Aug 10
Desert Archaeology shell specialist Chris Lange provides an expanded version of a poster she presented at the 91st annual Pecos Conference (August 9-11, 2018) in Flagstaff, Arizona. Recent excavations at Early Agricultural period sites in the Tucson Basin have produced a number of marine shell ornaments. Sites dating to the…
Jun 15
Homer Thiel tells the story of a 19th-century ore assayer whose office was unearthed during archaeological work near the historic train depot in downtown Tucson. Arizona has long been marketed as the land of “5 Cs”:Climate, Cattle, Cotton, Citrus, and Copper. In the last quarter of the 19th century and…
May 7
Dr. Mary Ownby, Desert Archaeology’s ceramic petrographer, discusses the ways petrographic analytical techniques can be applied to samples from very different times and places around the globe. It may seem that pottery in the Southwest and from Egypt would have very little in common beyond the fact that both areas…
Mar 23
On the public opening of the Honey Bee Archaeological Preserve, we post R. J. Sliva's piece on the delicate balancing act of archaeological preservation and public outreach, written over the span of a few months last summer while monitoring the construction of the preserve’s access trail. “So... how is this…
Mar 15
R. J. Sliva, Homer Thiel, and Jenny Adams discuss a unique collection of artifacts encountered at Los Pozos... and a matching piece found during a later excavation. The Cienega phase of the Early Agricultural period in southern Arizona and northern Sonora lasted from about 800 BC to AD 50. A…
Mar 12
Homer Thiel and R. J. Sliva discuss Historic-era arrow points, with photos from recent research in Tucson. Native Americans in Arizona have used projectile points for at least 12,000 years for hunting and warfare. Large, heavy points that tipped darts (long, compound spears) were utilized for much of this time.…
Feb 16
Historical archaeologist Homer Thiel shows how the artifacts we excavate are used to fill in details of lives that are otherwise lost to the passage of time. Life in Territorial-era Tucson was often difficult. In 1873, Soledad Jacome's common-law husband, Juan Siqueiros, disappears from the documentary record. He may have…
Feb 9
Desert Archaeology zooarchaeologist Jenny Waters teams with Homer Thiel this week to explore the go-to protein source for ancient inhabitants of the Sonoran Desert. Content advisory: this post contains a historic photograph of the aftermath of a jackrabbit hunt. Ten years ago Desert Archaeology conducted excavations at a portion of…
Feb 2
Historical archaeologist Homer Thiel writes this week’s blog. Donald William Page only lived in Tucson for three years. But during that time he turned his attention to the community’s history and archaeology. He interviewed elderly residents, explored and mapped ruins, and, in 1929, conducted the first historical archaeological excavation in…
Jan 19
Historical archaeologist Homer Thiel discusses the lives of Chinese immigrants in late 19th and early 20th century Tucson. The first Chinese immigrants arrived in Tucson in the mid-1870s, several decades after Chinese people came to California during the 1849 Gold Rush. The initial arrivals operated restaurants, cooking American-style food at…