The depopulation of the Mesa Verde region in the late 13th century A.D. may seem like a mystery to many people, but archaeologists know where the Pueblo people went—the northern Rio Grande valley, Zuni and Hopi-- and most residents of this region think they know why: The climate grew both drier and colder, and the Pueblo people were not able to grow the food they needed to sustain their population. Washington State University post-doctoral researcher Kyle Bocinsky and WSU archaeologist Tim Kohler have reconstructed the “maize niche”—the geographic areas where the climate was amenable to raising corn—using tree-ring and other types of data to reconstruct precipitation and temperature for each year during the A.D. 600–1300 period. By comparing those data with the minimum thresholds required to grow the types of maize being cultivated at the time, the study has identified the area in which those conditions are met and how that area changed every year. Other researchers, including Ken Peterson of the Dolores Archaeological Program, have performed similar studies. Kyle uses new techniques to show how the maize niche shifted from year to year and establishing which portions of the Mesa Verde region were most reliable growing areas and which were most unreliable through time. Bocinsky’s work addresses the seven centuries when Pueblo occupation of the region was most substantial, allowing him to examine how changes in the size and location of the maize niche correspond to cultural changes in Mesa Verde Pueblo society. One of the most important cultural changes was the complete depopulation of the region by about A.D. 1285. Bocinsky’s work shows that a shrinking maize niche was an important factor, but it also shows that changes in the maize niche alone do not completely explain the depopulation of the region. Farming in some portions of the Mesa Verde region did become untenable at various times, including during the latter part of the 13th century. During the worst times, however, farming was still viable in some portions of the region. To understand why all people left, researchers have to understand the social and political dynamics that were related to changes in the maize niche and agricultural yields. Bocinsky and Kohler developed their maize niche analysis as a part of the Village Ecodynamics Project or VEP. The VEP team—Bocinsky and Kohler, Crow Canyon scientists, and researchers from elsewhere—is conducting analyses that integrate the maize niche study with an assessment of culture change in the Mesa Verde region, including Crow Canyon’s reconstruction of how population size and settlement location changed through. The team is currently developing a new publication that presents the results of these analyses, so stay tuned for news of these results in 2015.
Posted on: Mon, 08 Dec 2014 16:29:01 +0000
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