88013856 bUKLAU OF LAND MANAGEMENT ARIZONA People of the Desert, Canyons and Pines: Prehistory of the Patayan Country in West Central Arizona Connie L. Stone CULTURAL RESOURCE SERIES No. 5 1987 53^' / t IT? n nbt> People of the Desert, Canyons and Pines: Prehistory of the Patayan Country in West Central Arizona by Connie L. Stone Cultural Resource Series O Q,\ks$j Monograph No. 5 r>-> <yi, Published by the Arizona State Office of the Bureau of Land Management 3707 N. 7th Street Phoenix, Arizona 85014 September 1987 BUREAU OF LAND MANAGEMENT LIBRARY Denver, Colorado 88613856 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS For land managers, anthropologists, and the public, this volume provides an introduction to the prehistory, native peoples, and natural history of a vast area of west central and northwestern Arizona. Many Bureau of Land Management personnel contributed to its production. Among them are Henri Bisson, Phoenix District Manager; Mary Barger, Phoenix District Archaeologist; Don Simonis, Kingman Resource Area Archaeologist; Gary Stumpf, State Office Archaeologist and Editor of the Cultural Resource Series; Jane Closson, State Office Writer/Editor; Amos Sloan, Cartographic Aid; and Dan Martin of the Denver Service Center. Two illustrations were superbly crafted by Lauren Kepner: the split-twig figurine on the cover and the view of a pueblo structure perched high above the floor of Meriwhitica Canyon. Both were reproduced from photographs. W& :.;:;«.«J!S "'' ''*.-*" ' : j". : ' • !• . • . Wi ' '•»••'• J:-': : ; •;>V'-£t<v.'. ,v 'v V&- 111 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Page No. No. CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION CHAPTER 7: THE EXISTING DATA BASE: The Kingman Region: A Class I Inventory 1 THE TYPES AND DISTRIBUTION OF CULTURAL RESOURCES CHAPTER 2: THE ENVIRONMENT AND NATURAL RESOURCES Site Types 71 Summary of Known Geographic Distributions .... 73 Physiography and Geology 5 Climate 11 CHAPTER8:MANAGEMENTCONSIDERATIONS: Hydrology 13 EVALUATION, INVENTORY Vegetation 14 AND PROTECTION Wildlife 17 Evaluation 75 Exploitable Resources 18 Inventory 79 Reconstructing the Prehisto) ; Environment 22 Protection 80 Historic and Modern Changes 24 REFERENCES 83 CHAPTER 3: PEOPLE OF THE DESERT, CANYONS AND PINES The Hualapai 27 The Yavapai 31 LIST OF MAPS AND TABLES The Mohave 32 Intertribal Relations 35 MAP The Historic Disruption of Native Groups 37 1-1 Cultural Resource Overview Units in Arizona ... 2 CHAPTER 4: HISTORY OF ARCHAEOLOGICAL 1-2 Administrative Areas in the Kingman-Prescott RESEARCH Region 4 The Colorado River 41 2-1 Physiographic Provinces in Arizona 6 The Interior 43 2-2 The Kingman West Central Overview Area V The Eastern Highlands 47 2-3 Physiographic Zones in the Overview Area 8 CHAPTER 5: PREHISTORY OF THE REGION 2-4 Elevation Contours 9 The Paleo-Indian Period 51 2-5 Average Temperature and Precipitation 12 Archaic Occupations 53 2-6 Vegetation Zones 16 The Ceramic Period 56 3-1 Historic Tribal Areas 28 3-2 Historic Tribal Alliances 36 CHAPTER 6: RESEARCH DOMAINS 5-1 Selected Archaic Site Locations in the Southwest Culture History 64 and Great Basin 54 Cultural Ecology and Socioeconomic Systems 65 5-2 Archaeological Sites in the Prescott Region .... 61 Technology 67 Demography 67 TABLE Social Interaction and Exchange 68 2-1 Wild Plants Used by Yuman Groups 20 Ideological Systems 69 5-1 Regional Culture History 57 Paleoenvironmental Reconstruction 69 Conclusion 70 v c ENT£fi !"047 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION This book describes the prehistory and Native American years of human adaptation to its aridity and environmen- peoples of the Patayan country, an area of western Arizona tal diversity. In this transitional zone linking the South- that can also be called the Kingman region in reference to west, Great Basin, and southern California desert, these its central town. If one were to draw a box around this fragile and irreplaceable cultural resources possess impor- portion of west central Arizona, its corners clockwise from tant scientific and heritage values. the northeast would be the lower Grand Canyon, an unparalleled natural wonder; the town of Prescott, Victo- rian homes nestled in the piney woods of the first territorial capital; Lake Havasu along the Colorado River, home of THE KINGMAN REGION: the imported London Bridge; and Hoover Dam, a wonder of A CLASS I INVENTORY engineering. The territory bounded by these unique historic and natu- This document is a "Class I overview" of prehistoric ral resources contains the physical remnants of at least cultural resources within the region incorporating the four thousand years of human occupation. Its native Kingman Resource Area managed by the Bureau of Land inhabitants had to cope with the region's fundamental Management (BLM), an agency of the U. S. Department of aridity, but beyond that they could choose from the natural the Interior. Regional Class I overview preparation is an resources of diverse environmental zones. The lower Grand important phase of the cultural resource inventory process Canyon and its side canyons were oases cut deeply into the outlined in BLM Manual 811 1, Release 8-3 (1978). Based on Colorado Plateau. According to the creation myth of the a compilation and assessment of existing data, the Class I Hualapai Indians, these canyons were the original home of inventory provides background information and guidance all of the northern Arizona tribes (Ewing 1961). The chap- for future planning and management decisions regarding arral, pinyon-juniper woods, and high grasslands sur- cultural resources. It incorporates information on the natu- rounding Prescott "formed such a rich larder for Yavapais ral environment, ethnographic background, and history of that they surely were one of the gifts from Sun" (Trimble archaeological research; a summary review of the regional 1986:139). To the west of the Grand Wash Cliffs and the prehistory and related research issues; a discussion of Prescott highlands, the land dropped down to the vast dry archaeological site types; and a comprehensive biblio- Basin and Range country. Isolated mountain ranges, graphy. The synthesis of this information generates man- separated by seemingly endless desert valleys, were the agement recommendations regarding the evaluation, oases of this desert country. Early explorers moving west- inventory, and protection of cultural resources. As stated in ward from the high country were disillusioned by this east- Manual 8111, Class I overviews provide "critical evalua- ern extension of the Mohave Desert. Hoping to reach the tions oriented towards the unique problems and concerns Colorado River, they seemed to encounter yet another encountered in an active management program". This mountain range beyond each barren valley (U.S. Senate information can also provide the basis for incorporating 1936). The lower Colorado River was regarded as the Nile of cultural resources into multiple use planning. North America by Harold Colton, a founder of the Museum Beginning in the late 1970s, regional Class I overviews of Northern Arizona (Colton 1945). Like the Nile, it sup- were initiated in western areas managed by the Bureau of ported a prehistoric population of farmers. However, the Land Management and the U. S. Forest Service. In 1978, people could not count on successful harvests due to the the Arizona State Office of the BLM and Region 3 (South- relatively unpredictable floods of the Colorado. Whether west) of the Forest Service established an "Interagency they lived along the river or in the mountains, to the desert Cultural Resource Inventory Agreement" (BLM AZ-950- folk "survival was a matter of foresight, experience, and IA8-001) for the coordination of Class I overview efforts. endurance" (Stevens 1986:75). This agreement partitioned Arizona into nine geographic A sense of humor evidently also helped. To the Spaniards areas, labeled "joint cultural resource overview units" of the Onate expedition of 1605, a river Indian named Otata (Map 1-1). A "lead agency" was designated to assume the described the natives of California (Hammond and Rey completion of prehistoric and historic overviews for each 1953). Some had ears so long that five or six persons could unit. The BLM was held responsible for the West Central, stand under each one. According to Otata, some slept under Southwest, Southeast, and Arizona Strip overview units. water, and others slept while standing with burdens on The Arizona Strip overview is in progress, and the others their heads. However, most people on the "island" of Cali- have been completed (Brandes 1985; Bronitsky and Merritt fornia were bald men ruled by a giant woman called Cinaca 1986; McGuire and Schiffer 1982). Cohota. The Spaniards were skeptical, but those explorers The West Central Arizona overview unit was divided into in a strange land were not ready to discount everything southern and northern zones for the prehistoric overview. they heard. Perhaps the natives succeeded in diverting the The line of division, the Bill Williams River hypothetically white men's attention to California. Over two centuries extended east to Prescott, corresponded roughly to major later, gold brought them back to west central Arizona. Gold environmental, cultural, and administrative boundaries was no laughing matter, and the lives of the Indians were within this environmentally and culturally diverse unit. altered forever. The division enabled a more efficient and meaningful Over a thousand prehistoric sites have been documented analysis and enhanced the clarity of the total synthesis. It in this region. They contain