Description
The El Morro Valley Prehistory Project, directed by Professor Keith Kintigh, is focused on the El Morro Valley of west-central New Mexico during the late Pueblo III and Pueblo IV periods (ca. AD 1225 AD 1350). Although the valley was very sparsely settled prior to AD 1225, by AD 1300 it had one of the largest and densest population concentrations in the northern Southwest.

Our most recent field work examined the processes of community formation and migration entailed by the initial settlement of the valley (see report) are also seeking to understand the social and political dimensions of the transformation about AD 1275, from clusters of small roomblocks to the occupation of very large, 200-1200 room planned pueblos and the abrupt end of their occupation about AD 1350. Field work has included excavation, a small-sites testing program, and archaeological survey and has been designed to tie into Kintigh's and Redman's prior work in the Zuni area.

Sources of Funding
ASU Archaeological Field School
NSF Dissertation Improvement Grant

Publications
Huntley, Deborah L. and Keith W. Kintigh (2004)
Archaeological Patterning and Organizational Scale of Late Prehistoric Settlement Clusters in the Zuni Region of New Mexico. In The Protohistoric Pueblo World: A.D. 1275-1600, pp. 62-74, edited by Andrew I. Duff and E. Charles Adams. University of Arizona Press, Tucson.

Kintigh, Keith W., Donna M. Glowacki, and Deborah L. Huntley (2004)
Long-term Settlement History and the Emergence of Towns in the Zuni Area. American Antiquity 69(3): 432-456.

Kintigh, Keith W. (2000)
Leadership Strategies in Protohistoric Zuni Towns. In Alternative Leadership Strategies in the Greater Southwest, pp. 95-116, edited by Barbara J. Mills. University of Arizona Press, Tucson.

Presentations and Events
Community Formation and Migration in the 13th Century El Morro Valley, New Mexico by Gregson Schachner and Keith W. Kintigh, Arizona State University. Poster presented at the 69th Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, Montreal, Canada.

Contact: Keith Kintigh