The University of Arizona Press
Archaeological Investigations in Gavilan Canyon
A Mimbres River Tributary in New Mexico
In the 1980s, Texas A&M University’s NAN Ranch Project included surveys and excavations in Gavilan Canyon, a major tributary of the Mimbres River. Uniquely, these excavations documented water control systems and their uses. Collected and now made available for the first time, Archaeological Investigations in Gavilan Canyon shares results from the excavations that were conducted primarily at Pueblo Vinegaroon, a Classic Period Mimbres pueblo of about twenty rooms, and at nearby Cholla Village.
During the NAN Ranch Project, researchers conducted extensive surveys of the canyon from its confluence with the Mimbres River and documented numerous sites dating to as early as Early Archaic through Classic Mimbres. The results also document pithouse sites as well as numerous small masonry pueblos. Analysis shows that the ebb and flow of late prehistoric occupation in Gavilan Canyon largely matches the occurrence of wet periods and prolonged droughts.
The book reveals that the changes in occupation in Gavilan Canyon help explain changes seen in the Mimbres River Valley, including the extensively excavated NAN Ranch and Swarts sites.
“This intriguing volume provides a window into a little reported aspect of Mimbres archaeology, demonstrating the long-term occupation and land use within a tributary drainage to the Mimbres River. These investigations shed light on hitherto unrecognized aspects of late Classic Mimbres settlement and social behaviors as Classic Mimbres society collapsed and transformed. It is an essential companion to the well-reported large pithouse and pueblo sites in the Mimbres Valley and beyond.”—Roger Anyon, co-author of Ancient Communities in the Mimbres Valley: Continuity and Change from AD 750 to 1350
“Creel and Shafer’s new publication presents long neglected data from the Gavilan Canyon area of the lower Mimbres River. It completes the picture of what was happening during the Mimbres Pithouse and Classic periods at the famous NAN Ranch site and its major tributary. As such, it is an excellent example of what we can still learn from decades old data for interpreting and understanding the movements and motivations of prehistoric peoples of the Mimbres Valley specifically and for ancient Southwestern societies in general.”—Robert Stokes, Eastern New Mexico University
