Late Prehistoric Exchange Between the Southwest and Southern Plains

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Abstract
A system of interdependence, or mutualism, between Puebloan horticulturalists in New Mexico and Southern Plains hunter-gatherers was documented by the first Europeans to enter the Southwest. This interdependence involved the exchange of subsistence resources, primarily corn and bison meat, as well as durable goods such as ceramics, lithics, and turquoise. Analyses of the forms and distributions of the archaeological remains of this exchange system indicate an abrupt increase in Plains/ Pueblo trade beginning ca. A.D. 1450. It is argued that this increase documents the development of Plains/ Pueblo interdependence. The distributions of obsidian and Puebloan ceramics on the Plains, in conjunction with ethnohistoric data, indicate that the Plains/Pueblo exchange system was part of a larger system of huntergatherer/ horticultural interaction which encompassed populations from central Kansas to western Oklahoma.

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