Experts say a petroglyph in New Mexico’s Chaco Canyon may depict a solar eclipse from 920 years ago.
Read MoreSearch Results for: "chaco canyon"
Elite ‘Dynasty’ at Chaco Canyon Got Its Power From One Woman, DNA Shows
New DNA evidence shows that elite leaders at Chaco Canyon weren’t just members of the same class — they were members of the same extended family, a “dynasty” that traced its ancestry to a single woman.
Read More
Chaco’s Elites Were Natives of Chaco Canyon, Not Migrants, Their Remains Show
The elites of Chaco Canyon were born and raised there, and weren’t migrants from distant regions, as many thought, new research finds.
Read More
How Did People of Chaco Canyon Grow Their Food? Expert Says, They Didn’t
Recently, researchers have been at odds over a simple, central question in Southwestern archaeology: How did the people of Chaco Canyon manage to grow their food? According to new research: They didn’t.
Read More
Bones of Exotic Macaws Reveal Early Rise of Trade, Hierarchy in Chaco Canyon
A new look at some unusual remains found at New Mexico’s Chaco Canyon may change our understanding of when, and how, the culture of the Ancestral Puebloans felt the first…
Read More
900-Year-Old Village Recorded in Volcanic Badlands of New Mexico
A 900-year-old village hidden in New Mexico’s black-rock badlands reveals its unique ties to Chaco Canyon.
Read More
N. America’s Oldest Bison Fossil Found, Revealing ‘Mother of All Bison’
A fossil bone found in Yukon reveals that all North American bison descended from a single female that crossed into the Americas less than 200,000 years ago.
Read More
Mesa Verde’s Sun Temple Reveals Geometrical ‘Genius,’ Physicist Says
An 800-year-old structure in Mesa Verde National Park was built using the same basic geometry found in ancient monuments around the world, a new study reports.
Read More
Photos: Watch the ‘Shadow Dagger’ Solar Calendar Mark the Equinox
See for yourself how ancient petroglyphs found in Arizona mark the spring equinox with a “shadow dagger.”
Read More
Thousands of Ancient Petroglyphs, ‘Dramatic’ Solar Calendar Reported in N. Arizona
Archaeologists have uncovered a trove of previously undocumented rock art in northern Arizona, including a prehistoric solar calendar that has been marking the seasons for more than 700 years.
Read More
Cocoa, Caffeinated ‘Black Drink’ Were Widespread in Pre-Contact Southwest, Study Finds
Stimulating drinks made from exotic plants, like the cocoa tree and a type of southern holly, were consumed much more widely across the prehistoric Southwest than was thought, according to…
Read More
Western Digs’ Top 5 Archaeology Stories of 2014
They were made at sites ranging from Hawaii to Colorado. They date back to the dawn of agriculture in the Southwest and to the end of the last ice age…
Read More
Twin 1,300-Year-Old Villages Discovered in Arizona Sand Dunes
Archaeologists exploring the high desert of northern Arizona have found a pair of “matching” villages that date back some 1,300 years, revealing evidence of a crucial phase in Southwestern prehistory….
Read More
Violence in the Ancient Southwest Offers Insights Into Peace, Study Says
Despite some recent sensational claims that the prehistoric Southwest was the site of the worst violence in American history, the archaeologist often cited for that assertion says that, in fact,…
Read More
‘Hidden Architecture’ of 1,000-Year-Old Village Discovered in New Mexico
For more than 40 years, archaeologists have been coaxing what they could from the traces of an ancient Puebloan settlement in New Mexico they call Blue J. Buried under a thousand…
Read More
Mesa Verde’s ‘Mummy Lake’ Was Built to Hold Rituals, Not Water, Study Says
A grand, sandstone-walled pit in Mesa Verde National Park has for decades been seen as an achievement of prehistoric hydrology, part of a system of cisterns and canals used by…
Read More
