"The Ambassador's Herb": Tobacco Pipes as Evidence for Plains-Pueblo Interaction, Interethnic Negotiation, and Ceremonial Exchange in the Northern Rio Grande. Master's Thesis. (original) (raw)
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This project centers on Plains-Pueblo interaction in the protohistoric period in the U.S. Southwest and analyzes how trade and inter-regional interactions were ritually mediated between Great Plains and Pueblo groups, in part through the examination of pipes and smoking materials used in these interactions at pueblos in the Northern Rio Grande area of New Mexico. Ethnographic and ethnohistoric literature indicate that pipe smoking was part of rituals that cemented inter-tribal trade relationships. Therefore, I propose that pipes, which were used in trade negotiations and ceremonial interactions, can be proxies for examining social interaction and regional mediation aspects of trade and decision making. This paper assesses this hypothesis that intensity of pipe smoking correlates with intensity of trade. It also uses pipe designs, forms, and compositional materials to trace trade networks and locations of origin of visitors to the sites I am examining. Pipe types and density at pueblos reported to be Plains-Pueblo trade centers, such as Pecos Pueblo, will be compared with sites on the Plains and sites further interior in the Pueblo region.
2018
This project centers on Plains-Pueblo interaction in the late-prehistoric and protohistoric periods. It analyzes how trade and interregional interactions were ritually mediated between these two culture groups, through the examination of pipes and smoking materials used in economic interactions at pueblos in the Northern Rio Grande area of New Mexico. Ethnographic and ethnohistoric literature indicates that pipe-smoking was part of rituals that cemented inter-tribal trade relationships. The data from this project support the idea that pipes were used in trade negotiations and ceremonial interactions and can be proxies for examining social interaction and regional mediation aspects of trade and decision making. The blending of Plains and Pueblo pipe forms and materials suggests that there may have been a certain level of integration, alliance, or partnership in these interactions. Three categories of data totaling 1,306 pipes were analyzed from known trade centers and comparative samples from interior sites not known to be trade centers in the Southwest and Great Plains. The methods used in this study included analyses and tabulations of particular physical attributes of pipes that provide information on pipe use and regional style, as well as spatial and temporal analyses of pipe concentrations and concentrations of particular pipe attributes.
We use pipe forms at Scott County Pueblo (14SC1), a seventeenth-century multiethnic community in western Kansas with Ndee (Dismal River) and Puebloan residents, to consider the community's position within multiple regional interaction spheres. We first present a broad regional overview of Central/Northern Great Plains and Midwest, Northern Rio Grande, and Ndee pipe forms in the AD 1500-1700 period, tabulating the presence and absence of specific forms at 14 archaeological sites, before classifying two complete pipes and 49 identifiable pipe fragments recovered from 14SC1. Our pipe form comparisons better distinguish Ndee pipes from other forms than previous literature and confirm that 14SC1 pipes are fully consistent with the documented Ndee and Puebloan occupations at the site. Ceremonial beliefs and practices around smoking at 14SC1 were shared with other Ndee communities and the Northern Rio Grande region, presumably cementing regional relationships that facilitated the movement of other material culture and people. Although Dismal River territory extended into the Central Plains, we find almost no material evidence of diplomatic, social, or ceremonial engagement with Caddoan-speaking groups such as the Sahnish (Arikara), Cǎriks i Cǎriks (Pawnee), and kirikir?i:s (Wichita)
2018
Trade between Pueblo and Plains groups is fairly well understood in terms of which products were traded and when and where the trade interactions took place, but how these trade alliances were formed and how these economic interactions were socially and ritually mediated has received less attention. This paper argues that pipe smoking played a role in this process, and that pipes are a useful artifact class to trace and study Plains-Pueblo interaction networks. To illustrate this, the paper focuses on the results of analyses of smoking pipes from Pecos Pueblo, a prominent Plains-Pueblo trade center. Spatial analyses of the distribution of pipes at the site, as well as analyses of changes in pipe forms, materials, surface designs, and use, suggest that Plains and Pueblo people at Pecos exchanged smoking customs and that pipes took on a role of helping to facilitate inter-group interactions in the Protohistoric Southwest.
Toward an Archaeology of Pueblo Ritual Landscapes
Pueblo ritual and blessing features have been a focus of cultural anthropologists since the late nineteenth century. Archaeologists, especially those working in the Tewa Basin in collaboration with Native communities, are increasingly incorporating the identification, documentation, and evaluation of ancestral Pueblo blessing features in their studies. From the archaeologists' perspective, this work possesses the potential to contribute to broadening our collective understanding of the development and elaboration of increasingly distinctive cultural community identities between the thirteenth and seventeenth centuries throughout the Pueblo World. For Tribal communities, this archaeological research is proving useful to their interests in demonstrating the spatial extent-and the cultural-historical continuities-within the cultural landscapes in which their forebears harvested water for growing crops, collected plants and minerals, and hunted game animals for their material livelihood. The archaeological traces of blessing features also relate to how Native communities came to understand their place in the cosmos and their obligations to sustain physical and spiritual relationships with the
"Neat and Artificial Pipes": Base Metal Trade Pipes of the Northeastern Indians
In 1643, while writing about his Narragansett neighbors, Roger Williams made a passing comment regarding their metalworking talents. In his words, "They have an excellent art to cast our pewter and brass into neat and arti ficial pipes" (Williams 1936:45). Although archaeologists working on seventeenth and eighteenth-century Native American sites in the Northeast have uncovered base-metal pipes made from pewter, lead, brass, copper, and iron, most scholars have logically assumed that these finds had a European origin crrubowitz 2001:5). Here we examine these enigmatic artifacts, focusing particularly on the lead and pewter pipes in their cultural and historical contexts. Although our interpreta tions are preliminary, we hope to better define the geographic, cultural, and tem poral ranges of these unusual pipes. We provide a basic descriptive typology of the pipes and make some general statements regarding their manufacture and possible manufacturers. What the pipes may have meant to those who made and smoked them is also discussed. We conclude with some suggestions for further research.
Pipe Manufacture on the Plains and Experimental Archaeology: Not Just Blowing Smoke
Pipe Manufacture on the Plains and Experimental Archaeology: Not Just Blowing Smoke, 2014
Several types of smoking pipes have been manufactured and used by native North American peoples throughout later prehistoric and historic times. Although substantial information exists on the styles of these pipes, very little is known about their methods of manufacture. This paper examines one particular style of pipe, the Florence Pipe, associated with the proto-Wichita Great Bend peoples. A block of Minnesota pipestone was manufactured into a pipe using stone tools replicated after those found in the Robb Collection from central Kansas. This archaeological assemblage was proposed to have been used in the manufacture of Florence pipes, which was confirmed through use-wear analysis of the collection. The steps and labor requirements for the creation of Florence pipes are illuminated in this paper in a way that cannot be accomplished through archaeological analysis and use-wear analysis alone.
Laboratory of Anthropology note, 1975
Museum of New Mexico MNM Project ; no. 63.13. United States. Bureau of Indian Affairs. Northern Pueblos Agency United States.Forest Service Pueblo of Picuris Archaeological surveying Historical archaeology Ancestral Pueblo culture Limited occupation sites Pueblo architecture Pit houses Fieldhouses Agriculture, Prehistoric Terracing Waffle gardens Pottery types Hopi Black-on-orange pottery Kapo Black pottery Kwahee Black-on-white pottery Peñasco Micaceous pottery Santa Fe Black-on-white pottery Socorro Black-on-white pottery Socorro Plain pottery Taos Black-on-white pottery Taos Gray pottery Taos Plain pottery Tewa Red pottery Vadito Micaceous pottery Pueblo II period Pueblo III period Pueblo IV period Pueblo V period Taos phase Peñasco phase AD 100-1300 AD 1150-1250 Historic period AD 1600-1930 Taos County (N.M.) Picuris Pueblo (N.M.) Dos Pefiascos Site (N.M.) Grant Boundary Site (N.M.) Peñasco Alto Site (N.M.) Peñasco Grande Site (N.M.) Vadito I Site (N.M.) Vadito II Site (N.M.) Vadito West Site (N.M.) LA 926 LA 12747 LA 12748 LA 12749 LA 12750 LA 12751 LA 12752