Archaeological Research Facility

The analysis here of 21 obsidian cruciforms, and one cruciform produced from a volcanic or plutonic rock, from archaeological sites presumably from southern New Mexico and northern Chihuahua indicates a diverse provenance assemblage dominated by the northern Chihuahuan obsidian source at Sierra Fresnal (Shackley 2005). The remainder of the artifacts are produced from one of the sources in the Jemez Mountains of northern New Mexico, but likely procured from Rio Grande Quaternary alluvium (see Church 2000; Shackley 2021). A brief discussion is offered below.