Vapaki

Ancestral O’Odham Platform Mounds of the Sonoran Desert

Edited by Glen E. Rice, Arleyn W Simon, Chris Loendorf

This volume presents a far-ranging conversation on the topic of Hohokam platform mounds in the history of the southern Arizona desert, exploring why they were built, how they were used, and what they meant in the lives of the farming communities who built them. Vapaki brings together diverse theoretical approaches, a mix of big-picture and tightly focused perspectives, detailed coverage for regional specialists of variation in the mounds, a broad synthesis useful for those working from other regional and topical foundations, and a rich corpus of perspectives and ideas for further research. Contributors grapple with questions about platform mounds, including the social, political, ideological, symbolic, and adaptive factors that contributed to their development, spread, and eventual cessation.

The differing perspectives presented here about what motivated Ancestral O’Odham populations of the Hohokam Period to build these monuments, whether as displays of status, identity, political ability, membership in regional networks, or architectural models of the cosmological order, offer insights to researchers studying monumental architecture in other contexts. O’Odham knowledge of the history and uses of mounds is combined with archaeological data to understand the place of platform mounds in the lives of the Ancestors and their continued presence among modern descendants.

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Glen E. Rice is professor emeritus in the School of Human Evolution and Social Change at Arizona State University. He is the author of Sending the Spirits Home: The Archaeology of Hohokam Mortuary Practices, and co-editor of Deadly Landscapes: Case Studies in Prehistoric Southwestern Warfare.

Arleyn W. Simon is associate research professor emeritus in the School of Human Evolution and Social Change at Arizona State University, where she directed the Archaeological Research Institute from 1995-2018.

Chris Loendorf is the senior project manager for the Gila River Indian Community Cultural Resource Management Program. He has directed large-scale excavations at Salado, Hohokam, and O’Odham sites for over three decades.

Contributions by  David R. Abbott, Lewis Borck, Todd W. Bostwick, Richard Ciolek-Torello, Jeffery J. Clark, Jeffrey S. Dean, Christian E. Downum, David E. Doyel, Katherine A. Dungan, Mark D. Elson, Paul R. Fish, Suzanne K. Fish, Barnaby V. Lewis, Owen Lindauer, Brian Medchill, Douglas R. Mitchell, Laurene Montero, Linda Morgan, Erica O’Neil, Erik Steinbach, Carla R. Van West, Christopher N. Watkins, and M. Kyle Woodson.

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Table of Contents:
List of Figures
List of Tables
Preface: Vapaki of the Ancestors by Chris Loendorf and Barnaby V. Lewis
Acknowledgments
Editors’ Note
 
Part I: Introduction
1. Platform Mounds of the Sonoran Desert by Glen E. Rice, Arleyn W. Simon, Chris Loendorf, Carla R. Van West, and Jeffrey S. Dean
 
Part II: A Context for the Study of Platform Mounds
2. Platform Mounds and Ethnographic Analogy Revisited: Defining the Functional Universe by Mark D. Elson
3. West Mexican Connections and Classic Period Hohokam Platform Mounds by Suzanne K. Fish and Paul R. Fish
4. Contextualizing Platform Mounds by Carla R. Van West and Jeffrey S. Dean
5. Akimel O’Odham Traditional Knowledge Regarding Platform Mounds by Linda Morgan, Barnaby V. Lewis, and Chris Loendorf
 
Part III: Development of Platform Mounds
6. The Gatlin Site Platform Mound by David E. Doyel
7. What We Know and What We Wished We Knew about Hohokam Platform Mounds by David R. Abbott
8. When is a Platform Mound: A Focus on Diversity and Function by Richard Ciolek-Torello
 
Part IV: Platform Mounds at a Local Scale
9. Platform Mound Communities along the Middle Gila River by M. Kyle Woodson, Chris Loendorf, and Brian Medchill
10. A Monument for Memory: The Pueblo Grande Platform Mound by Todd W. Bostwick, Douglas R. Mitchell, Laurene Montero, and Christian E. Downum
11. Social Organization and Leadership Strategies among Tonto Basin Platform Mound Communities by Arleyn W. Simon and Owen Lindauer
12. Mounds, Mounding, and Polychrome Pottery: Roosevelt Red Ware and Platform Mounds in the Tonto Basin of Central Arizona by Katherine A. Dungan
 
Part V: Platform Mounds on a Regional Scale
13. Anarchic Social Movements as an Explanation for Rapid Change: A Case Study from the Hohokam World, AD 1200–1450 by Lewis Borck and Jeffery J. Clark
14. Monuments, Costly Signaling, and Replicative Fitness during the Hohokam Era by Glen E. Rice, Christopher N. Watkins, Erica O’Neil, and Erik Steinbach
 
Part VI: Conclusion
15. Unfinished Work at Platform Mounds by Glen E. Rice and Chris Loendorf
 
References
List of Contributors
Index