Day Seven in Chaco Canyon

Daniel Gillis   

October 11, 2016                                                                                                                              

                                                                                                

            We started today’s field school session with a trip to the cliff faces behind and to the west of Pueblo Bonito. Our Professor, Dr. Wills, has a special permit to collect modern animal bones for a study of their diets using a technique called Stable Isotope Analysis.  We helped search for carcasses of animals that died in the area near the excavations.  By looking at the isotope ratios of certain elements in modern animal’s bones and comparing them to bones of animals found at ancient archaeological sites scientists can determine a lot about how the landscape and climate has changed in Chaco Canyon.  
 
We saw some petroglyphs carved in the face of the rock cliff. After searching the rocks for about a half an hour we spread out in a straight line across a flat area of land between the Wetherill Cemetery and our excavation area. We walked across the ground in straight lines about 5 meters apart. These lines are used to search an area and are called transects. Upon returning to our work area we put the animal bones that we had gathered into bags marked with the GPS co-ordinates of where we had found them and today’s date. These bone will be given to the scientists conducting the study.

            Today’s excavations of the Trading Post consisted of starting in on digging our test units. Test units are small areas usually one meter by one meter in area, but some were one meter by two meters. Archaeologists use these test units to get an idea of what is under the surface in a few small areas of interest rather than digging up the entire area being studied. The location of the test units is measured on our grid and the elevation of the unit is also recorded. We began digging in our units today and excavated units of 20 centimeters in depth. We tested the soil’s texture and color within each 20 cm unit. After reaching the 20 cm mark we again measured the elevation of the test unit.

            To conduct these excavations we used hand trowels (these are not garden trowels, but completely flat) to scrape soil loose from the floor of the unit. We then scooped the soil up with dustpans into buckets, which we carried to ¼ inch screens to run the soil through. The screens stop small pieces of artifacts from being accidentally discarded. In my unit today I found 3 pottery sherds, two were of corrugated grayware and one was of undecorated whiteware. These pottery sherds were also bagged with the location at level at which they were found for later study in our lab back at the University of New Mexico.

            At about two o’clock this afternoon Dr. Wills took us on a brief tour of some of the larger intact rooms on the west side of Pueblo Bonito. The rooms we saw had really high ceilings, about 10-12 feet high, and were still intact with their original masonry and wood ceilings. A park ranger accompanied us on the tour and pointed out some of the features of the rooms.

            We are all having a great time out here!