EDITED BY ALANA CORDY-COLLINS UNIVERSITY GALLERIES, UNIVERSITY OF SAN DIEGO 1 Contributors: The following scholars were invited by Professor Alana Cordy-Collins to write the short descriptive essays for each of the objects documented in this catalogue. Authors are identified at the end of the texts by their initials, as indicated below. Mark Bahti (MB) Paige Bardolph (PB) Timothy Gross (TG) Ken Hedges (KH) Cheryl Hinton (CH) Richard O’Connor (RO) Diana Pardue (DP) Zena Pearlstone (ZP) Amadeo Rea (AR) Stan Walens (SW) 18 Selected Works from the May Collection 19 Roberta and Vernon Jojola Gila / Hohokam / Sacaton This jar exemplifies the characteristics of Hohokam pot- of a household’s ceramic implements, along with other tery in the Sedentary period, 950 to 1150 CE. It is made jars, bowls, plates, ladles, and scoops. It most likely from clay that fired a buff or tan and was painted with served to store food or other items. Effigies and censers mineral pigments to produce red geometric designs. (thick, sturdy spools of fired clay with a concavity in The layout of these designs in panels is indicative of which archaeologists think incense was burned) made this period in Hohokam ceramics, and the shape of the in the same style as this jar have been found. vessel is particularly diagnostic. This jar has the distinc- The Hohokam were organized into complex political tive Gila Shoulder, the angular union of the upper walls units centered on large villages with ball courts (similar and the base of the pot, which became popular during to those found in Mesoamerica) and platform mounds. this period. The structure of archaeological sites indicates both The Hohokam, agriculturalists who raised maize, beans, hierarchical organization of structures within sites and squash using canals to irrigate large tracts of land and a similar ranking of sites in regions, the largest in the Phoenix and Tucson basins, made their pottery sites serving as administrative centers. Luxury goods using the paddle-and-anvil method of construction. A including stone and shell jewelry and exotic items from concave disc of clay was formed to start the vessel, and Mesoamerica (e.g., lost wax cast copper bells) give coils of clay were added to it. To bond these coils to the evidence of widespread trade, and archaeologists have vessel, the potter used a paddle (usually of wood) to suggested that the large sites served as marketplaces for strike the outside of the pot while supporting the inside the surrounding communities. Ceramics such as this with a small cobble or a specially made, mushroom- vessel played a part in this trade, with some vessels hav- shaped, pottery anvil. Pots were fired in such a way ing been made specifically as trade items. The records that oxygen was available during the process so that for this jar indicate only that it came from southern carbon burned out of the clay, leaving the light surface Arizona or northern Mexico, the range of the Hohokam. to contrast with the mineral paint. The paddle-and-anvil Archaeologists today are using temper identification method of pottery making is the same as that used by and chemical characterization of clays to define manu- San Diego’s Kumeyaay and Luiseño, although their facturing areas for ceramics within the Hohokam area, pottery is generally reddish brown to black and is and analysis of designs is allowing finer temporal place- seldom decorated. ment. The archaeologists have been able, using these analyses, to identify manufacturing tracts and trace the This vessel has alternating design panels framed by bold movement of vessels to other sites. TG lines. The panels are filled with rectangular scrolls and fine line designs. There is a zigzag line around the neck of the jar, and the rim flares outward, another charac- teristic of this type of pot. This jar would have been part 20 JAR, ca. 1280–1320 CLAY, PAINT, 26.5 x 40.0 X 40.0 cm 21 Roberta and Vernon Jojola Mesa Verde / Anasazi Around 1000 CE an interesting thing happened in Mugs have been found primarily at sites in the Mesa ceramic technology in the Four Corners area of the Verde region of Colorado and the Chaco Canyon area American Southwest. The Anasazi, or Ancestral Pueblo, of New Mexico. The earliest explorers of Mug House potters there began making a new vessel form—a single in what is now Mesa Verde National Park found three serving bowl with a handle—rather like a modern coffee mugs tied together, and it was these mugs that most mug. These mugs were made for a short period of time likely suggested the name for this cliff dwelling. This (approximately 1000 CE to 1280 CE) and in a restricted mug was recovered from Dove Creek, Colorado, which area of the Southwest. is about forty miles northwest of Mesa Verde, but there is no further information about the context in which it Although they varied some in shape and size, this mug was found. Mugs have been recovered from both trash from the May Collection is typical of this type of vessel, and fill, and they have sometimes been included with especially those made at the end this period. It has a flat burials, suggesting that these were important vessels. bottom and sides that slope up to the rim. The handle is a curving band of clay that is undecorated. In some Archaeologists have long puzzled over the purpose of other examples there is a hole in the handle that is the the mugs. That they were individual serving vessels same “T” shape as some of the doors in the cliff dwell- seems obvious, but what was being served? Students at ings and open-air pueblos in which such mugs have USD have been exploring this using the instrumental been found. The exterior of the mug is painted with chemistry labs on campus. Employing both liquid chro- design elements characteristic of Mesa Verde black-on- matography and mass spectrometry to analyze residues white pottery, a ceramic type dated to between 1150 and extracted from a sample of twenty-four mugs from the 1280 CE. The banded design with framing lines and the May Collection, the students found evidence of theo- opposed stepped triangles are elements often found on bromine, a compound associated with cacao (choco- pottery of this time period, including on other examples late). Recent research has established the presence of of mugs. Also typical of Ancestral Pueblo mugs is the this chemical in vessels from Chaco Canyon, where they appearance of painted tick marks on the rim. This mug may have been obtained through trade from Mesoamer- shows the classic elements of the vessel form, but there ica and used in ritual. Yet the type of vessel was different are some interesting variations that occur. In addition (cylindrical pitchers rather than mugs), and they were to the “T” shaped hole in the handles of some mugs, a from a slightly earlier time (1000 to 1125 CE). This USD few have false bottoms. This creates a space in which fire student research extends the geographic and temporal clay pellets were placed, apparently so they would rattle. range of cacao use in the American Southwest and helps At least one double mug with two bowls joined at the explain the mug’s functions. TG handles is known. Reference: Fernandez, Andrew, Lauren Klein, Donald Millar, and Alexia De Loera. “Mugs of the Mesa and Old Chocolate: Evidence of Prehistoric Cacao Use in the Mesa Verde Region of the North American Southwest.” Poster presented at the 80th Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, San Francisco, California, 2015. 22 MESA VERDE MUG, ca. 700–1350 CLAY, PAINT, 7.8 x 12.8 x 11.0 cm 23 Roberta and Vernon Jojola Keres / Kewa / Santo Domingo When Coronado, in his search for the Seven Cities To further distinguish and identify their work, they of Cibola, found himself on the plains of present-day would add one or more turquoise beads near the top western Kansas, he encountered traders from Santo of one of the strands of their multistrand necklaces, as Domingo Pueblo on a trading expedition, selling their well as stamp their interlocked initials—JMR—with a stone and shell beads. While shell and stone beads have custom-made hallmark on the silver or gold cones that a very wide cultural distribution in the pre-Contact capped the strands. Southwest, by the twentieth century, Santo Domingo This heishi necklace in the May Collection, comprising Pueblo (Kewa) in New Mexico had become the pre- twenty strands, was made from olivella shell. These eminent producer of such work, with Zuni a distant tiny (no more than one inch in length) marine snail second. More than merely creating the beadwork, how- shells (family Olividae) have been traded into the arid ever, the Kewa were accomplished traders even within Southwest from the California coast for centuries. The a world where intertribal trading was a widespread and shells are sawed into sections, creating thin curlicue active network, bringing shells from the Gulf of Mex- sections that are then snapped or broken into squares. ico, the Pacific Coast, and the Gulf of Texas. During Each square is individually drilled and strung on wire. the boom period in Indian jewelry (roughly 1972–80), The drilled pieces are then ground round, an inch or so the trading network went global, but with a downside: at a time, and ultimately polished. Though fine shell and cheap shell bead necklaces were imported from the stone bead makers, the Rosettas were also known for Philippines, threatening the economic foundation of inventing “liquid silver”—necklaces made of hand- Santo Domingo Pueblo.