LEARNING OF SPANISH COLONIAL LIFE

Anna Boozer runs dirt through a screen under a blazing sun. The dirt is screened in order to find tiny artifacts.

The 18th century is glimpsed at an excavation in New Mexico.

By Pamela Salmon

Archaeologist Nan Rothschild first worked in the Southwest from 1989 to 1991 at Zuni Pueblo in western New Mexico. There, she said, “I became interested in what it meant to be Hispanic in the 18th century in New Mexico, and I wanted to excavate an historic site in the Rio Grande Valley.”

This desire brought her to San José de las Huertas, a Spanish Colonial site located within the northern reaches of the Sandia Mountains. The site is approximately one mile north of Placitas, New Mexico, a mixed community of Hispanic descendants whose ancestors worked the land and rural-oriented suburbanites who commute to work in nearby Albuquerque. San José de las Huertas is part of a 25-acre parcel owned by The Archaeological Conservancy.

An archaeological survey in 1972 and an excavation of a two-room house in 1983 by archaeologists working for companies building liquid hydrocarbon and carbon dioxide pipelines close to the area confirmed the site’s archaeological significance. This led the Cortez Pipeline Company to donate 12 acres to the Conservancy in 1986. The Conservancy later obtained an additional 13 acres from several other landowners.

“Spanish Colonial sites are rare and endangered,” said Jim Walker, the Conservancy’s Southwest regional director. He identified them as one of the Conservancy’s top preservation priorities. The Conservancy owns five Spanish Colonial sites, four in New Mexico and one in Arizona. Most of the significant sites have been obliterated by modern development, according to Walker. In fact, of approximately

This historic pueblo potsherd was found during last season’s excavation. It’s typical of the types of sherds found at the site.

This obsidian projectile point was also discovered during the excavation. It is less than an inch long.

Nan Rothschild and two crew members excavate a large house with adobe walls. Rothschild was surprised to find the structure’s foundation stones just a few inches below the surface.

GETTING TO WORK

200,000 recorded archaeological sites in New Mexico, less than 100 are intact Spanish Colonial sites. He believes that San José de las Huertas is “the most intact Spanish Colonial village in New Mexico, if not the Southwest.”

Rothschild concurred. “I had collected information from other excavations and I realized this would be the perfect site.” Las Huertas fit the bill for Rothschild because it’s protected by the Conservancy, in good condition, and apparently had few disturbances after it was abandoned.

Rothschild and Heather Atherton directed the dig. Rothschild is the chairwoman of Barnard College’s anthropology department, and Atherton is a graduate student at Columbia University. They had some expectations about what they would find at Las Huertas relative to the physical layout of the village and the social hierarchy of its residents. They studied documentation from excavations at other Spanish Colonial sites, particularly in the Caribbean and northern Mexico, and they researched historical archives regarding Spanish Colonial activity in New Mexico. But Ather-

ton explained the limitations of this research: “Because (written) history is told by the literate, the elite, and government, we get only one view. Archaeology gives us other information.” Rothchild’s and Atherton’s goals complemented one another. While Rothschild is particularly interested in social relationships among the settlers themselves and with their Native American neighbors along the Rio Grande, Atherton focused on how Spanish policy, including the crown’s imperialist and secular goals, affected the behaviors of the residents of remote villages. She said during this time period Spain was changing from a policy of dominating the natives through religious conversion to one of natural resource extraction. Historical documents say San José de las Huertas was permanently settled in 1765 by nine Spanish families who petitioned the Spanish governor of New Mexico for legal claim to the property in the form of a land grant. It appears to have been occupied until 1826, with as many as 300 people living there at its peak during a comparatively peaceful period in the early 1800s. Susan Blumenthal, who explored the property with her archaeologist father in the 1950s, mentioned the valley was a haven for hippies in the 1960s. Having identified a site, the archaeologists had to determine the activities and technologies, not to mention sources of funding, that would help them achieve their goals. They also had to apply The working conditions at San José de las Huertas are challenging. In addition to dealing for permission from the Conservancy to work with the heat, the crew has to work around the abundant cholla cacti. on the property. Walker believed Rothschild and Atherton could put together an account of life at Las Huertas that would contribute not only to the body of archaeological research, but also to the historical continuity of descendants still living in the region. They also embraced the practice of conservation archaeology, a requirement of the Conservancy. “The old idea of archaeology was that you dig everything up because you don’t want to miss anything,” explained Walker. “The knowledge of those old sites is frozen at that time because there is no way to apply new ideas or new technologies. We want to make sure impacts are minimal so that portions of a site are available for future research.” Rothschild and Atherton developed a budget for the excavation that took into account everything from the cost of field equipment to laboratory analysis to first aid. They estimated that their project would cost between $33,000 and $39,500. At approximately $6,000, curation was one of the most expensive items in the budget. Finding and paying for the space to properly store the materi-

The three pots shown above (from left, A, B, and C) were recovered during a 1980 excavation. The pots were found in a storage pit beneath the floor of a two-room house. It's believed that they were used to store grain. The illustration below shows where the pots were found in the storage pit. Pots A and C were largely intact, while pot B was broken in several places.

als that result from excavating, such as artifacts and field notes, can be challenging. They arrived at this expense based on the expectation of storing 24 to 26 boxes of materials. If necessary, they were prepared to conclude the excavation prematurely so as to avoid exceeding that amount of material.

The archaeologists applied for a grant from the Earthwatch Institute, an organization that promotes conservation of natural resources and cultural heritage through partnerships among scientists, educators, the general public, and businesses. Earthwatch provided both money and volunteers who, at their own expense, would work with the researchers for five weeks. The women also obtained a grant from the Wenner-Gren Foundation, which supports research in anthropology.

For parts of the last four years the researchers have worked at Las Huertas, with the first year spent mapping, assessing surface artifacts, and surmising what an excavation would reveal. The second and third years were dedicated to refining surface and subsurface mapping using magnetometry and soil resistivity testing, which measure surface and subsurface features through variations in the magnetic and electrical conductivity of the ground. They combined the results from these techniques with topographic maps and 1980 aerial photographs from the Conservancy to develop an overlay of features as seen from the air, ground, and below ground. In the fourth year, the summer of 2002, the archaeologists, with help from the Earthwatch volunteers, conducted test excavations.

Their crew painstakingly dug, scraped, and swept the hardpan with small trowels, picks, and brushes. They caused as little disturbance as possible while searching for the remnants of what once was an active subsistence-farming village. Half of the crew of four men and 12 women are volunteers who paid more than $800 each to toil for a week under clear blue skies in 95-degree temperatures.

“You have to be in good physical shape to do this,” said a volunteer from San Diego as she took a break at a picnic table under a blue canopy. Other members of the crew

The Conservancy Expands Its Preserve

Last December, the Conservancy acquired its fourth contiguous tract of land at San José de Las Huertas. The acquisition of a 1.4-acre lot marks the final stage of a 16-year quest to obtain one of the best-preserved Spanish Colonial villages in the Southwest. This acquisition was funded by a generous contribution from the late Jane Sandoval, a longtime Conservancy member.

Containing housemounds and features, the lot was part of a small subdivision that marks the beginning of a new era for the isolated Las Huertas valley. Originally home to a succession of Anasazi, Spanish Colonial, and Mexican farmers, the small valley has seen hippies in the 1960s, land speculators and pipelines in the ’70s and ’80s, and rambling new suburban homes in the ’90s and ’00s. Though the valley will continue to evolve, San José de Las

Huertas is preserved.

joined her. They chatted excitedly about the pieces of bone, pottery, and adobe they found, and then voted to have Krispy Kreme doughnuts for breakfast the next morning.

“We’ve got a hoof,” announced volunteer Bob Keeler, who is working at Area 7, one of nine excavation pits placed strategically throughout the 80-by-100-square-yard area on which the crew is allowed to dig. Keeler is a teacher of anthropology and Latin American studies at Clackamas Community College in Oregon City, Oregon, and a veteran of many Earthwatch expeditions, which provide him with information that he uses in the classroom. The white-bearded Keeler toiled in a 12-inch-deep midden that is laced with ash. “This is a pit that someone dug,” he said. “It has a lot of charcoal and some slag, which suggests blacksmithing or copper smelting. That’s what makes this exciting. It’s more than just a garbage pit.” Historical documents indicate that a copper mine, located slightly east of the excavation site, was probably active in the late 1800s.

Maribel Dana, a volunteer who teaches high school near Riverside, California, worked along with Keeler. She put a piece of charcoal into a clear, plastic bag and dated it, gave it an identification number, and noted the excavation pit and the depth at which it was found. Then she fingered a small artifact that appeared to be copper ore. “I’ve never seen anything like this before,” she said. “To me, it’s like finding little jewels.” Atherton told Keeler and Dana that metal tools were scarce at Las Huertas and surmises that the copper was probably used to repair the few tools that the inhabitants did have.

Denise Mullen, a teacher at Albuquerque’s James Monroe Middle School, worked in Area 2. Here, the volunteers focused on the shape and direction of a long adobe wall. Small pieces of debris were put in a plastic bag and labeled. Later, researchers will determine whether the pieces are adobe, plaster, or charcoal. Like Keeler, Mullen is a frequent volunteer and uses information from her digs in her classroom. “I want my students to be aware that archaeology is in their own backyard,” she said.

The aerial and magnetometry maps indicate that the village was laid out in a typical Spanish Colonial arrangement with four walls and a plaza in the center. However, the maps also show some structures outside the walls, a variation from the standard village design. The location of the village suggests that Las Huertas was isolated and vulnerable to raiding by marauding bands of nomadic Indians, principally Navajo, Apache, and Ute.

Because of the dangers in such settlements, Rothschild and Atherton believe Las Huertas was inhabited by people who were willing to live with the risks in exchange for land of their own. More than likely, they say, these people were at the lower socioeconomic levels of Spanish society. They also hypothesize that a social hierarchy existed within the community, since living spaces appear to vary in size and are found outside the walls.

Rothschild suggested that a group called genizaros was on the lower rung of the Las Huertas social hierarchy. “Genizaros were detribalized Indians who had a reputation for being good fighters,” she said. “What we think is that they were Indians who had been captured by the nomadic groups and then ransomed to work in the Spanish homes. They didn’t have any land, and they couldn’t go back to their original communities.”

Because of the village’s distance from any imperial governing body, Atherton believes that the residents of Las Huertas exercised substantial social freedom. Both Rothschild and Atherton think the location of Las Huertas lent itself to frequent cross-cultural interaction, and possibly intermarriage, among the Spanish settlers and the nearby Indians. Such encounters make relationships particularly intriguing, said Rothschild. She observed that while traditional Spanish imperialistic contacts with Pueblo Indians in the Rio Grande Valley were based on religious conversion and domination, those between the Spanish at Las Huertas and the neighboring Pueblo Indians were based on survival and congeniality. For example, historical documents note that the apparent lack of a church at Las Huertas prompted its residents to attend weddings and funerals at the church at neighboring San Felipe Pueblo.

DEVELOPING CONCLUSIONS

Other signs of cross-cultural contact are expected to be confirmed by further analysis of the several thousand artifacts retrieved by the excavators. In addition to the metal fragments, numerous pottery sherds from various Pueblos have been found. The sherds are identified by their colors, patterns, surface textures, and tempers. European creamware, so named because of its ivory-colored glaze, and majólica, earthenware covered with tin and

Kelly Britt exposes the foundation of a structure that had been altered. The archaeologists are uncertain whether this structure was a large house or two smaller dwellings.

lead glazes from Spain or Mexico, are also present, all of which lead Atherton to conclude that there probably was no on-site production of pottery.

Atherton suspects that the crude grinding and cutting stone implements found at the site represent the types of tools most often used by the inhabitants. Manos and metates were used for grinding vegetables and seeds, and points and scrapers for hunting and cleaning animal carcasses. The site has also yielded more sophisticated implements such as symmetrical, fluted, and other shaped cutting tools and more developed grinding tools; but it’s thought these were either obtained through local trade or discarded by nomads.

Atherton does not believe any major trade caravans, like those that visited Santa Fe or Albuquerque, came through Las Huertas. However, she noted that the magnetometer data showed subsurface parallel depressions running roughly on an east-west axis through the village. She suggested these depressions might have been a road for animal-drawn carts that possibly connected to a network of trails that led to other villages.

While Rothschild and Atherton pondered relationships, lifestyles, and daily activities at San José de las Huertas, the volunteers washed artifacts that could provide vital information about these matters at a small empty rental house near the University of New Mexico. They sat at eight-foot tables covered with sheets of blue plastic. On top of each table were three blue plastic tubs filled halfway with water. The volunteers sipped wine and talked about everything from the Meyers Briggs personality test to where to shop in Albuquerque to how to say “hot dog” in various languages.

Atherton brought bagged artifacts to the group. “You can drybrush metal and bone and wash slag and pottery,

” she explained, “but don’t do anything with wood.” The volunteers took the bags, double-checked their contents to ensure that the artifacts are categorized correctly, and washed those they could. They were careful not to wash anything that appeared to be adobe, plaster, or charcoal. The cleaned artifacts were then rebagged

The remainder of the work is left primarily to Atherton. She has about 250 bags, each of which contains multiple artifacts. She has selected a handful of researchers to perform the necessary analyses. The faunal fragments will go to a University of Washington scientist and the slag to one at the University of Arizona. The analysis of the botanical and soil samples have yet to be assigned. Atherton will analyze the ceramic, lithic, and metal materials.

When the analyses are complete, Atherton will pack the artifacts in one-cubic-foot archival boxes. She estimates that she will only need about 15 of them. The boxes will be stored at the Maxwell Museum of Anthropology in Albuquerque in a humidity- and temperature-controlled environment and made available for study by other researchers.

Atherton expects to complete her fieldwork this summer. The Las Huertas project will flesh out research done in the early 1960s by archaeologists with the University of New Mexico and the subsequent work that was done there. “As far as I’m concerned the whole valley is of extreme significance,” said neighbor Susan Blumenthal. She believes the area was once teeming with activity. With the excavation and analysis of each artifact, Rothschild and Atherton endeavor to understand that activity.

PAMELA SALMON lives in New Mexico and is the author of Sandia Peak: A History of the Sandia Peak Tramway and Ski Area.