PRE-FRONTIER; PRE-WEST

Post by Doris McCraw/Angela Raines

We love writing about the West, it seems to be in our blood. But what was the West before it was the myth we love? I'm talking about the world before the year 1,000. Of course as a teen I was fascinated with the Aztecs, Toltecs, and then the Olmecs. Then I had the gift of visiting the Cahokia mounds. Now of course we talk about the Anasazi, Chaco Canyon. So who were there peoples? How did their stories impact our lives and our own writing?

Timelines:

Cahokia peoples settled the Mississippi/Illinois river area around 700.

Anasazi people settled the Four Corners area around 200

Chaco Canyon in use by 850.

All three were in decline by around 1200-1300.

Both the Cahokia and Anasazi are the subject of much speculation. They both build amazing civilizations. Were they cannibals? Did they have human sacrifice? One of the hardest parts of archeology is putting yourself in the 'shoes' of the inhabitants of the area you are studying, much as we authors do when creating our characters. It is not easy to be historically correct, especially when you don't know all the facts about the time you are writing.

The following quote from the Cahokia Mounds website gives a hint of the influence the inhabitants had on their area: “One of the greatest cities of the world, Cahokia was larger than London was in AD 1250. The Mississippians who lived here were accomplished builders who erected a wide variety of structures from practical homes for everyday living to monumental public works that have maintained their grandeur for centuries” For additional information the following links will take you on that journey.

http://cahokiamounds.org/, http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/01/cahokia/hodges-text , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cahokia I really encourage you to read all, but if you only have time for one, the National Geographic article is a good overview.

en.wikipedia.org

The Anasazi are more widely recognized, mainly because of Mesa Verde and the history of the Pueblo people. Still what became of them? Why did they abandon the dwellings that they are remembered for? We may never know, but what a history these people have. The following quote from the Mesa Verde site shows how important the preservation of the history is: Preserving the “Works of Man”

Mesa Verde, Spanish for green table, offers a spectacular look into the lives of the Ancestral Pueblo people who made it their home for over 700 years, from AD 600 to 1300. Today the park protects nearly 5,000 known archeological sites, including 600 cliff dwellings. These sites are some of the most notable and best preserved in the United States. Additional information can be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancestral_Puebloans , http://www.blm.gov/co/st/en/fo/ahc/who_were_the_anasazi.html ,http://www.smithsonianmag.com/people-places/riddles-of-the-anasazi-85274508/?no-ist I love the BLM site, it allows you to follow a question and answer format.

en.wikipedia.org

Lastly there is Chaco Canyon in the Southwest. This area also contains more from the Anasazi culture. Many think it may have been part of the 'highway' through which trade goods traveled. For more on this site: http://www.nps.gov/chcu/index.htm ,https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaco_Culture_National_Historical_Park ,https://sacredsites.com/americas/united_states/chaco_canyon.html

en.wikipedia.org

That these peoples influenced future generations is without question. Still, so much is not known, or is speculation. Mesa Verde, Cahokia Mounds and Chaco Canyon are still mysteries in many ways, but oh the stories they can inspire. Did the Anasazi and the Mississippians at Cahokia know and trade with each other? So many questions but so many stories to be told, so many myths and mysteries.

Angela Raines is the pen name for Doris McCraw. Doris also writes haiku posted five days a week at - http://fivesevenfivepage.blogspot.com and has now passed one thousand haiku and photos posted on this blog. Check out her other work or like her Amazon author page:  http://amzn.to/1I0YoeL

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The Southwest and Cannibalism

By Kristy McCaffrey

Pueblo Bonito, Chaco Canyon, New Mexico.

Why did the Anasazi start building massive stone pueblos around A.D. 900 at Chaco Canyon in New Mexico—a barren gorge in the desert of the San Juan basin—and within 250 years suddenly abandon them? Pueblo Bonito contained over 650 rooms and its construction required more than 30,000 tons of shaped sandstone blocks. Hundreds of miles of roads were created that stretched out from Chaco Canyon in arrow-straight lines, an engineering marvel achieved without compass, wheel, or beast of burden. Shrines, irrigation systems, and a network of signaling stations were erected. These structures aligned with the sun, the moon, and each other.

Anthropologist Christy Turner.

Physical anthropologist Christy Turner, professor emeritus at Arizona State University, and others have detected traces of extreme violence and cannibalism on human bones unearthed at 40 different Ancestral Puebloan sites in the southwestern United States.

The earliest locations with cannibalized human remains date around A.D. 900. Turner identified 72 Anasazi sites at which violence or cannibalism may have occurred. He estimated that at least 286 individuals were butchered, cooked, and eaten. After the Chaco civilization collapsed around A.D. 1150, many Anasazi moved into deep and remote canyons, living in dwellings hugging the sides of cliffs on high, fortified mesas. The Anasazi had been seized with paranoia, or, perhaps more simply, fear.

There are roughly six criteria for determining whether human remains have been cannibalized—breakage, cut marks, abrasion from being smashed against an anvil, burning, missing vertebrae, and “pot polish” created by stirring bones in a pot. Opponents to the cannibalism theory argue that the condition of remains can also be caused by the chewing of a carnivorous animal, re-burial, or witch executions, in which the victim was cut up to locate the witch’s evil heart, anywhere from the head to the big toe. Dismembering was the only way to prevent the witch from wreaking revenge after death.

Anasazi ruin.

In the 1990’s definitive proof arrived when a group of archaeological sites were excavated at the base of Sleeping Ute Mountain in southern Colorado. Within the first kiva was found a pile of chopped-up, boiled, and burned human bones. In the second kiva were found the remains of five people in which evidence suggested they had been roasted, then the bones defleshed and split open for the marrow. The skulls of at least two people had been placed upside down on the fire, roasted, and broken open, and the cooked brains presumably scooped out. Tools for chopping were found with traces of human blood on them.

In the third kiva, however, was the most unusual find. In the ashes of a central hearth was found a nondescript lump. Further analysis revealed it was a coprolite—desiccated human feces. Testing revealed that the feces contained human myoglobin, a protein found only in skeletal and heart muscle. The only way it could get into the intestinal tract was through eating. Based on the evidence at hand it was clear the community had been attacked. The people had been killed, cooked, and eaten. Then, in an ultimate act of contempt, one of the killers defecated in a hearth, the symbolic center of the family and the household.

Turner offers more
details in his book,
Man Corn.

Turner found that most deposits of cannibalized bones were often situated near Chaco Great Houses, spread across the Four Corners region, and that most dated from the Chaco period. The eating of human flesh seems to have begun as the Chaco civilization began, around A.D. 900; peaked at the time of the Chaco collapse and abandonment, around A.D. 1150; and then all but disappeared. Turner theorizes that cannibalism might have been used by a powerful elite at Chaco Canyon as a form of social control. Ancient terrorism.

Toltecs.

And who were these powerful elite? Most likely the Toltecs—precursors of the Aztecs. The Toltec empire in Mexico lasted from about A.D. 800 to 1100. It’s possible a heavily armed group of these “thugs” infiltrated into the southwestern part of the U.S. and found a suspicious but pliant population whom they terrorized into reproducing the theocratic lifestyle they had previously known in Mesoamerica. This involved heavy payments of tribute, constructing the Chaco system of great houses and roads, and providing victims for ceremonial sacrifice. The Mexicans achieved their objectives through the use of warfare, violent example, and terrifying cult ceremonies that included human sacrifice and cannibalism.

The Navajo have stories in their folklore that reveal aspects of Chaco Canyon that are very different from the Anglo view. Elder Navajo say that Chaco was a place of hideous evil. The people there abused sacred ceremonies, practiced witchcraft and cannibalism, and made a dreaded substance called corpse powder by cooking and grinding up the flesh and bones of the dead. Their evil threw the world out of balance, and they were destroyed in a great earthquake and fire.

The final truth is that the Anasazi, around A.D. 1150, abruptly fled their homes in the Chaco region to live in remote cliff sides, behaving as if chased by a formidable opponent. When the evidence of cannibalism is presented, the motivation for this departure can be understood under a different light.

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Connect with Kristy

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Historical Western Romance Novel

Rancher Ethan Barstow is weary of the years-long estrangement from his brother, Charley. Deciding to track him down is easy; not so easy is riding in the company of Kate Kinsella, Charley’s fiancée. In the land of the Navajo, spirits and desire draw them close, leading them deeper into the shadows and to each other.

Into the Land of Shadows

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Works Cited

Hartigan, Rachel. “Dying for dinner? A debate rages over desert cannibalism.” U.S. News Magazine. July 2000.  <http://www.usnews.com/usnews/doubleissue/mysteries/anasazi.htm>

Preston, Douglas. “Cannibals of the Canyon.” The New Yorker Magazine. November 1998.

Pringle, Heather. “Were Some Ancestral Puebloan People the Victims of Ethnic Conflict?” Archaeology Magazine. September 2010. <http://archive.archaeology.org/blog/were-the-ancestral-puebloan-people-victims-of-ethnic-cleansing/>

Turner, Christy G. and Turner, Jacqueline A. Man Corn: Violence and Cannibalism in the Prehistoric American Southwest. University of Utah Press, 1998.

Witze, Alexandra. “Researchers Divided Over Whether Anasazi Were Cannibals.” National Geographic Magazine. June 2001. <http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2001/06/0601_wireanasazi.html>