
Ancient Chaco Canyon population likely relied on imported food - curtis
https://www.colorado.edu/today/2016/12/29/ancient-chaco-canyon-population-likely-relied-imported-food
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oldmancoyote
There are reasons to believe estimates of the population of Chaco Canyon may
be too high.

There are at least two kinds of communal structures in Chaco: the large
elaborate structures; and lots of small pueblos scattered around the canyon. I
understand the high population estimates are based on the numbers of small
pueblos.

I was listening to a talk by a woman who lived in one of the modern pueblos in
New Mexico, and she remarked, off hand, that the population of any given
pueblo moved from one pueblo to an other as the small animals and plants they
relied on became depleted. They successively re-inhabited a circuit of pueblos
allowing each to recover before returning.

I don't doubt that the people of Chaco Canyon influenced a wide area, but I am
skeptical of large population estimates.

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sizzzzlerz
Having been to Chaco several times and having read anything I can find on it
and the Anasazi, I've always been curious why there don't seem to be middens
of a size and quantity that might be expected if a large population lived
there over several hundred years. Theories which suggest the many rooms in the
Great Houses were mostly ceremonial, never meant to be occupied meaning a much
smaller population would be more consistent. Why, then, would they have gone
to the significant effort building them? One of the more fascinating questions
which may never be answered.

~~~
njarboe
Imagine a get together like Burning Man but instead of huge temporary art
installations and the burning of the man, people gathered around a mega-
structure and your sub-group gained status by adding to it. Bring a new blue
stone to Stonehenge and get a bunch of other people to help you install it and
you are the cool in-group that year.

