The Timba-Sha Survey and Boundary Fencing Project: Archeological Investigations at Death Valley National Monument

In March 1984, the author and J. Michael Bremer, archeologists from the Western Archeological and Conservation Center, conducted two small archeological projects in Death Valley National Monument. The first consisted of a 200-acre land survey in and around Timba-Sha Indian village, which overlooks the salt pan in central Death Valley, California. The second consisted of data collection from four sites located in the Grapevine Mountains in southwest Nevada. Although the projects are geographically and environmentally distinct, both projects fall in a portion of the Great Basin utilized by the same cultural groups, and the sites dealt with illustrate this. For that reason, and because the projects were carried out in the same field project, they have been included in the same report.

However, each of the two projects was carried out for reasons of its own, and needed separate conclusions and recommendations. This report is, therefore, arranged into five sections. The background information pertinent to both projects will be presented after the introduction. In the next two sections, the two individual project reports will appear, containing information and results that are project specific. Finally, some concluding remarks tying the two projects together are presented in the fifth and final section of the report.