Apachean (Southern Athapaskan)Southwest ApacheanNavajoNavajo Gray WareDinetah Gray

Type Name: Dinetah Gray

Period: 1500 A.D. - 1800 A.D.
Culture: Apachean (Southern Athapaskan)
Branch: Southwest Apachean
Tradition: Navajo
Ware: Navajo Gray Ware


First posted by C. Dean Wilson 2012

Utility ware pottery associated with the early Navajo sites wares referred to as Dinetah Scored by Farmer (1942) and Dinetah Utility by Dittert (1958) which was first described by Brugge (1963). Dinetah gray represents the earliest utility ware that can be clearly attributed to Navajo potters. It is the dominant ceramic type in almost assemblages at sites in the traditional Navajo homeland commonly referred to as the Dinetah (Brugge 1963; Wilson and Blinman 1993).

Many descriptions and discussions of Dinetah Gray have assumed a relatively late date for the arrival of Navajo pottery in the Dinetah region sometime after the Pueblo Revolt or during the very late seventeenth or very early eighteenth century (Baugh and Eddy 1987; Brugge 1963; 1983; Carlson 1965). More recent investigations, however, indicate that Dinetah Gray is commonly associated with components dating to the entire seventeenth century and can occur as early as the mid-sixteenth (Brown 1996; Hill 1995; Hogan 1989; Reed and Reed 1992; Wilshusen 2010). The question whether pottery produced by Navajo groups represents a technology adopted from their Pueblo neighbors after their entry into the Southwest, or was acquired earlier along their route from the artic and through the plains or mountain-west is still largely unresolved although cases have been made for both scenarios.

Dinetah Gray dominates assemblages dating to both the Dinetah and Gobernador phases of the Navajo. Vessels were constructed by coiling and finished by scraping, and only rarely are coil junctures visible on either the interior or exterior. Unlike Anasazi pottery types where interior scraping was commonly a shaping as well as a finishing technique, Navajo scraping efforts were focused on coil juncture obliteration and possible surface texturing. Most interior and exterior vessel surfaces are very rough, bumpy, and pitted. Surfaces are almost always unpolished. Distinct striations or scoring, that may be oriented angularly, vertically, or horizontally relative to the vessel, are common on exterior surface. This texture appears to be the result of the use of juniper bark or corn cobs or husks used as scraping tools (Brugge 1963). Temper is often visible on the surface and Dinetah Gray vessels tend to exhibit much thinner vessels relative to size than Anasazi gray ware types. Decorations are extremely rare, and rims are tapered. Paste texture is often silty and sherds are usually soft and crumble and spall very easily, often resulting in fairly small sherd size. Surface color is usually dark gray or black but may occasionally be dark brown or dark red. Pastes are sometimes vitrified. The paste cross section is usually dark gray to black, but are sometimes dark brown, red, or gray. Distinct cores are rare. Some of the clays that were utilized appear to be derived from alluvial sources and are dark red when exposed to oxidation atmospheres, while others are clearly geologic in origin. The dark paste colors indicate that firing took place in a predominantly reduction atmosphere, in sharp contrast with Anasazi firing techniques. Tempering material varies between different portions of the Upper San Juan region. Sand temper is dominant in the Navajo Reservoir area, while a crushed detrital material containing sand and igneous porphyries was used along the La Plata Valley. Vessel thickness variability suggests that construction methods may have improved from the Dinetah to Gobernador phase.

Forms are almost always cooking or storage jars, although a few bowl sherds are present. Jars are narrower and bases are more conical than in Anasazi tradition jars. The great majority of vessels have conical base or pointed bottom with a thin flat base (Brugge 1963; Helton-Croll 2010). Vessel size is also highly variable, although forms associated with later periods are often very narrow, tall, and large. The overall shape and profile is extremely distinct from forms associated with various Pueblo traditions, although these shapes most closely resemble those produced in the Gallina region which also display pointed bottom. Dark or black surfaces are common, both as a consequence of firing and cooking. Organic adhesions are present on some sherds and vessels and probably a residue of pitch applications.

References:
Baugh, Timothy G. and Frank W. Eddy
1987 Rethinking Apachean Ceramics: the1985 Southern Athapaskan Ceramic Conference. American Antiquity 53:793-798.

Brown, Gary
1996 The Protohistoric Transition in the Northern San Juan Region. In The Archaeology of Navajo Origins, edited by R .H. Towner, pp. 47-40. University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City.

Brugge, David M.

1963 Navajo Pottery and Ethnohistory. Navajo Nation Papers in Anthropology 4. Navajo Nation Cultural Resource Management Program, Window Rock, Arizona.

1982 Apache and Navajo Ceramics in Southwestern Ceramics. In Southwest Ceramics: A Comparative Review. Edited by A. H. Schroeder, pp. 279-298. Arizona Archaeologist 15, The Arizona Archeological Society, Phoenix.

Carlson, R.L.
1965 Eighteenth Century Navajo Fortresses of the Gobernador District. Museum Series in Anthropology, vol. 10. University of Colorado, Boulder.

Dittert, Alfred E.
1958 Preliminary Archaeological Investigations in the Navajo Project Area of Northwestern New Mexico. Museum of new Mexico Papers in Anthropology, Navajo Project Series 1, Santa Fe.

Dykeman, Doug
2003 The Morris Site 1: Early Navajo Land Use Study, Gobernador Phase Community Development in Northwestern New Mexico. NNAD Fruitland Data Recovery Series No. 4. Navajo Nation Papers in Anthropology No. 39, Window Rock

Farmer, Malcom F.
1942 Navaho Archaeology of Upper Blanco and Largo Canyons, Northern New Mexico. American Antiquity 8:65-79.


Helton-Croll, Claire K.
2010 Why Conical Pots? An Examination of The Relationship Among Ceramic Vessel Shape, Subssitence, and Mobility, Ph.D. Dissertation, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque.

Hill, David V.
1995 A Brief Overview of the Navajo Presence in the Upper San Juan Drainage and South Colorado and their Ceramics. In Archaeological Pottery of Colorado: Ceramic Clues to the Prehistoric and Protohistoric Lives of the State’s Native Peoples, edited by R.H. Brunswig, Jr., B. Bradley, and S.M. Chandler, pp. 98-119. Colorado Council of Professional Archaeologists, Denver.

Hogan, Patrick.
1989 Dinetah: A Reevaluation of Pre-Revolt Navajo Occupation in Northwestern New Mexico. Journal of Anthropological Research 45(1): 53-56.

Reed, Lori S. and Paul F. Reed
1992 The Protohistoric Navajo: Implication of Interaction, Exchange, and Alliance Formation with the Eastern and Western Pueblos. In Cultural Diversity and Adaptation: The Archaic, Anasazi, and Navajo Occupation of the Upper San Juan Basin, edited by L. Reed and P. Reed, pp. 91-91-104. Cultural Resources Series No. 9. New Mexico Bureau of Land Management, Albuquerque.

Wilshusen, Richard H.
2010 The Dine at the Edge of History; Navajo Ethnoenesis in the Northern Southwest, 1500-1700. In Across A Great Divide: Continuity and Change in Native North American Societies, 1400-1900, edited L.L. Scheiber and M.D. Mitchell, pp 192-211, The University of Arizona Press, Tucson.

Wilson, C, Dean, and Eric Blinman
1993 Upper San Juan Region Typology, Archaeology Notes 80. Office of Archaeological Studies, Museum of New Mexico, Santa Fe.




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