JOURNAL OF TEXAS ARCHEOLOGY AND HISTORY: JTAH SPECIAL VOLUME #6; PAPER 5E: 403-412, 2024
During a series of mapping projects at Eagle Nest Canyon (ENC) in 2014, the impacts of an extreme... more During a series of mapping projects at Eagle Nest Canyon (ENC) in 2014, the impacts of an extreme flood event were documented within the canyon using a fixed-wing Swinglet CAM drone along with a Phantom 1 quadcopter to create "before and after" 3D photogrammetry models of the landscape. This paper demonstrates the importance of mapping archaeological landscapes and how the data can be applied to understand how sites change over time.
Papers of the Chan Chich Archaeological Project, Number 16, 2023
During the 2023 field season of the BEAST project, we deployed a drone-based lidar system to map ... more During the 2023 field season of the BEAST project, we deployed a drone-based lidar system to map areas around the sites of Chan Chich and Gallon Jug. The National Center for Airborne Laser Mapping (NCALM) at the University of Houston mapped both sites as well as an extensive area well beyond using a plane-based lidar system in May 2022. NCALM mapped an area of approximately 650 km2 as compared to our 5 km2. Our goal was to compare the data collected using the two platforms.
ABSTRACTThe accurate and precise collection of three-dimensional (3D) context and provenience dat... more ABSTRACTThe accurate and precise collection of three-dimensional (3D) context and provenience data is of critical importance for archaeologists. Traditional square-hole methods are being augmented by new digital techniques to increase the accuracy and precision with which 3D data are collected. Structure from Motion (SfM) photogrammetry is an emerging digital technique that is becoming more widespread for collecting 3D data of archaeological sites and features. We are using handheld digital cameras and ground-based SfM to record accurate and precise 3D context and provenience data at the scale of the excavation unit and profile during rockshelter excavations in the Lower Pecos Canyonlands of Texas. By combining SfM with traditional excavation methods, we collect 3D data on excavation units, layers, features, and profiles without excavating in grid-bound square units. SfM provides a straightforward and flexible method to excavate based on the stratigraphy and logistical pragmatics, which further aids in assigning precise context and provenience to recovered artifacts and samples. This article describes how ground-based SfM serves as a basic recording tool during excavation and shows that, by applying ground-based SfM methods to excavation, archaeologists can collect more, and more accurate, data than with traditional square-hole methods.
Since 2007 our team has been conducting low level aerial reconnaissance in the northern highlands... more Since 2007 our team has been conducting low level aerial reconnaissance in the northern highlands of Ecuador, a challenging environment with low air pressure, frequent high winds, misting rain, and rapidly alternating intense sun and enveloping low lying clouds. We struggled with our kites that initial year but managed to build the first high-resolution aerial map of an Ecuadorian Inka fortress. During subsequent years, the switch to drones and improved photo-analytical capacity opened a new world of visualization to us and our colleagues, though never without challenges from the difficult environment. Beyond the beautiful images of the Inka fortresses, mound sites, and haciendas that we were mapping, was the power of photogrammetry and 3D modeling in building not only precise images but offering a better overall structural understanding as well. Complex slope models and volumetric cut and fill calculations were among the analytical techniques we could bring to the first complete maps of the large earthen mound centers at Cochasquí and Zuleta, for example. Ultimately, the ability to analyze landscapes in real time became our standard, and in conjunction with powerful subsurface tools such as radar and magnetometry, such visualizations have become an essential tool for our investigations.
Redacted version to safeguard site location data. Contact the lead author or Carlsbad Field Offic... more Redacted version to safeguard site location data. Contact the lead author or Carlsbad Field Office, Bureau of Land Management, for original version. The Merchant site is a fourteenth and early fifteenth century pueblo settlement located near Grama Ridge, a prominent escarpment near the boundary where the basin-and-range region merges with the southern Plains in the southeastern corner of New Mexico. The Merchant site is representative of the Ochoa phase, a poorly understood time period of southeastern New Mexico dating from around A.D. 1300/1350 to 1450. The Ochoa phase, and the El Paso and Late Glencoe phases of the closely related Jornada Mogollon region to the west, are contemporaneous with the Pueblo IV period of the greater Southwest, the Antelope Creek phase of the southern Plains, and the Toyah phase of central Texas. As such, Merchant and other Ochoa phase settlements were part of the widespread patterns of population aggregation, migrations, and diasporas and accompanying developments in social and ritual organization that occurred throughout the Southwest, northern Mexico, and southern Plains during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
Since 2007 our team has been conducting low level aerial reconnaissance in the northern highlands... more Since 2007 our team has been conducting low level aerial reconnaissance in the northern highlands of Ecuador, a challenging environment with low air pressure, frequent high winds, misting rain, and rapidly alternating intense sun and enveloping low lying clouds. We struggled with our kites that initial year but managed to build the first high-resolution aerial map of an Ecuadorian Inka fortress. During subsequent years, the switch to drones and improved photo-analytical capacity opened a new world of visualization to us and our colleagues, though never without challenges from the difficult environment. Beyond the beautiful images of the Inka fortresses, mound sites, and haciendas that we were mapping, was the power of photogrammetry and 3D modeling in building not only precise images but offering a better overall structural understanding as well. Complex slope models and volumetric cut and fill calculations were among the analytical techniques we could bring to the first complete maps of the large earthen mound centers at Cochasquí and Zuleta, for example. Ultimately, the ability to analyze landscapes in real time became our standard, and in conjunction with powerful subsurface tools such as radar and magnetometry, such visualizations have become an essential tool for our investigations.
Previous research on agriculture in the American Southwest focuses overwhelmingly on archaeologic... more Previous research on agriculture in the American Southwest focuses overwhelmingly on archaeological survey methods to discern surface agricultural features, which, in combination with climatological, geological, and geographical variables, are used to create models about agricultural productivity in the past. However, with few exceptions, the role of floodplain irrigation and floodwater farming in ancestral Pueblo agriculture is generally downplayed in scholarly discourse. Using a variety of methods, including Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV), satellite imagery, pedestrian survey, and supervised classification of remotely sensed imagery, we examine this issue through a consideration of how ancestral Ohkay Owingeh (Tewa) people solved the challenges of arid land farming in the lower Rio Chama watershed of New Mexico during the Classic period (A.D. 1350–1598). Based on acreage estimates, our results indicate that runoff and rainwater fields in terrace environments would have been insuff...
Since 2007 our team has been conducting low level aerial reconnaissance in the northern highlands... more Since 2007 our team has been conducting low level aerial reconnaissance in the northern highlands of Ecuador, a challenging environment with low air pressure, frequent high winds, misting rain, and rapidly alternating intense sun and enveloping low lying clouds. We struggled with our kites that initial year but managed to build the first high-resolution aerial map of an Ecuadorian Inka fortress. During subsequent years, the switch to drones and improved photo-analytical capacity opened a new world of visualization to us and our colleagues, though never without challenges from the difficult environment. Beyond the beautiful images of the Inka fortresses, mound sites, and haciendas that we were mapping, was the power of photogrammetry and 3D modeling in building not only precise images but offering a better overall structural understanding as well. Complex slope models and volumetric cut and fill calculations were among the analytical techniques we could bring to the first complete maps of the large earthen mound centers at Cochasquí and Zuleta, for example. Ultimately, the ability to analyze landscapes in real time became our standard, and in conjunction with powerful subsurface tools such as radar and magnetometry, such visualizations have become an essential tool for our investigations.
... Philippines was one of a dozen or so villages reported by the Spanish dur? ing their early se... more ... Philippines was one of a dozen or so villages reported by the Spanish dur? ing their early settlement of the Visayas from Legaspi's landing at Cebu City in 1565 (Figure 1).Its name, meaning "downriver" (Mojares 2000) or "by the river" (Fr. ...
This report presents a summary of the results of the Blanket Purchase Authority (BPA) 10 project ... more This report presents a summary of the results of the Blanket Purchase Authority (BPA) 10 project sponsored by the Carlsbad Field Office (CFO) of the Bureau of Land Management and funded under the Permian Basin Programmatic Agreement. The BPA 10 project included six cultural resource projects, including survey inventories, site evaluations, and excavations.
RESUMEN: Los autores exponen las dificultades por las que hubo de pasar la respuesta a un ar-tícu... more RESUMEN: Los autores exponen las dificultades por las que hubo de pasar la respuesta a un ar-tículo, publicado en Science en 2018, en el que se afirmaba que el Neandertal era el autor de ciertas pinturas de tres cuevas españolas, según dataciones obtenidas por el método del uranio-torio. En esa respuesta, se explicitaban las distintas fuentes de error que pue-den conducir a fechas anormalmente envejecidas y se recapitulaban los argumentos ar-queológicos que contradicen dataciones tan antiguas. Muchos de los evaluadores de las revistas americanas prefirieron confiar en la arqueometría más que en la Arqueología europea, para ellos desconocida. Así, el artículo circuló por las manos de numerosos re-visores, transcurriendo un año y medio antes de que pudiera, por fin, salir en el Journal of Human Evolution. Este proceso ilustra la opacidad que subyace tras la aparente obje-tividad y neutralidad del procedimiento de evaluación científica de revisión por pares cuando se trata de contradec...
JOURNAL OF TEXAS ARCHEOLOGY AND HISTORY: JTAH SPECIAL VOLUME #6; PAPER 5E: 403-412, 2024
During a series of mapping projects at Eagle Nest Canyon (ENC) in 2014, the impacts of an extreme... more During a series of mapping projects at Eagle Nest Canyon (ENC) in 2014, the impacts of an extreme flood event were documented within the canyon using a fixed-wing Swinglet CAM drone along with a Phantom 1 quadcopter to create "before and after" 3D photogrammetry models of the landscape. This paper demonstrates the importance of mapping archaeological landscapes and how the data can be applied to understand how sites change over time.
Papers of the Chan Chich Archaeological Project, Number 16, 2023
During the 2023 field season of the BEAST project, we deployed a drone-based lidar system to map ... more During the 2023 field season of the BEAST project, we deployed a drone-based lidar system to map areas around the sites of Chan Chich and Gallon Jug. The National Center for Airborne Laser Mapping (NCALM) at the University of Houston mapped both sites as well as an extensive area well beyond using a plane-based lidar system in May 2022. NCALM mapped an area of approximately 650 km2 as compared to our 5 km2. Our goal was to compare the data collected using the two platforms.
ABSTRACTThe accurate and precise collection of three-dimensional (3D) context and provenience dat... more ABSTRACTThe accurate and precise collection of three-dimensional (3D) context and provenience data is of critical importance for archaeologists. Traditional square-hole methods are being augmented by new digital techniques to increase the accuracy and precision with which 3D data are collected. Structure from Motion (SfM) photogrammetry is an emerging digital technique that is becoming more widespread for collecting 3D data of archaeological sites and features. We are using handheld digital cameras and ground-based SfM to record accurate and precise 3D context and provenience data at the scale of the excavation unit and profile during rockshelter excavations in the Lower Pecos Canyonlands of Texas. By combining SfM with traditional excavation methods, we collect 3D data on excavation units, layers, features, and profiles without excavating in grid-bound square units. SfM provides a straightforward and flexible method to excavate based on the stratigraphy and logistical pragmatics, which further aids in assigning precise context and provenience to recovered artifacts and samples. This article describes how ground-based SfM serves as a basic recording tool during excavation and shows that, by applying ground-based SfM methods to excavation, archaeologists can collect more, and more accurate, data than with traditional square-hole methods.
Since 2007 our team has been conducting low level aerial reconnaissance in the northern highlands... more Since 2007 our team has been conducting low level aerial reconnaissance in the northern highlands of Ecuador, a challenging environment with low air pressure, frequent high winds, misting rain, and rapidly alternating intense sun and enveloping low lying clouds. We struggled with our kites that initial year but managed to build the first high-resolution aerial map of an Ecuadorian Inka fortress. During subsequent years, the switch to drones and improved photo-analytical capacity opened a new world of visualization to us and our colleagues, though never without challenges from the difficult environment. Beyond the beautiful images of the Inka fortresses, mound sites, and haciendas that we were mapping, was the power of photogrammetry and 3D modeling in building not only precise images but offering a better overall structural understanding as well. Complex slope models and volumetric cut and fill calculations were among the analytical techniques we could bring to the first complete maps of the large earthen mound centers at Cochasquí and Zuleta, for example. Ultimately, the ability to analyze landscapes in real time became our standard, and in conjunction with powerful subsurface tools such as radar and magnetometry, such visualizations have become an essential tool for our investigations.
Redacted version to safeguard site location data. Contact the lead author or Carlsbad Field Offic... more Redacted version to safeguard site location data. Contact the lead author or Carlsbad Field Office, Bureau of Land Management, for original version. The Merchant site is a fourteenth and early fifteenth century pueblo settlement located near Grama Ridge, a prominent escarpment near the boundary where the basin-and-range region merges with the southern Plains in the southeastern corner of New Mexico. The Merchant site is representative of the Ochoa phase, a poorly understood time period of southeastern New Mexico dating from around A.D. 1300/1350 to 1450. The Ochoa phase, and the El Paso and Late Glencoe phases of the closely related Jornada Mogollon region to the west, are contemporaneous with the Pueblo IV period of the greater Southwest, the Antelope Creek phase of the southern Plains, and the Toyah phase of central Texas. As such, Merchant and other Ochoa phase settlements were part of the widespread patterns of population aggregation, migrations, and diasporas and accompanying developments in social and ritual organization that occurred throughout the Southwest, northern Mexico, and southern Plains during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
Since 2007 our team has been conducting low level aerial reconnaissance in the northern highlands... more Since 2007 our team has been conducting low level aerial reconnaissance in the northern highlands of Ecuador, a challenging environment with low air pressure, frequent high winds, misting rain, and rapidly alternating intense sun and enveloping low lying clouds. We struggled with our kites that initial year but managed to build the first high-resolution aerial map of an Ecuadorian Inka fortress. During subsequent years, the switch to drones and improved photo-analytical capacity opened a new world of visualization to us and our colleagues, though never without challenges from the difficult environment. Beyond the beautiful images of the Inka fortresses, mound sites, and haciendas that we were mapping, was the power of photogrammetry and 3D modeling in building not only precise images but offering a better overall structural understanding as well. Complex slope models and volumetric cut and fill calculations were among the analytical techniques we could bring to the first complete maps of the large earthen mound centers at Cochasquí and Zuleta, for example. Ultimately, the ability to analyze landscapes in real time became our standard, and in conjunction with powerful subsurface tools such as radar and magnetometry, such visualizations have become an essential tool for our investigations.
Previous research on agriculture in the American Southwest focuses overwhelmingly on archaeologic... more Previous research on agriculture in the American Southwest focuses overwhelmingly on archaeological survey methods to discern surface agricultural features, which, in combination with climatological, geological, and geographical variables, are used to create models about agricultural productivity in the past. However, with few exceptions, the role of floodplain irrigation and floodwater farming in ancestral Pueblo agriculture is generally downplayed in scholarly discourse. Using a variety of methods, including Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV), satellite imagery, pedestrian survey, and supervised classification of remotely sensed imagery, we examine this issue through a consideration of how ancestral Ohkay Owingeh (Tewa) people solved the challenges of arid land farming in the lower Rio Chama watershed of New Mexico during the Classic period (A.D. 1350–1598). Based on acreage estimates, our results indicate that runoff and rainwater fields in terrace environments would have been insuff...
Since 2007 our team has been conducting low level aerial reconnaissance in the northern highlands... more Since 2007 our team has been conducting low level aerial reconnaissance in the northern highlands of Ecuador, a challenging environment with low air pressure, frequent high winds, misting rain, and rapidly alternating intense sun and enveloping low lying clouds. We struggled with our kites that initial year but managed to build the first high-resolution aerial map of an Ecuadorian Inka fortress. During subsequent years, the switch to drones and improved photo-analytical capacity opened a new world of visualization to us and our colleagues, though never without challenges from the difficult environment. Beyond the beautiful images of the Inka fortresses, mound sites, and haciendas that we were mapping, was the power of photogrammetry and 3D modeling in building not only precise images but offering a better overall structural understanding as well. Complex slope models and volumetric cut and fill calculations were among the analytical techniques we could bring to the first complete maps of the large earthen mound centers at Cochasquí and Zuleta, for example. Ultimately, the ability to analyze landscapes in real time became our standard, and in conjunction with powerful subsurface tools such as radar and magnetometry, such visualizations have become an essential tool for our investigations.
... Philippines was one of a dozen or so villages reported by the Spanish dur? ing their early se... more ... Philippines was one of a dozen or so villages reported by the Spanish dur? ing their early settlement of the Visayas from Legaspi's landing at Cebu City in 1565 (Figure 1).Its name, meaning "downriver" (Mojares 2000) or "by the river" (Fr. ...
This report presents a summary of the results of the Blanket Purchase Authority (BPA) 10 project ... more This report presents a summary of the results of the Blanket Purchase Authority (BPA) 10 project sponsored by the Carlsbad Field Office (CFO) of the Bureau of Land Management and funded under the Permian Basin Programmatic Agreement. The BPA 10 project included six cultural resource projects, including survey inventories, site evaluations, and excavations.
RESUMEN: Los autores exponen las dificultades por las que hubo de pasar la respuesta a un ar-tícu... more RESUMEN: Los autores exponen las dificultades por las que hubo de pasar la respuesta a un ar-tículo, publicado en Science en 2018, en el que se afirmaba que el Neandertal era el autor de ciertas pinturas de tres cuevas españolas, según dataciones obtenidas por el método del uranio-torio. En esa respuesta, se explicitaban las distintas fuentes de error que pue-den conducir a fechas anormalmente envejecidas y se recapitulaban los argumentos ar-queológicos que contradicen dataciones tan antiguas. Muchos de los evaluadores de las revistas americanas prefirieron confiar en la arqueometría más que en la Arqueología europea, para ellos desconocida. Así, el artículo circuló por las manos de numerosos re-visores, transcurriendo un año y medio antes de que pudiera, por fin, salir en el Journal of Human Evolution. Este proceso ilustra la opacidad que subyace tras la aparente obje-tividad y neutralidad del procedimiento de evaluación científica de revisión por pares cuando se trata de contradec...
Versar Cultural Resources Report No. 872-2EP, 2021
This report presents the results of a comprehensive documentation and analysis of ground stone be... more This report presents the results of a comprehensive documentation and analysis of ground stone bedrock features at LA 43414 (the Merchant site) and LA 121668. The bedrock features are located on lands administered by the Carlsbad Field Office (CFO) of the Bureau of Land Management and the New Mexico State Land Office. This project was funded under the Permian Basin Programmatic Agreement (PBPA) administered by the CFO. This investigation recorded and examined 359 ground stone bedrock features between the two sites, using newly standardized documentation procedures for bedrock mortars and grinding basins that were instigated by the CFO (see Murrell 2019). Structure from Motion photogrammetry was used to make high-resolution 3D models of the features, which also provided the data to gather length, width, and depth data for each feature. Additionally, qualitative attributes were recorded during on-site field work. A statistical cluster analysis was used to evaluate the morphological variation of the bedrock features and subsequently to identify six clusters or groups or similar features. The resulting clusters assessed in relation to a suite of related research topics including (1) exploring the functional and morphological variability of bedrock features; (2) correlating use-wear characteristics to potential function; (3) discussing the spatial distribution of bedrock feature morphologies and their relation to other features such as burned rock accumulations or pueblo remains; (4) examining whether the bedrock features were created through intentional manufacture or sustained use; (5) discussing the use-life of features; (6) determining the potential age and cultural affiliation of the bedrock features; (7) correlating the associated past and present plant and mineral resources using previous excavation data at LA 43414, ethnography, and pollen results; and (8) evaluating the possibility of ritual contexts for bedrock features at these sites.
Redacted version with site location information removed. Contact the Carlsbad Field Office, BLM... more Redacted version with site location information removed. Contact the Carlsbad Field Office, BLM or the author for complete PDF version.
Redacted version to safeguard site location data. Contact the lead author or Carlsbad Field Offi... more Redacted version to safeguard site location data. Contact the lead author or Carlsbad Field Office, Bureau of Land Management, for original version.
The Merchant site is a fourteenth and early fifteenth century pueblo settlement located near Grama Ridge, a prominent escarpment near the boundary where the basin-and-range region merges with the southern Plains in the southeastern corner of New Mexico. The Merchant site is representative of the Ochoa phase, a poorly understood time period of southeastern New Mexico dating from around A.D. 1300/1350 to 1450. The Ochoa phase, and the El Paso and Late Glencoe phases of the closely related Jornada Mogollon region to the west, are contemporaneous with the Pueblo IV period of the greater Southwest, the Antelope Creek phase of the southern Plains, and the Toyah phase of central Texas. As such, Merchant and other Ochoa phase settlements were part of the widespread patterns of population aggregation, migrations, and diasporas and accompanying developments in social and ritual organization that occurred throughout the Southwest, northern Mexico, and southern Plains during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
No Bear (24GL1717) is an unusual rock art site located on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation in Gla... more No Bear (24GL1717) is an unusual rock art site located on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation in Glacier County, Montana. Including superimposed Foothills Abstract, Vertical Series, and Ceremonial tradition images, the rock art panels are perched high on a sandstone cliff that is now badly undercut by erosion. Because the site is in imminent danger of collapse the Oregon Archaeological Society undertook a project in collaboration with the Blackfeet Nation, the Montana Archaeological Society, and Willis Archaeology to record the more than 50 different motifs drawn as both pictographs and petroglyphs. Because these images are far out of reach from below, Mark Willis used pole-assisted photography to record them.
In 2016, the Chan Chich Archaeological Project (CCAP) and Belize Estates Archaeological Survey Te... more In 2016, the Chan Chich Archaeological Project (CCAP) and Belize Estates Archaeological Survey Team (BEAST) pursued multiple research agendas within the 144,000-acre permit area in Northwestern Belize. At Chan Chich, excavations in the Upper Plaza began a 3-year initiative to build a high-resolution chronology of the plaza's and associated structures' construction history. This multi-season effort will investigate the relationship between divine kingship and the architectural evolution of the Upper Plaza. Additionally, CCAP renewed excavations at Norman's Temple complex, a hilltop group west of the Main Plaza, documenting ancient Maya graffiti and discovering a dense terminal artifact deposit. Under the auspices of BEAST, a drone survey mapped cleared pasturelands of Gallon Jug and a large lagoon know as Laguna Seca, and the project completed its second and final season of investigations at Kaxil Uinic, an historic period San Pedro Maya village. This paper summarizes the results of the 2016 investigations.
Investigations of the Belize River East Archaeology Project: A Report of the 2022 Field Season, 2023
Results of drone based LiDAR mapping of prehistoric Maya sites in the BREA project area near Croo... more Results of drone based LiDAR mapping of prehistoric Maya sites in the BREA project area near Crooked Tree, Belize.
Investigations of the Belize River East Archaeology Project: A Report of the 2020 Field Season, 2022
As part of the fieldwork conducted in January of 2020, several areas within the BREA project area... more As part of the fieldwork conducted in January of 2020, several areas within the BREA project area were mapped using drones and Structure from Motion technologies. The overall goal of this mapping was to gather additional–as well as more accurate and precise remotely sensed data in order to enhance understanding of ancient Maya landscape management. This work was a continuation of our 2014 and 2017 drone mapping projects, in which we were able to demonstrate a number of benefits to the work: not only were we able to identify a large number of previously undocumented mound structures in the space of a few days, we have also been able to document the presence of large-scale wetland management structures, such as artificially constructed canals and ponds. The utility of these remote sensing technologies, and their affordable cost, are changing on a fundamental level the ways in which archaeologists collect, process, and display data. Further, remotely sensed data is helping to refine the kinds of research questions we ask.
Redacted version with site location information removed. Contact the Carlsbad Field Office, BLM ... more Redacted version with site location information removed. Contact the Carlsbad Field Office, BLM or the author for a full PDF version.
Redacted version with site location information removed: contact the BLM Carlsbad Field Office o... more Redacted version with site location information removed: contact the BLM Carlsbad Field Office or lead author for an unredacted copy.
This report presents the results of the archaeological documentation and interpretation of 21 rock art sites on lands in the Guadalupe Mountains and Azotea Mesa regions administered by the Carlsbad Field Office of the Bureau of Land Management. The comprehensive documentation of rock art at 21 sites was a multidisciplinary and multiphase effort over the course of two years that involved several specialists as well as field and post-field consultations with Native American Tribal Historic Preservation Offices, elders, and other representatives. The rock art and surrounding occupation areas of 21 sites were documented. This vast and varied panorama of rock art paintings and engravings spanned a period of at least 4,000 years. A total of 168 rock art panels with 1,045 individual elements were drawn, photographed, and described. The artistic and symbolic content of the panels include abstract paintings, zigzag elements, and polychrome paintings dating to the Archaic Period; possible representational images and masks from the Formative/Ceramic Period; and dynamic scenes of humans, horses, and other animals dating to the 1800s. Ten pictographs were directly dated using plasma oxidation radiocarbon dating of paint samples. In addition to the rock art, other evidence of past human interaction with the landscapes of southeastern New Mexico is presented. The rock art panels are surrounded by shrine features, cairns, rock walls, house structures, and agave baking pits. Most of the rock art is associated with distinctive natural features such as caves, rockshelters, cliffs, and boulder outcrops. When considered together, the rock art, shrines, striking vistas, and dynamic settings provide profound insights into the ways in which the past inhabitants of the canyons and mountains of the Guadalupe Mountains engaged with the natural and spiritual world.
In this chapter we explore these “heterotopian” aspects of a monumental landscape, examining the ... more In this chapter we explore these “heterotopian” aspects of a monumental landscape, examining the fringes or outskirts of Saturday Creek, an ancient Maya urban center in the middle Belize River Valley. We examine some of the activities that the “vacant terrain” may have supported in the fringes of the peri urban landscape, including wetland and orchard agriculture, and how these agrarian activities related with the neighboring urban core center of Saturday Creek and also the nearby ¬¬¬secondary centers of Hats Kaab and Chikin Chi’Ha (Figure 5.1). Our study relies on a combination of geospatial technologies, including publicly available satellite imagery and our surveys of the landscape using Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), as well as traditional pedestrian survey and Total Station mapping. We also rely on data we have gleaned from both our archaeological investigations and the ethnohistoric accounts from Spanish chroniclers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The Spanish recorded details about their journeys to the Maya communities in the middle Belize Valley and their experience in the surrounding landscape. They describe this location as a cross-roads, an entry point for those traveling south on an overland route, which traversed along a sandy pine ridge and through wetland swamps to finally reach the Belize River for travel up or down (west or east) on this riverine “highway.”
Early rock art research indicated that there were few “horizontal bedrock” rock art sites in Sout... more Early rock art research indicated that there were few “horizontal bedrock” rock art sites in Southern New Mexico and far West Texas. These sites are often difficult to see and are easily missed in survey work. Recent research and survey work has documented a growing number of these sites on the etched limestone and sandstone of the desert slopes and basins. The use of photogrammetry makes it easier to document these sites and provide good images for analysis. Like the remnants of subtle agricultural features and puddled adobe ruins these subtle rock art sites give us insight into the culture of the Archaic and Jornada Cultures in Southern New Mexico and West Texas. This presentation will document a few of these and list some research possibilities.
One unique combination of rock art elements found in the Jornada Mogollon region of southern New ... more One unique combination of rock art elements found in the Jornada Mogollon region of southern New Mexico and West Texas is a cloud terrace with a face/mask below it. Figure 1 is an example of this element. The terrace is often decorated by an arc and rain. This combination closely resembles the tablita or cloud terrace headdresses of some Hopi and Jemez katsinas which were known in Ancestral Pueblo (A.D. 1300 to Post-Contact). Recent absolute dating of tablita fragments from Ceremonial Cave in West Texas and Doolittle Cave in western New Mexico suggests we look closer at possible connections. While the tablita fragments that were found may have been part of shrines, evidence suggest that they were worn by Jornada Mogollon people and that they were possibly one of the precursors to the katsina masking tradition.
This Windmill site is along a shallow arroyo in Sierra County, New Mexico. The Archaeological Soc... more This Windmill site is along a shallow arroyo in Sierra County, New Mexico. The Archaeological Society of New Mexico’s Rock Art Council’s Dona Ana Archaeological Society’s Rock Art Documentation team (ASNM-RAC-DAAS) conducted field works at this site in 2019. LA 82899 had been previously documented but, due to the deteriorated condition of the panels minimal analysis of the petroglyphs was made. A model created by Mark Willis using innovative Structure from Motion (SfM) models and a radiance scaling enhancement provide better images for documentation. Tracings of these models help create a clearer schematic of some of the panels at the Windmill Site. This report presents these tracings and analysis including methods, distribution, and possible cultural affiliations.
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Papers by Mark Willis
The Merchant site is a fourteenth and early fifteenth century pueblo settlement located near Grama Ridge, a prominent escarpment near the boundary where the basin-and-range region merges with the southern Plains in the southeastern corner of New Mexico. The Merchant site is representative of the Ochoa phase, a poorly understood time period of southeastern New Mexico dating from around A.D. 1300/1350 to 1450. The Ochoa phase, and the El Paso and Late Glencoe phases of the closely related Jornada Mogollon region to the west, are contemporaneous with the Pueblo IV period of the greater Southwest, the Antelope Creek phase of the southern Plains, and the Toyah phase of central Texas. As such, Merchant and other Ochoa phase settlements were part of the widespread patterns of population aggregation, migrations, and diasporas and accompanying developments in social and ritual organization that occurred throughout the Southwest, northern Mexico, and southern Plains during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
This report presents the results of the archaeological documentation and interpretation of 21 rock art sites on lands in the Guadalupe Mountains and Azotea Mesa regions administered by the Carlsbad Field Office of the Bureau of Land Management. The comprehensive documentation of rock art at 21 sites was a multidisciplinary and multiphase effort over the course of two years that involved several specialists as well as field and post-field consultations with Native American Tribal Historic Preservation Offices, elders, and other representatives.
The rock art and surrounding occupation areas of 21 sites were documented. This vast and varied panorama of rock art paintings and engravings spanned a period of at least 4,000 years. A total of 168 rock art panels with 1,045 individual elements were drawn, photographed, and described. The artistic and symbolic content of the panels include abstract paintings, zigzag elements, and polychrome paintings dating to the Archaic Period; possible representational images and masks from the Formative/Ceramic Period; and dynamic scenes of humans, horses, and other animals dating to the 1800s.
Ten pictographs were directly dated using plasma oxidation radiocarbon dating of paint samples.
In addition to the rock art, other evidence of past human interaction with the landscapes of southeastern New Mexico is presented. The rock art panels are surrounded by shrine features, cairns, rock walls, house structures, and agave baking pits. Most of the rock art is associated with distinctive natural features such as caves, rockshelters, cliffs, and boulder outcrops. When considered together, the rock art, shrines, striking vistas, and dynamic settings provide profound insights into the ways in which the past inhabitants of the canyons and mountains of the Guadalupe Mountains engaged with the natural and spiritual world.