Location: Chihuahua Map
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Paquime or Casas Grandes is an ancient archaeological site in the state of Chihuahua in Mexico constructed before the arrival of Columbus. It is added to the UNESCO World Heritage Site due to its historic and architectural importance. This is the largest adobe pueblo site in the region containing over 2000 rooms in total. Casas Grandes reached its political and economic peak between 1150 and 1450 AD with population reaching as many as 2500 people. Paquime or Casas Grandes Archaeological Site is designated as an UNESCO World Heritage Site due to its historic and architectural importance. This is the largest adobe pueblo site in the region containing over 2000 rooms in total. Casas Grandes reached its political and economic peak between 1150 and 1450 AD with population reaching as many as 2500 people.
Between CE 1130 and 1300, the area's inhabitants
began to congregate in small settlements in this wide fertile
valley. The largest identified settlement is known today as Paquimé
or Casas Grandes. It began as a group of 20 or more house clusters,
each with a plaza and enclosing wall. These single-story adobe
dwellings shared a common water system. Evidence shows that Paquimé
had a complex water control system that included underground drain
systems, reservoirs, channels for water to get to the homes, and a
sewage system.
After being burned about 1340, Casas Grandes
was rebuilt with multi-story apartment buildings to replace the
small buildings. Casas Grandes consisted of about 2,000 adjoining
rooms built of adobe, I-shaped Mesoamerican ballcourts, stone-faced
platforms, effigy mounds, and a market area. About 350 other,
smaller settlement sites have been found in the Casas Grandes area,
some as far as 70 kilometers (39 miles) away. Archaeologists believe
that the area directly controlled by Casas Grandes was relatively
small, extending out about 30 kilometres (19 mi) from the city. The
population may have been about 2,500 in Casas Grandes with perhaps
10,000 people living within its area of control.
Specialized
craft activities included the production of copper bells and
ornaments, extensive pottery, and beads from marine molluscs. These
crafts were probably distributed by an extensive trading network.
Casas Grandes pottery has a white or reddish surface, with
ornamentation in blue, red, brown, or black. It is sometimes
considered to be of better manufacture than the modern pottery in
the area. Effigy bowls and vessels were often formed in the shape of
a painted human figure. Casas Grandes pottery was traded among
prehistoric peoples as far north as present-day New Mexico and
Arizona and throughout northern Mexico.
The archaeologist
Stephen Lekson has noted that Paquimé is aligned on roughly the same
longitudinal axis as Chaco Canyon and Aztec Ruins, with an error of
only a few miles. Chaco reached its cultural peak first, then Aztec
and Paquimé. The similarities among these sites may indicate that
their ruling elites also had a ceremonial connection. Lekson
proposed that ruling elites, once removed from their prior positions
at Chaco, re-established their hegemony over the area at Aztec and
later Paquime. This idea, though, remains controversial and is not
as widely accepted as often reported (cf. Lekson 2009). It has been
proposed, and more widely accepted, that the origins of Paquime can
be found in its connection with the Mogollon culture.