Dolores Archaeological Program Technical Reports, DAP-028: Excavations at Dos Casas Hamlet (Site 5Mt2193), a Basketmaker III / Pueblo I Habitation Site

Dos Casas Hamlet (Site 5MT2193) is a small Basketmaker III/Pueblo I Anasazi site located approximately 8 km northwest of the town of Dolores, Montezuma County, Colorado. During the summer of 1978, the University of Colorado excavated the site as part of first-year operations associated with the Dolores Cultural Resources Mitigation Program. These investigations recorded two prehistoric pithouses and an arc of associated surface rooms and outdoor occupation areas to the north at Site 5MT2193. The pithouses are aligned north-south with the ventilator tunnel of the northern structure dug through the northern wall of the southern structure, indicating that two occupations, or elements, were present, perhaps both using the same group of surface facilities. These two hypothetical elements are borne out by the tree-ring dates recovered from the two pithouses. The more southerly house (Pithouse 1) was constructed around A.D. 760 and Pithouse 2 was constructed approximately 10 years later, about A.D. 770. The site is located in the Sagehen Flats Locality, Escalante Sector, Yellowjacket District, and was occupied during the Sagehen Phase (A.D. 600-850). The site is classified as a small hamlet or semipermanent to permanent habitation and is inferred to have been the abode of a family unit (perhaps six to nine individuals) practicing small-scale agriculture in the local area. This family is postulated to have been one social unit of the West Sagehen Neighborhood, a local dispersed Anasazi community inhabiting the area in the eighth century A.D.

Dos Casas Hamlet, Site 5MT2193, was selected for excavation by the Dolores Archaeological Program (D.A.P.) because initial survey reports and later field inspections indicated that the site offered an opportunity to study a small Sagehen Phase (Basketmaker III-Pueblo I period) habitation site. Sites of the "hamlet" type such as Site 5MT2193 are the most numerous site type represented in the Sagehen Flats Locality of the D.A.P. project area; additional information about this site type should lead to a clearer understanding of the local Sagehen Phase community. Like most of the sites in the Sagehen Flats Locality, Dos Casas Hamlet has been disturbed by recent agricultural and grazing activities. Jacal rubble distributed over the surface of the site suggested that surface structures, as well as pitstructures, might have been present at one time. The large quantity of jacal rubble present was unique to Site 5MT2193. It was expected that preservation of these different types of structures at this site would allow information to be collected on site layout, use areas and houses, activity areas, and on the functions of such cultural loci.

Originally the information in this record was migrated into tDAR from the National Archaeological Database Reports Module (NADB-R) and updated. In 2015, as part of its effort to improve tDAR content, the Center for Digital Antiquity uploaded a copy of the document and further improved the record metadata.