Abstract
DENDROLOGICAL evidence, in other words the tree-ring method of dating as applied to the archæological investigation of early cultural remains in the south-western United States, not only confirms, and is itself confirmed by, strati-graphical evidence, but also serves to afford a clue to at least one among the causes which may have contributed to bringing about fundamental changes in mode of life of south-western peoples, and even the decay of a flourishing civilization. It has, for example, long been an open question among American archæologists why a people living in small scattered villages should develop a tendency to concentrate in urban communities, which later hecome the great communal houses of the Pueblo period; and further, why this Pueblo civilization, on attaining a remarkable peak-point in development, should suffer a serious decline, and many settlements be abandoned. At neither point does there appear to be any significant fluctuation in numbers of the population, nor any serious increase in raiding activity of hostile tribes.
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References
Smithsonian Inst.: Bur. Amer. Ethnol. Bull., 121 (1939).
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Tree Rings and Cultures in the South-Western United States. Nature 144, 967–968 (1939). https://doi.org/10.1038/144967a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/144967a0