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IV / Village Pattern and Architecture

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 June 2018

Extract

Having briefly considered the location, environment, and layout of the various Mogollon villages, we may now analyze them to determine whether or not they follow a pattern.

In their choice of village sites, it is clear that, with few exceptions, the Mogollon chose places of some elevation and isolation. Twelve of 2I4. villages were located on a mesa, a bluff, or a ridge; 10 others occupied terraces well above valley bottoms; and one was situated on the outwash fan of nearby mountains. Only one was located in a valley bottom. Furthermore, Danson. (1952) found in his survey that the early people built their villages on mesas or isolated ridges well back from the main stream of travel. Without exception, sites were located in mountainous country or near to mountains. Whether by preference or for some other reason, it was in the mountain country that the Mogollon people had their ecological niche. Many sites lie in secluded valleys on tributary streams; but except, perhaps, in the northernmost sites, the availability of agricultural land seems to have been one of the deciding factors in selecting a village site.

Type
Part I: The Mogollon Culture
Copyright
Copyright © Society for American Archaeology 1955

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