More Than Maize: Shell Ornaments from Early Agricultural Sites in the Tucson Basin, Arizona

New data from recent excavations of sites dating to the Early Agricultural Period (EAP) in the Tucson Basin (1200 B.C.-A.D. 50) are shedding light on a previously understudied aspect of the lifeways of the population living along the Santa Cruz River. The new information shows a difference in both shell species and ornament forms, especially during the Early Cienega phase (800-400 B.C.) of the EAP. While there is a continuation through time of many of the ornaments, there appears to be a distinction both temporally and contextually among populations living along the Santa Cruz River. The site of La Playa, Sonora, Mexico, is believed to be the source of most of the shell ornaments found in the Tucson Basin EAP sites, as they utilized their proximity to the Gulf of California.