GREAT BASIN NUMIC PREHISTORY
Linguistics, Archeology, and Environment
c.
MELVIN AIKENS
University of Oregon, Eugene
and
YOUNGER
T.
WITHERSPOON
Bureau of Land Management, Portland
CONTENTS
The numic problem in a broader context. . . . . . .
Hypothesis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Problems and conclusions
, .. .
References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
FIGURES
1. Distribution of the Utaztekan languages
2. Distribution of the Numic languages.......
3. Distributions of desert, lacustrine, and
horticultural adaptations
9
15
16
18
10
11
12
All enduring problem of Desert West prehistory has
I wen that of understanding the far-flung distribution
;lIld unusual linguistic homogeneity of its historic
Numic-speaking occupants. Numic, the most north­
erly of several families belonging to the great
l) taztekan stock of the western United States and
Mexico, includes three closely related pairs of lan­
guages spread over a vast area: Western N umic
(Mono-Paviotso) in the western Great Basin, Cen­
I ral Numic (Panamint-Shoshoni) in the central
Basin and western Plains, and Eastern Numic
(Kawaiisu-Ute), which extended across the eastern
Basin, Colorado Plateau, and central Rocky Moun­
lains into the western Plains. Linguistic diversity
across the whole of this enormous area is remarkably
low, which has been interpreted to indicate that the
Numic speakers achieved this distribution only in
relatively recent times; estimates based on lexico­
~tatistical glottochronology suggest that the ancestral
Numic speech community which gave rise to the
Ihree paired daughter groups expanded and split
apart about 1,000 to 1,500 years ago (Goss 1965;
Hale 1958-59; Lamb 1958).
When the Numic distribution is viewed on a
map, it appears that its component languages have
fanned out from a point in the extreme southwestern
corner of the Great Basin (Figures 1, 2). Further, the
closest linguistic relatives of Numic, the Tubatula­
balic and Takic languages, occur nearby. They lie
immediately west of the Sierra Nevada from where
the Western, Central, and Eastern Numic languages
converge in the area of Death Valley. This general
region thus appears as a center of linguistic diversity
and, according to the principles of historical
linguistics, as the probable homeland of the Numic
peoples. From here they apparently expanded fast
and far within the last millennium.
The archeological problems of interest in the
present paper stem from this interpretation. If the
Numic speakers began a major expansion through­
out the Great Basin and beyond around 10 centuries
ago from a tiny homeland in the extreme southwest
of their historically known range, to what people
should the archeological record of the preceding
millennia in this enormous area be referred? What
became of these unidentified predecessors? And
what permitted the Numic peoples to take over such
a vast area in such a short period of time? Previous
discussions of archeology and language in the Desert
West have illuminated many aspects of Numic
prehistory, but a satisfactory resolution of these
questions has not yet been achieved (Bettinger and
Baumhoff 1982; Fowler 1972; Goss 1965, 1968,
1977; Gunnerson 1962; Hopkins 1965; Lamb 1958;
Madsen 1975; Miller 1966; Simms 1983; Taylor
1961 ).
It is particularly appropriate, we feel, to ad­
dress the Numic problem in a volume honoring
Professor Jesse D. Jennings, since his own highly
insightful (and inciteful) concept of a Great Basin
Desert Culture relied heavily on comparisons be­
tween the archeological record and the lifeway of
ethnographically known N umic peoples Gennings
1957). We hope that he likes our solutions; in any
event, we are confident that he will, as he always
has, approve of an effort to forward scientific under­
standing, wherever it leads.
THE NUMIC PROBLEM
IN BROADER CONTEXT
A recent paper by Bettinger and Baumhoff
(1982) analyzes the Numic expansion as a problem
in internal cultural dynamics, seeing it as motivated
by inherent competitive advantages of the Numic
socioeconomic system itself. This is an essential
perspective, but we construe it rather differently
than they do. We believe as well that a broader pur­
view, that takes in non- N umic cultures of the Great
Basin and adjacent regions, and attends to en­
vironmental change as an important driving force, is
necessary to a full appreciation of the factors in­
volved. The Numic folk did not exist in isolation,
and surrounding societies were as important to their
fortunes as a people as were the mountains and
desert valleys in which they lived. Linguistic, ar­
cheological, and environmental evidence must all be
considered in examining the Numic's broader con­
text.
The contact-period linguistic map of western
North America implies a varied history of expansion
10
AIKENS AND WITHERSPOON
UTAZTEKAN
LANGUAGES
KEY
lj1ttt~~
WESTERN NUMIC
ggggg
CENTRAL NUMIC
t:::: :l SOUTHERN NUMIC
(:f~:J
TUBATULABALIC
t":::j TAKIC
mmm HOPIC
r====:1 SOUTHERN
t::::::::j UTAZTEKAN
r.:!:\
~
1
N
Gulf of Mexico
Pacific Ocean
Kilometers ~.I.?_°---rl4_?LO__6.l.?"T~_8_qL:°_--._ _---l1 km
Statute Miles 0
200
400
800 mi
660
SOURCES
KROEBER 1934
RAND McNALLY INTERNATIONAL ATLAS 1969
Denise M. Mason 1984
Figure 1. Distribution of the Utaztekan languages in western North America.
11
GREAT BASIN NUMIC PREHISTORY
rnigration by a series of aboriginal groups
oue/in and Voegelin 1966). Coastal Alaska and
Aleutian Islands were the homeland of the
-Ieutian speakers. Interior Alaska and western
H\da were occupied by Athapaskan and other
mbcrs of the Na-Dene phylum of languages, and
-.lh of them, Salishan peoples dominated the
)Iumbia-Fraser Plateau. Still farther south, Penu­
An speakers occupied the Middle Columbia and
__ nttk(~ River drainages, and extended beyond into
MOuth-central California. Another large block oc­
(1ul'l'(~d yet farther to the south in Mexico. Scattered
1(1'( HI ps of Hokan speakers occurred throughout U p­
111'1' California, and Hokan speakers formed a large
irnlid block in Baja California and along the lower
(:lliorado River in western Arizona. Other Hokan
hlllKuages were scattered in both northern and
Mil II 1hern Mexico. The interior Great Basin province
Itlld central Rocky Mountains, stretching from cen­
t t'lll Oregon to southern California, and extending
C'llslward across Nevada, Utah, southern Idaho,
Wyoming, and Colorado, was populated by Numic
I'(~presentatives of the Utaztekan stock; another
KTOUp of Utaztekans occupied southern Arizona and
west Mexico (Figure 1). On the western Plains,
Npcakers of Siouan and Algonquian tongues were
dominant. Finally, additional groups of N a-Dene­
all representing the Athapaskan family-occurred as
small blocks in northwestern Oregon, southwestern
Oregon, and northern California, while a large body
of Athapaskan speakers-the Apache-Navajo-oc­
cupied eastern Arizona, New Mexico, and south­
west Texas.
According to the lexicostatistical method of
glottochronology, divergence times between related
languages within these various groupings range
from about 600 years at the low end of the scale, to
about 7,000 years at the high end. A postulated
genetic relationship between the Penutian and
Utaztekan groups implies an age of 10,000 years or
so for the breakup of an ancestral Macro-Penutian
speech community somewhere in western North
America. High antiquity is also suggested by the
great divergences within Hokan, the far-flung and
broken distribution of the Hokan languages, and the
possibility that the Hokan languages may be geneti­
cally linked to the Siouan languages of the Plains
and eastern United States. The postulated Hokan­
Siouan macrophylum implies another extremely old
ancestral speech community. Within Utaztekan
itself, the grouping of central interest to the present
discussion, lexicostatistic divergence times between
various related languages range from about 1,000 to
5,000 years (Sapir 1929; Swadesh 1954, 1956).
Of immediate interest in terms of sociocultural
context is the fact that the Numic range is enclosed
on the north and west by a near-continuous body of
Penutian-speaking peoples, among whom are inter­
spersed several groups of Hokan speakers. On the
south, Great Basin Numic is closed off from its more
southerly Utaztekan cousins by a solid block of
Hokan speakers. That these enclosing groups are
ancient inhabitants of their respective regions is in­
dicated by the scattered and broken Hokan distribu­
tion, and by lexicostatistical divergence times on the
order of 3,500 to 5,500 years ago between neighbor-
Figure 2.
Distribution of the Numic languages.
ing related languages, both Hokan and Penutian
(Kroeber 1955; Shipley 1978).
East of the region occupied by Numic speakers,
Siouan and Algonquian peoples came to dominance
during historic times, but there is persuasive
evidence of an Athapaskan presence along the
eastern edge of the northern and central Rocky
Mountains at the time of earliest White contact
(Gunnerson and Gunnerson 1971; Perry 1980;
Schlesier 1972; Wright 1978). This distribution,
ethnohistorically documented, probably has con­
siderable prehistoric time depth. A glottochrono­
logical date of about 1,300 years has been calculated
for the split between northern and southern
Athapaskan groups (Hoijer 1956), and it has been
suggested (Perry 1980) that this date probably marks
the time when an ancient chain of Athapaskan
speakers continuously distributed along the northern
and central Rocky Mountains finally pulled apart,
severing communications between the southerly
Navajo-Apache and their northern relatives. (The
12
AIKENS AND WITHERSPOON
late Numic expansion out of the Great Basin and
onto the western Plains may actually relate to this
rupture.) A prehistoric Athapaskan presence in the
Rockies may be as old as 5,000 years or so, accord­
ing to one archeological assessment that perceives an
unbroken cultural continuity extending back from
late prehistoric (but pre- N umic) times, to the Alti­
thermal period (Wright 1978).
Thus it seems reasonable to postulate that the
Numic borderlands were occupied, for the last 5,000
years or so, by Penutian- and Hokan-speaking
peoples to the north, west, and south, and by
Athapaskans to the east. Within the interior Great
Basin area thus circumscribed, Numic speakers are
the only ethnohistorically known occupants.
The historic Numic occupation in the western
and eastern Great Basin and adjacent Colorado
Plateau is archeologically underlain by the Love­
lock, Chewaucanian, Fremont, and Anasazi cul­
tures respectively, which all carne to an end within
a few hundred years of A.D. 1000, and which
were clearly not Numic manifestations (Figures 2,
3). A Numic connection has been argued for Fre­
mont and Virgin Branch Anasazi (Gunnerson 1962;
Taylor 1957), but convincingly refuted by the obser­
vation that there are simply no trait-specific con-
SOURCE:
".J.
NYSTROM &
co.
I
Figure 3. Distribution of desert, lacustrine, and horticul­
tural adaptations in the Great Basin at about A.D. 500-1000.
tinuities between Fremont, Virgin, and the historic
N umic cultures in pottery, basketry, architecture,
rock art, or other complex elements, such as would
be expected if the two were historically related
(Adovasio 1980; Adovasio, Andrews and Fowler
1982; Butler 1983; Euler 1964; Schroeder 1963).
Similarly, there is a striking disjunction between tht~
material objects of the Lovelock culture and ethno­
graphic Numic culture of the same region. This is
most notable in basketry types and in the fact that
Numic peoples made pottery and Lovelock peopl<­
did not, but it is evident in architectural and artistic
elements as well (Adovasio, this volume; GrosscuJI
1960; Heizer and Napton 1970; Loud and Harring-­
ton 1929).
The character of these non-Numic archeolog-­
ical manifestations is important to the argumenl
being built up here, because of the significant socio
economic contrasts between the prehistoric cultures
and the culture of the historic Numics who replaced
them. A brief descriptive sketch will supply tIll"
needed information.
The Lovelock culture was an adaptation to wei
lands resources found around the numerous lakes
and marshes of the western Great Basin fringe-tlw
Humboldt-Carson Sink, Pyramid Lake, Winne
mucca Lake, and Honey Lake, to name the musl
prominent. It is dated between about 2700 B.C. alld
A.D. 550 at Lovelock Cave, where the cultural COlli
plex is most fully attested (Heizer and Napton 1970;
Loud and Harrington 1929), but a single radioca'
bon date on a piece of the highly distinctive Lovelock
wicker basketry suggests that it may have persis,,""
as late as A.D. 1350 at Kramer Cave, near Will
nemucca Lake (Hattori 1982).
A relatively sedentary pattern of settlemenl i:i
indicated by the discovery of semisubterran(';111
pithouses at the Humboldt Lakebed site bcli ,w
Lovelock Cave, at site NV-PE-67 near the town "I
Lovelock, Nevada, and at sites near Honey Lak .. ,
California (Cowan and Clewlow 1968; Heizer ;111"
Napton 1970; Riddell 1960). From human COPI"
lites preserved at Lovelock Cave carne compellill!-,
evidence of a rich subsistence based on lake-m;II'il,
resources; meal remains included tui chub, cui III
sucker, Taho sucker, Lahontan speckled (1;.,.
freshwater molluscs, duck, coot, bulrush, call:r",
and tule, as well as saltgrass, Great Basin wild I),' ,
and other species common to the edges of wei Lilli I
habitats. Projectile points, milling stones, 'W"',
fishhooks, and waterbird decoys made of 1111.
bundles covered with feathered duck skins were p.111
of the associated cultural inventory (Heizer ;",.1
Napton 1970; Napton 1969).
Other evidence of sedentary occupation dUIIII,'
this general period, and of thriving lakeshore :;. I
tlements, is also known farther north, extendin~ ","I
beyond the Lovelock culture area as currently. I.
fined. Archeological survey at Lake Abert, in SOli II,
GREAT BASIN NUMIC PREHISTORY
("(Itral Oregon, has identified over 30 sites along the
Like's eastern shore, some 20 of them with apparent
housepit depressions. Excavations to date have been
limited, but tests have verified the presence of pit­
house floors and occupational debris including traces
1,1" freshwater mussels and fish bones. Radiocarbon
,btes span the period from 1500 B.C. to A.D. 1200,
;lIld projectile point cross-dating suggests a broader
lime range-perhaps 2500 B.C. to A.D. 1500. The
Ilianifestation, dubbed the Chewaucanian culture
(Pettigrew 1980), clearly represents a northern ex­
Icnsion, or cognate, of the lakeshore-adapted Love­
lock culture.
Far to the east, on the opposite edge of the
(;reat Basin, a largely sedentary village way of life
was established on the basis of a mixed horticultural
;md hunting-gathering economy. This was the Fre­
lIIont culture, well dated between about A.D. 500
and 1300 by many radiocarbon determinations
(Jennings 1978; Marwitt and Fry 1973). Settlements
included semisubterranean pithouses and above­
g-round structures, often found together in the same
sites. Hundreds of villages are known, and a very
considerable population is clearly represented. The
culture was not homogeneous over its entire range,
as shown by marked regional variation in pottery,
architecture, figurines, rock art, and other in­
dicators, but common themes relate the several
variants. Subsistence patterns also appear to have
varied according to the natural setting, with some
regions more heavily based on maize-beans-squash
horticulture, others more oriented to hunting and
gathering. Indeed, it has been suggested that some
Fremont settlements may have been principally
based on lake-marsh resources in a way quite com­
parable to the lacustrine settlements of the Lovelock
culture (Madsen 1980; Madsen and Lindsay 1977).
The Anasazi cultures of the Southwest are so
widely known as to require very little characteriza­
tion here. The Virgin Anasazi of southern Utah and
northern Arizona were the most westerly group, ex­
tending well into southern Nevada. The Mesa
Verde people occupied southwestern Colorado, and
the Kayenta dwelt in northeastern Arizona. Each of
these groups was committed to a sedentary village­
farming way of life, used painted pottery, built both
subterranean and aboveground masonry structures.
Each dated back to Basketmaker times, around the
beginning of the Christian era, and all three peoples
abandoned their settlements and farmlands during
the stressful arid interval of the twelfth and thir­
teenth centuries, withdrawing into other regions
where a horticultural way of life was still possible
(Lipe 1983).
I
13
Neither the Lovelock nor the Fremont cultures
truly exemplified the Great Basin desert foraging
pattern, and certainly the Anasazi did not. All repre­
sent instead groups with their closest economic ana­
logues ou tside the region.
A strong Californian connection for the Love­
lock culture is indicated by numerous trait-specific
similarities with the Windmiller culture of central
California: spire-lopped Olivella shell beads, Am­
phissa shell beads, and abalone shell beads are clearly
Californian imports; ground and polished charm­
stones, slate rods, and bone spatulas are of Wind­
miller types, perhaps manufactured locally. The
coiled basketry trays and remarkable stuffed water­
bird decoys of the Lovelock culture also have historic
analogues among the Costanoan and Patwin peoples
of the San Francisco Bay-Delta region (Beardsley
1954; Heizer and Krieger 1956; Napton 1969; Ragir
1972). Note too that wetlands adaptations were cen­
tral to the lifeways of these Californian groups (see
also Aikens n.d.).
Based on these observations linking Lovelock
with the Californian region, on the lack of convinc­
ing evidence for continuity between the Lovelock
and Numic cultures, and on the predominance of
Penutian speakers in central California and the
Sierra, Hattori (1982) has proposed that the bearers
of Lovelock culture were probably Penutian-speak­
ers like the Californians of the Windmiller and later
horizons. Similarly, it has been suggested that the
prehistoric Chewaucanian waterside villages at Lake
Abert in Oregon may represent Penutian-speaking
Klamaths-ethnographically adapted to waterside
settings in the Cascade foothills west of Lake Abert
-rather than the desert-adapted Numic-speaking
Paiute who claimed the region in historic times (Pet­
tigrew 1980). Archeological and ecological consider­
ations are further bolstered by Paiute oral tradition.
A Northern Paiute folktale describes their extermi­
nation of a people who had occupied the country
before them (Hopkins 1883), and a Surprise Valley
Paiute tradition relates that the Klamath formerly
occupied much of the northern Great Basin in
Oregon until the Paiutes drove them out (Kelly
1932).
The horticultural complex of the Fremont was
clearly derivative from the Southwest, as shown by
its black-on-white pottery, architectural styles, and
maize-beans-squash horticulture. The more north­
erly and easterly variants of Fremont also demon­
strated general similarities to Plains cultures in
grayware ceramic traits and the use of leather moc­
casins, the latter a northern element quite in
contrast with the longstanding use of woven fiber
14
AIKENS AND WITHERSPOON
sandals in the Great Basin and Southwest (Aikens
1967, 1972; Marwitt 1970, with references; Worm­
ington 1955).
An attempt was made some years ago by one of
the present authors (Aikens 1966, 1967) to link the
Fremont manifestation with Plains and South­
western Athapaskan peoples, both to account for the
complete disappearance of Fremont culture after
about A.D. 1300, and to account for the where­
abouts of the Athapaskan-speaking Navajo-Apache
during the centuries between their split from their
northern relatives and their late prehistoric appear­
ance in New Mexico and Arizona. This suggestion
met with little approval (Husted and Mallory 1967;
Wedel 1967; cf. Schlesier 1972), but nevertheless
remains, in our view, the most plausible accounting
yet offered for Fremont ethnolinguistic affiliations. It
may gain some strength from a case recently made
for a longstanding Athapaskan presence in the
northern and central Rocky Mountains (Perry 1980;
Wright 1978), since much of Fremont territory in­
cludes the Wasatch outlier of the Rockies, and Fre­
mont ceramics have been traced as far east as the
Colorado Front Range Games B. Benedict 1982,
personal communication). Recent work document­
ing a widespread and previously unrecognized Fre­
mont presence in southern Idaho may also have a
bearing on the Athapaskan question, and is in any
case important to the present argument for showing
that the historic Numic peoples of Idaho were
preceded there also by others of quite distinct origins
(Butler n.d., 1982, 1983). At any rate, an Atha­
paskan affiliation for Fremont is mentioned here
only as a possibility; its acceptance is not really
crucial to the thesis being advanced at present, it be­
ing at least clear that the Fremont people, whoever
they were, were not the same as the Numic speakers
who succeeded them in the area.
As for the linguistic affiliations of the Anasazi
groups, it seems most likely that the Virgin and
Kayenta peoples were related to the historic Hopi,
who represent a monolanguage family of Utaztekan
coordinate with Numic. The Mesa Verdean peoples
have been linked with the speakers of Kiowa­
Tanoan languages who historically occupied the
upper reaches of the Rio Grande, in north-central
New Mexico (Hale and Harris 1979 with references;
Wendorf and Reed 1955).
The preceding pages evoke a scene in which a
great deal, but not all, of the ethnohistorically
known N umic territory is accounted for as the range
of non-Numic peoples prior to the recent Numic ex­
pansion. Between at least A.D. 500 and 1300 in the
case of the Fremont and Anasazi, and perhaps 2700
B.C. and A.D. 1350 in the case of the Lovelock cul­
ture, there were no Numics in the eastern or western
Great Basin, or in the Southwest.
But in the central Great Basin uplands, there is
evidence of a cultural pattern that has remained
stable for approximately the past 5,000 years, that
cannot be clearly characterized as non-Numic in the
way that Lovelock, Chewaucanian, Fremont, and
Anasazi can. It, unlike them, has no clear outside
affiliations and furthermore it persisted archeolog­
ically without notable indications of rupture from
ancient times right up to the period of White con­
tact, when Numic speakers were found to be in sole
possession of the region. In the Reese River Valley
of central Nevada, a well-defined pattern of hunting­
gathering activities associated with seasonal settle­
ment shifts, identical to that of the historic Numic
occupants, has been documented as extending from
historic times as far back as 2500 B.C. (Thomas
1973, 1974). Thomas, who has studied this region
from a variety of perspectives, is emphatic on the
point that "there are no archaeological data from the
central Great Basin which cannot be subsumed
under Steward's general ethnographic [Numici
model." He does not assert that this continuity or
pattern demands an interpretation of continuoll~
possession by Numic ancestors throughout the
period of record, but we feel that such a conclusioll
offers inescapably the most reasonable and par
simonious accounting of the situation.
Thomas further notes, with equal emphasi~,
that there is vanishingly little evidence in the cenlr;d
Great Basin uplands for human occupation prior Ii'
about 5000 B.C., and very little even as late as 1110
interval 2500-3500 B.C. Of some 2,500 projecli'"
points collected in controlled sample surveys fnllil
the region, fewer than six specimens of tYllD
predating 5000 B.C. were identified! The peri"d
2500-3500 B.C. gives evidence of only an "inili,.!
and sparse occupation" and not until after 2',1111
B.C. does human activity become well attested, W,
attach major significance to the correspondence I"
tween this latter date and the linguistic estimak ,01
approximately 5,000 years ago for the time or 1110
Utaztekan breakup which led ultimately to ttl(' , "
tablishment of the Numic family (Goss 1977; Il.d,
1958-59; Lamb 1958).
This completes our sketch of the context we '" "
as crucial in accounting for both the homelalld III
which the Numic languages arose, and the lill' .c~
that led to the Numic speakers' great outward I ,
pansion in late prehistoric times. The follo\\ 11111
paragraphs identify a larger and more all. 10111
ancestral N umic homeland than that earlin 1'1"
posed by various scholars, and offer environrllt 'III i ,I
climatic reasons for the late prehistoric NUllli. q
GREAT BASIN NUMIC PREHISTORY
1';U1sion outward from it into surrounding regions.
This reconstruction is followed in turn by a con­
cluding section arguing problematical details of the
Illlcrpretation, and reiterating the main points of our
"lIltention.
HYPOTHESIS
The historically known Utaztekans, from Ore­
deep into Mexico, were pre-eminently people of
IIIC desert; the language map of North America
Icaves this in absolutely no doubt. Linguistic
"vidence suggests that Utaztekans have ranged the
I ksert West from ancient times, for at least the last
~J,OOO years, and clearly they are by long experience
;uld tradition the best-fitted of all far western
I>eople to cope with the exigencies of a hunting­
~~athering desert life. The Numic peoples, who rep­
n:sent one branch of this great Utaztekan stock, ex­
('mplify a supremely flexible and successful adapta­
'ion to the desert setting of the Great Basin (Steward
1(38).
In his compelling account of Great Basin
Numic society, Steward attributed overriding im­
portance to the comparative sparsity and cyclicity of
desert food products, which fostered a corresponding
sparsity and mobility in human populations. Espe­
cially within the central Great Basin heartland to
which Steward's ethnographic model best applies,
low population density and high mobility gave the
Numics security in a difficult environment where
they were obliged to routinely exploit a very broad,
diversified range of subsistence possibilities. As
outlined in preceding paragraphs, this cultural pat­
tern was extant in the central Great Basin at a time
when the more numerous and sedentary Lovelock,
Chewaucanian, Fremont, and Anasazi peoples oc­
cupied the moister and richer Sierra-Cascades flanks
to the west and Rocky Mountain outliers to the east.
In contrast to the Numic folk, these non-Numic
people habitually depended on a more special range
of concentrated and productive subsistence possi­
bilities. To the extent that the resources on which
their prosperity was based could be had in requisite
abundance only in particular settings, these people
were vulnerable. Though more prosperous, they
were less secure economically than the more broadly
based folk of the central Great Basin.
We suggest that to people in this situation the
pronounced low in effective moisture so well
documented throughout the west during the twelfth
and thirteenth centuries (Euler et al. 1979 and
references cited therein) was of crucial importance.
Particularly along the richer eastern and western
margins of the Great Basin, where the Lovelock,
Chewaucanian, Fremont, and Anasazi peoples were
I~()n
15
heavily invested in systems of intensive lacustrine
exploitation or horticulture, a relative abundance of
water was critical. For them, drought meant dis­
aster. But their bad luck turned out to be good luck
for their desert-adapted contemporaries in the cen­
tral Great Basin.
Simply, it is hypothesized that Numic ancestors
have occupied the central Great Basin since the time
of the Utaztekan breakup about 5,000 years ago,
and that the broader nineteenth-century range
memorialized in our linguistic and ethnographic
maps represents a very recent expansive phase. This
was initiated when aridity reduced the lacustrine
and horticultural food resource bases of Lovelock,
Chewaucanian, Fremont, and Anasazi peoples in
better lands to the west and east and brought about
their withdrawal, leaving their lands open for Numic
occupation (Figure 3).
While the Lovelock, Chewaucanian, Fremont,
and Anasazi peoples were enjoying adequate
moisture and the relative abundance it fostered, the
Numic ancestors, always few and scattered in com­
parison, had to remain content with their less
favored ranges far out in the central Great Basin.
But during the dry climatic interval of the twelfth
and thirteenth centuries, the more numerous and
sedentary "others" chose to withdraw from their
drying territories rather than give up the relative
wealth and comfort to which they had long been ac­
customed. They could presumably have remained to
survive where they were by shifting to a less abun­
dant, more mobile lifeway analogous to that of the
drylands-adapted Numic peoples, but the archeo­
logical evidence is clear that they did not. The
vacated territory was quickly occupied by the Numic
peoples, who were long accustomed to shifting their
ranges at opportunity. To them the old Lovelock,
Chewaucanian, Fremont, and Anasazi lands re­
mained, despite the drying trend, still comparatively
well watered and at least as desirable as the Numics'
inherently more arid Great Basin heartland.
Finally, we suggest that this is only the last in a
series of expansions and contractions that began as
people first entered the central Great Basin in signifi­
cant numbers 5,000 years ago. The earlier ebbs and
flows were no doubt also coordinated with and
motivated by recurring fluctuations in effective
moisture regimes. In a 1983 letter to the authors
commenting on an earlier draft of this paper,
Michael J. Moratto offered the following elaboration
of this idea:
Imagine (as you already have) that the central
Great Basin was the homeland ofUtaztekan peoples
for many millennia. Because of short- and long­
16
AIKENS AND WITHERSPOON
term environmental changes of varying intensities,
one would expect that the actual distribution of
populations and the nature of economic activities
within the core territory would have varied through
time. When conditions were optimal in terms of
Numic adaptation, Numic lands may have ex­
tended-as you suggest-as far west as the Sierran
scarp. When environmental conditions "deteri­
orated," Numic populations and settlement pat­
terns would have shifted accordingly-part of their
"resilience." One aspect of these shifts would have
been increased use of the montane environments
when lowlands became untenable. As more ar­
chaeology is done in the high Sierra, for example,
we see increasing evidence of montane settlement
by Great Basin peoples which seems to correlate
with adverse climatic episodes (desiccation) in the
western Great Basin. This model also has a
linguistic corollary. As the N umic homeland was ex­
tended, linguistic diversification would occur; as it
contracted, a process of homogenization would take
place. Thus, the very late glottochronological
"dates" do not say much about how long the
Numic folk have been in the Great Basin. They only
measure the time since the most recent "bottle­
neck" gave way to expansion. Also, the expansion­
contraction (amoeba) model might account for the
nature of the linguistic/cultural relationship be­
tween Numic, Tubatulabalic, and Takic groups.
Tubatulabal might be a residual group from an
earlier episode of expansion.
PROBLEMS AND CONCLUSIONS
The above treatment has not fully discussed
certain aspects of the conventional linguistic inter­
pretation of Numic prehistory, for the sake of simpli­
city in exposition. Some points could be seen as
troublesome to the proffered interpretation, but we
believe that they can be resolved without harm to
our basic contentions. The idea that the Numic
peoples originated from a tiny homeland in the
vicinity of Death Valley is at bottom based on the
diversity of the U taztekan languages to be found in
the general California-Arizona-Sonora borderlands.
In the initial statement of the linguistic hypothesis
(Lamb 1958), the early proto-Numic speech com­
munity was seen as remaining highly localized there
for a long period following the Utaztekan breakup of
about 5,000 years ago, and then-for unexplained
reasons-beginning a very rapid expansion across
the Great Basin about 1,000 to 1,500 years ago. This
time perspective for the Numic spread relied on lex­
icostatistical dates for internal divisions within
Numic, it being implied that the divisions came
about as the migrating speech community expanded
into and beyond the Great Basin.
Our hypothesis differs only slightly. It grants
that there was a major expansion of the Numic
range at about the time specified, but from a much
larger homeland already in the Great Basin. The
key difference is that we see Utaztekan (ancestral
Numic) peoples as being present in the Great Basin
from the time of the initial U taztekan breakup rather
than only from the time of the much later Numic ex­
pansion. Based on lexical clues in Californian
languages to a very early, quite northerly proto­
Utaztekan range (Nichols 1981), lexical clues in the
Numic languages to a probable later occupation in
the southern Sierra Nevada (Fowler 1972, 1980),
and previously mentioned archeological indications
Of cultural continuity in the central Great Basin, we
propose that this Great Basin hpmeland extended
from about north-central Nevada southward into the
Owens Valley region.
Postulating an ancestral Numic homeland of
this location and size also offers a more rational in­
terpretation of the striking tripartite split between
Western, Central, and Eastern Numic. A re-evalua­
tion of the internal classification of the Numic lan­
guages by Freeze and Iannucci (1979) suggests that
the first division to appear in proto-Numic was be­
tween western and eastern speech communities.
After this, the western speech community persisted
to become modern Western Numic, while the east­
ern one split to create the present Central and
Eastern (Central and Southern in Freeze's and Ian­
nucci's terms) Numic languages. This succession of
events is congruent with archeological evidence: as
noted above, the Lovelock culture collapse that
would have allowed Western Numic speakers to ex­
pand into the old Lovelock range along the Sierran
flanks may have slightly preceded the Fremont and
Anasazi abandonments that would have allowed the
more easterly Numics to expand and diverge into
Central and Eastern Numic in the eastern Great
Basin and northern Southwest.
This is in contrast to the vision-implied by the
original linguistic proposal-of a mysterious sus­
tained march by three separate legions of Western,
Central, and Eastern Numic speakers. Already di­
verged into separate languages in the extreme south,
they would have moved abreast in three great par­
allel columns out of their Death Valley homeland to­
ward the north and east. To turn Miller's (1966:93)
arresting characterization of this scene to the present
purpose, "It is unlikely that the Basin saw such
carefully planned migrations until the days of Brig­
ham Young."
In a discussion of "Old California Uto-Az­
tecan," Nichols (1981) cites evidence of ancient bor­
rowings between Utaztekan and certain Californian
languages to suggest that central California was the
GREAT BASIN NUMIC PREHISTORY
•• Iiginal Utaztekan homeland. His discussion relates
,,, lhe ancient Utaztekan breakup. Ours begins with
,III: appearance ofUtaztekans in the Great Basin as a
I"sult of that breakup. The two hypotheses do not
'll"cessarily conflict, and may indeed be mutually
':1 I pportive. Nichols' reconstruction simply takes as
~',ivcn the Lamb (1958) model of late Numic expan­
',1"11 from extreme southeastern California. Our
.,1lcrnative model of long occupance of the Great
Ihsin by Numic ancestors should allow a consider­
..I)1e simplification of the number and course of
p"pulation movements needed in Nichols' recon­
'.II'liction to account for the ancient borrowings
II I ested in U taztekan (including N umic) and Cali­
l<Jl'flian languages.
Another aspect of the relevant literature still re­
'iI'iring discussion is a recent analysis by Bettinger
,lIld Baumhoff(1982) which attributes the Numic ex­
I ';j flsion to an ability on the part of the N umics to
'"ll-compete postulated antecessors in the Great
llasin. They offer a fascinating theoretical exposition
"I how a people who were "processors" -labor­
1IIIensive exploiters of a wide variety of plant and
,lIlimal food resources-would be able to expand
"wir range in competition with a people who were
"I ravellers" -that is, primarily far-ranging hunters
.. I larger game. They identify the Numic peoples as
l"ocessors, and contend that the Numics replaced,
I,'ss than 1,000 years ago, preceding travelers who
"wn occupied the Great Basin.
Clearly, the approach of Bettinger and Baum­
1,,,11' differs radically from ours. We feel that the ma­
1"1 economic distinction they make between pro­
,('ssors and travelers flatly contradicts Thomas'
(1<)73, 1974) evidence for the presence in central
Nevada, throughout the last 5,000 years, of a subsis­
"'flce-settlement system identical to that of the
,'I hnographic Nurr.ics of the region. Additionally, we
.I" not feel that Bettinger and Baumhoff's concept of
I,rocessors replacing travelers speaks at all accur­
,IIely to the circumstances under which the Numics
"'placed the Lovelock, Chewaucanian, Fremont,
,I lid Anasazi peoples; none of these latter cultures
I"motely fit their characterization of "travellers." If
,IllY thing, in such a comparison, the Numics ought
I" be the travelers, and the Lovelock, Chewauca­
Ilian, Fremont, and Anasazi folk the processors.
Evidence is now emerging of previously undis­
'"vered high altitude occupation in late prehistoric
'i mes in the central Great Basin. Bettinger (personal
lllmmunication, May 1982) sees this as supporting
"IC traditional concept of a late N umic incursion,
IHIt we also doubt this contention. The site of Alta
'I()quima (Thomas 1982) at an elevation above
10,000 feet on Mount Jefferson in central Nevada
17
does indeed show a major contrast in the character
of occupation before and after approximately A.D.
1000, with evidence of upland hunting before that
date, and evidence of a settled village with house
structures after it. But this need not be viewed as in­
dicating the first arrival of N umic people in the
region. It could as well represent only as adjustment
by long-resident Numics through a simple range
shift-their primordial method of adjusting to local
scarcity-to the drying conditions of the twelfth and
thirteenth centuries, which would have reduced the
biotic productivity, especially of the lower-lying
parts of their country.
Finally, there must be considered the appear­
ance of coiled basketry at a very late date in the
central Great Basin, since Adovasio (this volume)
contends that the presence of coiling technique after
about A.D. 1000 in Monitor Valley, central Ne­
vada, and A.D. 850 at Dirty Shame Rockshelter,
southeastern Oregon, marks the arrival of Numic
speakers there. We feel that the two fragments of
coiled basketry known from Monitor Valley are too
few to bear the burden of such an interpretation,
particularly when no evidenc'e of any kind of bas­
ketry was recovered from any earlier period. The
Monitor Valley record simply does not speak to the
question of whether or not coiling was present there
in earlier times.
At Dirty Shame Rockshelter, three pieces of
coiled basketry appear after about A.D. 850, along
with Desert-side-notched projectile points and cer­
tain styles of Pinto points. It was suggested by one of
us (Aikens, Cole, and Stuckenrath 1977), as well as
by Adovasio, Andrews, and Carlisle (1977) that
these new elements could represent the Numic ar­
rival in the region, but in view of all the foregoing
this must be reconsidered. In fact, Dirty Shame
Rockshelter was reoccupied about 750 B.C. after a
3,200-year hiatus, and the assemblage from that
time on was functionally homogeneous, showing
that the lifeway established at the site upon its reoc­
cupation did not change significantly thereafter until
Dirty Shame was abandoned shortly before the time
of White contact. We believe it most defensible to
refer the entire post-750 B. C. occupation to the same
Numic peoples who claimed the area in historic
times, rather than arguing for a Numic incursion
based on the very minor changes noted at about
A.D. 850.
To conclude, we assess the virtues of this new
view of Numic prehistory as follows:
1. It eliminates the mystery, fostered by pre­
vious purely linguistic interpretations, of who the
pre-Numic occupants of the Great Basin were.
Simply, direct Numic ancestors have been in the
18
AIKENS AND WITHERSPOON
Great Basin much longer than was previously al­
lowed, and they had no significant immediate prede­
cessors in their central homeland-at least none
whose archeological trace has yet been identified.
2. It offers a plausible reason for the N umic ex­
pansion, which previous accounts also left a mys­
tery, in terms of environmental change and aban­
donment of surrounding territory by other peoples.
3. It is parsimonious, in that it presumes no
subtle balances, complex responses, or basic internal
changes in the structure of the human societies in­
volved; each is seen as adapted to the environment
in a particular way, and persisting as long as-but
no longer than-that adaptive pattern remained
viable. The Numic lifeway, inherently more flexible,
was able to prevail and spread under conditions that
the Lovelock, Chewaucanian, Fremont, and Ana­
sazi systems could not survive. In the long run, it
was the fittest.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
We thank Sven S. Liljeblad, Catherine S.
Fowler, Robert L. Bettinger, Michael J. Moratto,
Ray Freeze, Ruth Gruhn, and Steven R. Simms for
their constructive discussions of Numic prehistory
with us.
REFERENCES
Adovasio, James M.
1980
Fremont: An Artifactual Perspective. Utah State
Historical Society, Antiquities Section Selected Papers
7(16):35-40.
Adovasio, James M., Rhonda L. Andrews, and Ron C. Carlisle
1977 Perishable Industries from Dirty Shame Rockshel­
ter. Tebiwa: Miscellaneous Papers of the Idaho State Uni­
versity Museum of Natural History 7.
Adovasio, James M., Rhonda L. Andrews, and Catherine S.
Fowler
1982
Some Observations on the Putative Fremont "Pres­
ence" in Southern Idaho. Plains Anthropologist
27(95): 19-27.
Aikens, C. Melvin
1966
Fremont-Promontory-Plains Relationships in
Northern Utah. University of Utah Anthropological
Papers 82.
1967
1972
n.d.
Plains Relationships of the Fremont Culture: A
Hypothesis. American Antiquity 32(2): 198-209.
Fremont Culture: Restatement of Some Problems.
American Antiquity 37(1):61-66.
The Nightfire Island Lakeshore Adaptation in the
Broader Context of Desert West Prehistory. In
Nighifm Island: Later Holocene Lakemarsh Adaptation on
the western Edge if the Great Basin, by C. Garth
Sampson, University of Oregon Anthropological
Papers, in press. (MS 1984).
Aikens, C. Melvin, David L. Cole, and Robert Stuckenrath
1977
Excavations at Dirty Shame Rockshelter, South­
eastern Oregon. Tebiwa: Miscellaneous Papers of the
Idaho State University Museum if Natural History 11.
Beardsley, Richard K.
1954
Temporal and Areal Relationships in Central
California. University of California Archaeological Sur­
very Reports 24-25.
Bettinger, Robert L., and Martin A. Baumhoff
1982
The Numic Spread: Great Basin Cultures in Com­
petition. American Antiquity 47(3):485-503.
Butler, B. Robert
n.d.
Late Period Cultural Sequences in the Northeast­
ern Great Basin Subarea and Their Implications
for the Upper Snake and Salmon River Country.
Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology, in
press. Banning, California: Malki Museum. (MS
1982)
1982 Numic Expansion and the Demise of the Fremont
in Southern Idaho. Paper presented at the 18th bi­
ennial meeting of the Great Basin Anthropological
Conference, Reno, Nevada. On file at Idaho State
University Museum, Pocatello.
1983 The Quest for the Historic Fremont and a Guide to
the Prehistoric Pottery of Southern Idaho. Occa­
sional Papers of the Idaho Museum if Natural History 33.
Cowan, Richard A., and C. W. Clewlow
1968
The Archaeology of Site NV-PE-67. University if
California Archaeological Survey Reports 73: 195-236.
Euler, Robert C.
1964
Southern Paiute Archaeology. American Antiquity
29(3):379-381.
Euler, Robert C., George J. Gumerman, Thor V. N. Karl­
strom, Jeffrey S. Dean, and Richard H. Hevly
1979
The Colorado Plateaus: Cultural Dynamics and
Paleoenvironment. Science 205(4411): 1089-1101.
Fowler, Catherine S.
1972 Some Ecological Clues to Proto-Numic Home­
lands. University if Nevada Desert Research Institute
Publications in the Social Sciences 8: 105-121.
1980 Some Lexical Clues to Uto-Aztekan Prehistory.
Paper presented at a Symposium on Uto-Aztekan
Historical Linguistics, Albuquerque, New Mexico.
On file at Department of Anthropology, University
of Nevada, Reno.
'Freeze, Ray, and David E. Iannucci
1979
Internal Classification of the Numic Languages of
Uta-Aztecan. Amerindia 4:77-92.
Goss, James A.
1965
Ute Linguistics and Anasazi Abandonment of the
Four Corners Area. Society for American Archaeology
Memoirs 19:73-81.
1968
Culture-Historical Inference from Utaztekan Lin­
guistic Evidence. Idaho State University Museum Occa­
sional Papers 22: 1-42.
1977
Linguistic Tools for the Great Basin Prehistorian.
University if Nevada Desert Research Institute Publications
in the Social Sciences 12:49-70.
GREAT BASIN NUMIC PREHISTORY
"p, Gordon L.
The Culture History of Lovelock Cave, Nevada.
University rif California A rchaeological Survey Reports 52.
I 1IIIIIWI~>CH1, James H.
I'll,/.
Plateau Shoshonean Prehistory: A Suggested Re­
construction. American Antiquity 28(1):41-45.
"''''"''''''11, James H., and Dolores A. Gunnerson
I'll I
Apachean Culture: A Study in Unity and Diver­
sity. University oj Arizona Anthropological Papers
21:7-27.
II ,I, , Kl'nneth L.
I'I',HInternal Diversity in Uto-Aztecan I-II. International
1,,','1
Journal oj American Linguistics 24(2): 101-107;
25(2): 114-121.
i I ,I,
Kl'nneth, and David Harris
1'1 I' I
Historical Linguistics and Archeology. In Handbook
rif North American Indians 9: Southwest, ed. Alfonso
Ortiz, pp. 170-177. Washington, D.C.: Smithson­
ian Institution.
1 I ,",," I':ugene M.
I"W'
The Archaeology of Falcon Hill, Winnemucca
Lake, Washoe County, Nevada, Nevada State Mu­
seum A nthropological Papers 18.
, I"
, " 1<' obert F., and Alex W. Krieger
1,,'0/,
The Archaeology of Humboldt Cave, Churchill
County, Nevada. University rif California Publications
in American Archaeology and Ethnology 47( 1): 1-190.
II"
" , Robert F., and Lewis K. Napton
1'1111
Archaeology and the Prehistoric Great Basin
Lacustrine Subsistence Regime as Seen from Love­
lock Cave, Nevada. University oj California Archaeolog­
ical Research Facility Contributions 10.
1''''1' I , I larry
1'1',1>
The Chronology of the Athapaskan Languages. In­
temational Journal oj American Linguistics 22(4):219­
232.
! I '1,1,"", Nicholas A.
1'1/,',
Great Basin Prehistory and Uto-Aztecan. American
Antiquity 31(1):48-60.
II ".I ,"", Sarah Winnemucca
I""",,,
I'II>()
IIIH',
Life Among the Paiutes: Their Wrongs and Claims.
Boston: Cupples, Upham; New York: G. P. Put­
nam's Sons.
! 1.." .I, Wilfred M., and Oscar L. Mallory
1'1/, /
The Fremont Culture: Its Derivation and Ultimate
Fate. Plains Anthropologist 12:222-232.
I,· ''''''','', ,,"sse D.
"", /
Danger Cave. University oj Utah Anthropological Papers
27.
"';H
Prehistory of Utah and the Eastern Great Basin.
University rif Utah Anthropological Papers 98.
1.11
1'.. 011<'1
'" ",'
Ethnography of the Surprise Valley Paiute. Univer­
sity rif California Publications in American Archaeology and
Ethnology 31(3):67-210.
i\ll'redL.
Linguistic Time Depth Results So Far and Their
Meaning. International Journal rif American Linguistics
21(2):91-109.
I ""I, :;I'dncy M.
",'.I, Linguistic Prehistory in the Great Basin. Interna­
tionalJournal oj American Linguistics 24(2):95-100.
1'1"
IVoIli;lIn D.
1'1111
The Southwest. In Ancient North Americans, ed.Jesse
D. Jennings, pp. 421-493. San Francisco: Free­
man.
1"1",,
I"',',
19
Loud, L. L., and Mark Raymond Harrington
1929
Lovelock Cave. University rif California Publications in
A merican Archaeology and Ethnology 25( 1).
Madsen, David B.
Dating Paiute-Shoshoni Expansion in the Great
1975
Basin. American Antiquity 40(1):82-86.
1980
Fremont/Sevier Subsistence. Utah State Historical
Society, Antiquities Section Selected Papers 7(16):25-33.
Madsen, David B., and La Mar W. Lindsay
1977
Backhoe Village. Utah State Historical Society, Antiq­
uities Section Selected Papers 4( 12).
Marwitt, John P.
1970
Median Village and Fremont Culture Regional
Variation. University rif Utah Anthropological Papers 95.
Marwitt, John P., and Gary F. Fry
1973
Radiocarbon Dates from Utah. Southwestern Lore
38(1):1-9.
Miller, Wick R.
1966
Anthropological Linguistics in the Great Basin.
University rif Nevada Desert Research Institute, Technical
Report Series SoH, Social Sciences and Humanities
Publication I, ed. Warren L. d' Azevedo, et aI.,
pp, 75-112.
Napton, Lewis K,
1969 The Lacustrine Subsistence Pattern in the Desert
West. Kroeber Anthropological Society Special Publications
2:28-97.
Nichols, Michael J. P.
1981
Old California Uto-Aztecan. Reports rif the Survey rif
California and Other IndIan Languages I: 5-41.
Perry, Richard J.
1980
The Apachean Transition from the Subarctic to the
Southwest. Plains Anthropologist 25(90):279-296.
Pettigrew, Richard M.
1980 The Ancient Chewaucanians: More on the Prehis­
toric Lake Dwellers of Lake Abert, Southwestern
Oregon. Association oj Oregon Archaeologists, Occasional
Papers 1:49-67. Albany, Oregon: Linn-Benton
Community College.
Ragir, Sonia
1972 The Early Horizon in Central California Prehis­
tory. University rif California Archaeological Research
Facility Contributions 15.
Riddell, Francis A.
1960 The Archaeology of the Karlo Site (Las-7), Califor­
nia. University oj California Archaeological Survey
Reports 53.
Sapir, Edward
1929
Central and North American Indian Languages.
Encyclopedia Britannica 5: 138-141.
Schlesier, Karl H,
1972 Rethinking the Dismal River Aspect and the Plains
Athapaskans, A.D. 1692-1768. Plains Anthropologist
17(56):101-133.
Schroeder, Albert H.
1963
Comment on Gunnerson's "Plateau Shoshonean
Prehistory." American Antiquity 28(4): 559-560.
Shipley, William F.
1978 Native Languages of California. In Handbook rif
North American Indians 8: California, ed. Robert F.
Heizer, pp. 80-90. Washington, D.C.: Smithson­
ian Institution.
Simms, Steven R.
1983
Comments on Bettinger and Baumhoff's Explana­
tion of the "Numic Spread" in the Great Basin.
American Antiquity 48(4):825-830.
20
AIKENS AND WITHERSPOON
Steward, Julian H.
1938
Basin-Plateau Aboriginal Sociopolitical Groups.
Bureau oj American Ethnology Bulletin 120.
Swadesh, Morris
1954
Time Depths of American Linguistic Groupings.
American Anthropologist 56(3):361-364
1956
Problems of Long-Range. Comparison in Penu­
tian. Language 32( 1): 17-41.
Taylor, Dee C.
1957 Two Fremont Sites and Their Position in South­
western Prehistory. University oj Utah Anthropological
Papers 29.
Taylor, Walter W.
1961
Archaeology and Language in Western North
America. American Antiquity 27(1):71-81.
Thomas, David H.
1973 An Empirical Test for Steward's Model of Great
Basin Settlement Patterns. American Antiquity
38(2):155-176.
1974 An Archaeological Perspective on Shoshonean
Bands. American Anthropologist 76(1):11-23.
1982
The 1981 Alta Toquima Village Project: A
Preliminary Report. University oj Nevada Desert
Research I mtitute, Social Sciences Center Technical Report
Series 27. Reno.
Voegelin, Charles F., and Florence M. Voegelin
1966
Map of North American Indian Languages. Arner
ican Ethnological Society Publication 20.
Wedel, Waldo R.
1967 Review of "Fremont-Promontory-Plains Relation
ships in Northern Utah." AmericanJoumal ojArch",·
ology 71(4):426-427.
Wendorf, Fred, and Erik K. Reed
1955
An Alternative Reconstruction of Northern l~",
Grande Prehistory. El Palacio 62(5-6):131-173.
Wormington, H. M.
1955
A Reappraisal of the Fremont Culture. D",,1'rI
Museum oj Natural History Proceedings 1.
Wright, Gary A.
1978
The Shoshonean Migration Problem. Plaim AT/fill"
pologist 23(80): 113-137.