 1680 and the winter of 1681/82.

For the Piros, the events of the early 1680s brought the loss of the last of their ancestral pueblos and wholesale socio-cultural fragmentation. Among various interrelated reasons for this demise is a long history of unhappy relations with the colonizing Spaniards. Tantalizing if highly episodic references exist to violent encounters and failed rebellions especially for the years after 1650. The material dimensions of such conflicts are now emerging at the Piro mission pueblo of Tzelaqui/Sevilleta. A range of Spanish structures and more than 1,100 metal artifacts, mostly armor fragments and lead munitions, suggest an at times extensive Spanish presence which included several instances of fighting in and around the pueblo. Some diagnostic artifacts indicate hostilities perhaps as early as 1540-42. The bulk of armor and munitions, however, seem to be associated with structures from the mid- to late 1600s, just around the time the Piro pueblos entered their terminal crisis years.

AAHS Scholarship and Grant Recipients for 2010

The Society awarded $3300 in research and travel grants and scholarships this year. The recipients of this year’s awards are:

Research Grant

Kathryn Putsavage (U of Colorado, Boulder), $1000 to conduct GIS mapping, in-field ceramic analysis, ground penetrating radar studies, and preliminary test excavations at the Black Mountain site near Deming, New Mexico.

Travel Grants

Deanna Grimstead (U of A), $300 to co-organize and attend the 6th Annual Stanley J. Olsen Memorial Zooarchaeology Conference in Eagle Lake, California.

Sophia E. Kelly (ASU), $300 to travel to the SAA meetings in St. Louis, Missouri, to chair the symposium, “Gendered Labor in Specialized Economies,” in which she will present the paper, “Transformations to Gendered Labor Roles with the Rise of a Hohokam Specialized Economy.”

Melissa Kruse-Peeples (ASU), $300 to travel to the SAA meetings in St. Louis, Missouri, to present the paper, “The Prehistoric Food Supply: Evaluating Self-Sufficiency of Perry Mesa Inhabitants.”

Susan C. Ryan (U of A), $300 to travel to the SAA meetings in St. Louis, Missouri, to present the paper, “The Vertical Continuum: Ritual Termination and Renewal of Late Pueblo III Kivas.”

Michael W. Simpson (U of A, American Indian Studies), $200 to travel to the Western Social Science Association meetings in Reno, Nevada, to present the paper, “Judgment in Current U.S. High School History Books: The Appraisal Analysis and Critical Discourse Study of American Indians in Textbooks” and to participate in the panel, “Citizenship in Native Nations.”

Mason Scott Thompson (ASU), $300 to travel to the SAA meetings in St. Louis, Missouri, to chair the symposium, “The Performance of Mortuary Ritual in the American Southwest,” in which he will present the paper, “Burial Performance and Interactions with the Dead in Pueblo Bonito, Chaco Canyon.”

Brenda Todd (U of Colorado, Boulder), $300 to travel to the SAA meetings in St. Louis, Missouri, to present a poster on Chimney Rock Pueblo and to co-author a poster in a session honoring the 75th anniversary of Kiva.

Scholarships

Lori B. Love (U of Texas, San Antonio), $300 to support the completion of her M.A. thesis on the petrography and stylistic analysis of ceramics from Pueblo Alamo, New Mexico.