Utah Statewide Archaeological Society Newsletter, Volume 5, Number 3, September 1959

UTAH ARCHEOLOGY A Newsletter Vol.

5~

Septembex:, 1959

No.3 Contents

Editor's Notes . •

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The Utah Statewide Archeological Society H. Merrill Peterson

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A Preliminary Note on 1959 Excavations at the Coombs Site, Boulder, Utah.

J. Richard Ambler

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ARCHEOLOGY is distributed quarterly to all members of the Utah Statewide Archeological Society. Membership dues are $1.00 per year.

All correspondence should be directed to the Editor: James H. Gunnerson Department of Anthropology, University of Utah, Salt Lake City 12, Utah U~AH

EDITORVS NOTES (

The Socie~: An ~nformal meeting of the officers of the Utah Statew~de Archeological Society and representatives of the Department of Anthropology of the University of Utah was held in Salt Lake City on October 2. Much of the afternoon was devoted to discussing various ways in which the organization can be improved. It is hoped that some of these ideas will be ready for -presentation in the next issue of the Newsletter. By the) also, the officers expect to have drafted a constitution and by-laws which they plan to publish in the Newsletter and have the members vote on. If you have ideas as to what you want the USAS to be and do~ please communicate them at once to ,the secretary, Mrs. Lloyd Pierson~ Box 98, Moab, Utah.

Field Activities: Archeological field work in Utah is virtually completed for 1959. Activities although varied, have been primarily of a salvage nature. In the coutse of the wiriter, preliminary reports of at least some of ' the work will appear in the Newsletter.

This Issue: Th:.e article by Richard Ambler is a preliminary report of the major non-salvage archeological project sponsored by the University of Utah during 1959. At present, Ambler is preparing a complete report of this work.

The first item in this issue contains some thoughts regarding your society by its president, Merrill Peterson of Logan, Utah.

Cover: The pictograph which appears on~he cover is the third in a series of figures from Barrier (Horseshoe) Canyon which is located about 40 miles south of Green River, Utah. The original of this figure, which is here reproduced in approximately natural color, is about two feet high.

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THE UTAH STATEWIDE .ARCHEOLOGICAL SOCIETY H. Merrill Peterson The Utah Statewide Archeological Society was sponsored and has been nourished for the past five years by the Anthropology Department of the University of Utah. It has now 3 through necessity, been turned over to the Society for administration.

Its primary objectives have been to stimulate and encourage the layman and the amateur archeologist to take a more studied and intelligent interest in the science and to encourage cooperation between the professional archeologist and the amateur so as to preserve priceless data and materials that would otherwise be lost to science.

The Societyi s quarterly newsletter has been devoted to accounts of activities going on in the archeological field and to reports on archeology salvage work being carried on in connection with the construction work in different parts of the state.

In the past ten yearsÂť archeology has become a much more exact science than formerly due largely to time determination methods that have been and are being developed. Thus~ by removing much of the conjecture p it becomes a more intensely interesting subject. Study in the field of archeology and its related sciences will do much in broadening the scope of interest for the "artifact collector" and make it a more satisfying and interesting hobby.

The Archeological Survey Association of California is a like society for that state and has done much over the past years in compiling prehistory data and stimulating interest in the field of archeology. Their Society has been extremely successful and has grown to considerable proportions.

Moab and Logan at present have chapters of the Soceity and considerable local interest has been created in the areas. Other groups and towns are encouraged to form chapters and join the Society. Also individual members are solicited. If interested, please contact. Mrs. Lloyd Pierson of Moab)) Utah, Secretary of the Societ.y.

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A PRELIMINARY NOTE ON 1959 EXCAVATIONS AT THE COOMBS

SITE ~

BOULDER p UTAH

J. Richard Ambler Excavations at the Coombs Site in Boulder; Utah, were resumed this past summer for a period of 9 weeks i between July 20 and September 18. The work again has importance for the Upper Colorado River Basin Archaeological Salvage Project. In contrast to the previous summer's work for which volunteer labor was used, i this summer 10 men from Boulder and Escalante were hired with funds provided by the University of Utah Research Fund and the Wenner~Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research.

Operations were under the direction of Dr . Robert H. Lister, of the University of Colorado, assisted by the writer. Work was conducted on the property of Eph Coombs~ Jim Haws ~ and the City of Boulder.

The excavations at this site during the summer of 1958 have already been amply reported (Lister 1958; 1959)~ so this brief report will be concerned with only the past summer's work. The reader is referred to Listeris reports for an introductory discussion of the site.

The procedure followed in this year 6 s work was to extend the 5-foot wide exploratory trenches made last summerÂť and to start new trenches at right angles to these p placed so as to sample as large a portion of this extensive site as possible Wherever the trenches revealed some feature p such as an alignment of stones or charred posts (indicating a wall) or a pit dug into the sand or hard subsoil (often indicating a subterranean structure or burial) >> the area was carefully excavated to determine the size and nature of the feature; the fill of which was then removed~ usually in 8 inch levelso Trenching around the outside of the walls of a room usually revealed other adjacent rooms, which were then excavated in the same manner .

Architecture~

Most of the structures were built on the surface of the ground p had vertical walls of jacal (posts and small stones , liberally coated with mud) and had probably had flat roofs of poles, sticks and adobe . Some surface structures had crude masonry walls ~4=

formed usually of large basalt cobbles set _in a great deal of adobe mortar. These two types of construction were often combined in a ~ingle room where a new room of one type had been added on to an already existing room of the other typ~o In the western part of the site a group of 33 rooms, predominantly of jacal construction was found. Five of these rooms, however, were completely or partially constructed of masonry (Fig. 1).

This large group of buildings was arranged in a rectangular fashion around an open area that probably served as a courtyard. Most of these rooms had central firepits (indicated by circles in Fig. 1) and had household utensils scattered around on the floor9 suggesting that they were used as living quarters, probably one room to a family. Most of these living rooms had one or more small storage bins formed of thin upright sandstone slabs built along the walls and many rooms had a mealing bin or two~ , containing a metate and . several manos for grinding corno Scattered among the living rooms were smaller storage rooms where the people had stored their winter supply of food» especially corn. ' This large group of houses had burned !} leaving only the stubs of the charred wall posts standing» and fragments of the burned, roofs covered the floors. The rooms probably burned accidentally.

No evidence was fouqd,of violence or warfare. As close together as the .+ooms ~ereJ) it seems very likely that if one had caught fire, the rest would have burned also.

'Excavations were also continued at the east side of the site adjacent to the large L~shaped structure excavated in 1958 More structures!} largely of jacal construction, were found at both ends of the ilL" and along its west side (Fig. 1). The rooms along the west side were not completely excavated, but ~ppear small » and were probably used for storage.

At the south end of the long masonry structure!} two more living rooms were ~xcavatedo Others were located and partially excavated. To the east more rooms were located» but not all o;f these were excavated due to lack of time. Two cases of architectural superposition were found in this area to the east. ' ThEf 's outh wall of one of the masonry rooms had been built across .part of an earlier jacal structure. Just east of this masonry room» two Jacal rooms had be~n built over an earlier jacal room., the fire~ pit of which lay directly underneath the wall between the two later r60ms.

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Small groups of jacal houses were scattered over other portions of the site. Three of these, consisting of two rooms each, were excav~d this season.

Nine subterranean structures were located, eight of which were completely excavated. They (Fig. 2) were round to square, generally about 11 feet in diameter, and from three to five feet deep. The roofs, consisting of large and small beams, pine boughs and adobe were usually supported by four posts set in or near the wall of the pit. In all but one of the excavated structures evidence of a ventilator shaft was found on the southeast side. Some of these structures show evidence of having been used as living quarters, and can therefore be called pit houses, while others bear at least superficial resemblances to kivas, the ceremonial rooms used by Pueblo peoples. However, since laboratory analysis of the artifacts recovered has only just begun, it cannot yet be stated with any certainty whether these structures are earlier than or contemporaneous with the rest of the village. Two subterranean structures in the southwest portion of the site were definitely earlier than at least part of the village -- jaca1 surface structures were built over them after they had been abandoned and filled in.

Two other types of structures were represented at ¡ the site.

A shallow pit house about 18 inches deep and about 8 feet in diameter was excavated. A 4-post structure, found in the sand at the south edge of the site was ~vidently a sort of ramada, with .open sides.. The floor was probably somewhat below the surface of the ground at the time it was in use.

Burials: Ten burials were found, most of them along the .south side of the site. where accumulated sand would have made digging easier for the mourners. The body was u:sua11y placed on its back with the knees. flexed (drawn up) and with the head to the southwest.

Mortuary offerings accompanying the skeletons ranged from 1 t:o 13 pottery vessels som.e of which contained small tools and paint pigments ,Othe~s¡ had probably origim.ly conta'ined food. - Two of the burials had jewelry with them. One had a 74-piece turquoise necklace and a bracelet conSisting of almost 2000 stone beads and the other had a 4~piece turquoise bracelet. Each burial had been placed in a specially dug pit, which was then roofed over with juniper ("cedar") poles. The preservation of the bone was generally poor.

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Approximately 175 whole or restorable pottery vessels were recovered within the rooms and with the burials. Uncounted thousands of potsherds were also found and sent to the laboratory in Salt Lake City for study. The pottery is predominately corrugated~ showing the finger marks of the potte~~ ' where she pressed the coils of clay together. Most of the pottery, such as Black Mesa p Sosi, and Dogoszhi Black=on~white, Tusayan B1ack= on~red, Citadel Polychrome, and Tusayan and Moenkopi Corrugated, is of types found in IlJtthern Arizona and associated with the .

Pueblo II and early Pueblo III periods of the Kayenta Anasazi.

Some potteryp however, shows affinities to pottery found elsewhere in Utah, especially to the southwes~ and to the north in the Fremont area.

Many arrowpoints were recovered. These are predominately small, elongated,and triangu1ar~w!th concave base~o Also found were many scrapers p knives p and chipped flakes. Metates and manos, usually made of basalt, were numerous.

Many bane awls of varying shapes and sizes were found. 'S everal tips of deer antler, evidently used for chipping stone to form arrowpoints and similar tools~ were also found. In addition, many specimens of unworked bone were recovered, which, when identified, will give a better idea of the diet of these people.

Conclusions are not in order, because analysis of the material and information gathered during the summer has just begun, but a few gen~ra1 remarks can be made. The culture of the Coombs Site is predominately Pueblo, with close ties to northern Arizona. The site was occupied during parts of Pueblo II and TlIp possibly from about A.D~¡ 1075 to 12500 The village w~s quite large and the people subsisted principally on corn (maize), although a fair amount of large and small game was hunted.

Crafts included pottery making, stone and bone working, basketry, and weaving. The complete report of this past summeros work at the Coombs Site will be published in the UniversitlKof utah Anthrop~logical Papers.

Literature Cited ~\

Lister, Robert Ho 1958

A Preliminary Note on Excavations at the Coombs Site Boulder, Utah. Utah Archeology.

A Newsletter, Vol. 4, No.3, pp. 4-8 â&#x20AC;˘

1959

The Coombs Site. University of Utah Anthropo1o&ica1 Paper s l No . 41 .

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UTAH ARCHEOLOGY Dept. of Anthropology University of Utah Salt Lake City, Utah