Logo image
Back
Regional Conflict, Ceramic Senescence, and Pawnee Raw Material Choice in the Late Contact Era
Journal article   Open access   Peer reviewed

Regional Conflict, Ceramic Senescence, and Pawnee Raw Material Choice in the Late Contact Era

Margaret E Beck, Richard L Josephs, Lauren W Ritterbush and Donna C Roper
American antiquity, Vol.87(2), pp.248-266
12/02/2021
DOI: 10.1017/aaq.2021.119
Appears in  UI Libraries Support Open Access
url
https://doi.org/10.1017/aaq.2021.119View
Published (Version of record) Open Access

Abstract

Here, we consider the last decades of ceramic manufacture among the Pawnee in the Central Great Plains, using petrographic analysis to explore raw material availability and use at the Kitkahahki Town site (14RP1). Historical documents reveal tremendous regional pressures and conflicts in the Kitkahahki Town area during its occupation in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries-processes that could have altered or restricted the movement of women outside village boundaries. Contact-era Pawnee pottery from Kitkahahki Town exhibits atypical paste textures, atypical inclusions, or both. At least one potter used atypical materials available immediately adjacent to the village, which suggests that ceramic raw material collection was at least occasionally adjusted to reduce risk. Petrographic analysis contributes to our understanding of Indigenous communities in colonial settings, particularly to questions of technological change and landscape use when both were intensely negotiated and rapidly changing.
 Anthropology Archaeology Social Sciences Life Sciences & Biomedicine Science & Technology UIOWA OA Agreement

Details

Metrics

15 Record Views
Logo image