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Hinterlands and Regional Dynamics in the Ancient Southwest is the first volume dedicated to understanding the nature of and changes in regional social autonomy, political hegemony, and organizational complexity across the entire prehistoric American Southwest. With geographic coverage extending from the Great Plains to the Colorado River, and from Mesa Verde to the international border, the volumeÕs ten case studies synthesize research that enhances our understanding of the ancient SouthwestÕs highly variable demographic, land use, and economic histories. For this volume, ÒhinterlandsÓ are those areas whose archaeological records do not disclose the ceramic, architectural, and network evidence that initially led to the establishment of the Hohokam, Chaco, and Casas Grandes regional systems. Employing a variety of perspectives, such as the cultural landscapes approach, heterarchy, and the common-pool resource model, as well as technical methods, such as petrographic and stylistic-attribute analyses, the volumeÕs contributors explore variation in hinterland identities, subsistence ecology, and sociopolitical organization as regional systems expanded and contracted between the 9th and 14th centuries AD. The hinterlands of the prehistoric Southwest were home to a substantial number of people and were often used as resource catchments by the inhabitants of regional systems. Importantly, hinterlands also influenced developments of nearby regional systems, under whose footprint they managed to retain considerable autonomy. By considering the dynamics between hinterlands and regional systems, the volume reveals unappreciated aspects of the ancient SouthwestÕs peoples and their lives, thereby deepening our awareness of the regionÕs rich and complicated cultural past.
Winner of the Society for Economic Botany’s Mary W. Klinger Book Award The seemingly inhospitable Sonoran Desert has provided sustenance to indigenous peoples for centuries. Although it is to all appearances a land bereft of useful plants, fully one-fifth of the desert's flora are edible. This volume presents information on nearly 540 edible plants used by people of more than fifty traditional cultures of the Sonoran Desert and peripheral areas. Drawing on thirty years of research, Wendy C. Hodgson has synthesized the widely scattered literature and added her own experiences to create an exhaustive catalog of desert plants and their many and varied uses. Food Plants of the Sonoran Desert includes not only plants such as gourds and legumes but also unexpected food sources such as palms, lilies, and cattails, all of which provided nutrition to desert peoples. Each species entry lists recorded names and describes indigenous uses, which often include nonfood therapeutic and commodity applications. The agave, for example, is cited for its use as food and for alcoholic and nonalcoholic beverages, syrup, fiber, cordage, clothing, sandals, nets, blankets, lances, fire hearths, musical instruments, hedgerows, soap, and medicine, and for ceremonial purposes. The agave entry includes information on harvesting, roasting, and consumption—and on distinguishing between edible and inedible varieties. No other source provides such a vast amount of information on traditional plant uses for this region. Accessible to general readers, this book is an invaluable compendium for anyone interested in the desert’s hidden bounty.
If the Hohokam beheld Lake Pleasant today, spreading across the desert northwest of Phoenix, their eyes would scarcely recognize their home. Nearly a century ago, early pioneers in central Arizona were inspired by the Hohokam's hand-dug irrigation to divert the Agua Fria River from the Bradshaw Mountains, creating colossal agricultural potential in the Sonoran Desert. Lake Pleasant stands alone among the great reclamation efforts of the West, largely due to the tenacity of one man--William H. Beardsley, who died before it was completed. Beardsley, along with other visionaries like Carl Pleasant and Donald Waddell, overcame all odds to create the Pleasant Dam, which was completed in October 1927 and was later renamed the Waddell Dam. In the late 20th century, the New Waddell Dam was constructed, which tripled the size of the lake and made the water flow uphill, back into Lake Pleasant. Today Lake Pleasant Regional Park offers visitors over 20,000 acres of crystal clear water ideal for boating, water sports, and fishing and over 140 developed sites for RV and tent camping.