Prehistory and the Traditions of the O'Odham and Hopi

The oral traditions and ceremonial practices of the O'Odham and Hopi people suggest the outlines of a reconstruction of events in the Southwest in late prehistory, and offer insight into the processes that influenced important changes during this period. For many decades anthropologists have attempted to identify ties between prehistoric and historic populations in the Southwest. In central and southern Arizona, the material culture and social and economic organization of the late prehistoric populations and those found by the Spanish in the 1500s differ markedly. As a consequence, archaeologists have disagreed about relationships between the prehistoric and historic people of the region. The O'Odham and Hopi oral traditions are consistent with other forms of evidence available to us, including archaeological and linguistic data, and provide insight into processes that might have influenced the profound changes in social and economic organization that are apparent at that time.