With National Science Foundation support, Dr. Barbara Roth will conduct two seasons of archaeological excavations at the Harris Site, a pit house village located in the Mimbres River Valley of southwestern New Mexico. The site was occupied during the Late Pithouse period from about A.D. 500 to A.D. 1000. It was originally excavated in the 1930s by renowned Southwestern archaeologist Emil Haury, who used data from the site in defining the Mogollon as a distinct prehistoric cultural group in the Southwest. Haury excavated the southern portion of the site, leaving the north end untouched. Dr. Roth's research will focus on this northern portion. The goals of her research are to examine how households were organized and to determine if household organization changed over time as the people living at Harris devoted more of their time and efforts to agricultural production and began to stay permanently at the site. The Harris Site provides a unique opportunity to address these research goals because it is the only pithouse village of its size in the Mimbres River Valley that does not have a later Classic period pueblo built over it.
Dr. Roth's work at the site to date has identified two spatially distinct clusters of pithouses that appear to be socially distinct based on differences in architecture and artifacts found within them. Additional fieldwork and the analysis of all of the recovered materials will further investigate these clusters to see if they represent autonomous households that moved residences over time or if they are related households, akin to extended family groups found at later pueblo sites. Variation in households in terms of architecture or artifact content can also be used to determine if differences in wealth, status, or labor organization existed between these clusters.
This research will be accomplished by excavating additional pithouses within these two clusters and a possible third cluster on the east end of the site, and by excavating between houses to identify any features such as outdoor hearths or storage pits associated with them. The analysis of artifacts recovered from the houses and associated features and careful dating of all features will be instrumental in addressing how households were organized and whether this changed over time. The intellectual merit of this project lies in its potential to enhance our understanding of pithouse occupations in the Southwest and to contribute to a broader understanding of the role of household organization in prehistory.
The broader impacts of this research lie in providing opportunities for student training and research and in the dissemination of the research results, especially to the public. Undergraduate and graduate students will be involved in all phases of the project, including field work, data analysis, and publication. Perhaps more importantly, the project provides an opportunity for public outreach in the Mimbres area, an area known for its elaborate black-on-white pottery and consequently, looting. Public outreach remains a powerful tool for educating people against looting so every opportunity to provide public education will be taken.
