Southwest Archaeology Today for Jan 11, 2006

Archaeology Making the News – A Service of the Center for Desert Archaeology

– National Geographic Illustrates a “Prehistoric Baby Boom”: A new study of prehistoric cemeteries in North America is adding weight to the theory that the development of agriculture helped fuel baby booms around the world. According to the theory, populations swell when societies shift from a nomadic hunter-gatherer lifestyle to one based on the more sedentary routine of farming. Staying put allows women to have more babies, and a farming economy provides more food to support the growing population, explained Jean-Pierre Bocquet-Appel, a researcher at the National Center for Scientific Research in Paris.
http://tinyurl.com/97tsa – National Geographic

– Excavations Continue on the Tucson Presidio: This historic ground was just another paved lot for parking cars only a month ago. Today, the dusty parcel southwest of Church Avenue and Washington Street is a window to thousands of years of local human history and a glimpse into downtown Tucson’s future.
http://www.tucsoncitizen.com/news/local/010906a2_ct_rionuevo:

– Museum of Northern Arizona offers Saturday and Sunday Lectures as part of the “Stories on Stone Exhibit: Upcoming lectures include – “A Fragile Antiquity: Photographic Documentation of Endangered Rock Art.” Saturday, January 14th. by Evelyn Billo and Dr. Robert Mark, Rupestrian CyberServices Rock art is sensitive to the slow forces of erosion from wind, water, and sunlight. These natural processes are slow, but rock art is being lost at ever increasing rates due to vandalism, theft, and thoughtless acts. Therefore, we protect these stories on stone by recording rock art and in some cases “bringing it back” digitally so that this valuable legacy is not lost to future generations. On Sunday, January 15, Don Keller, Archaeological Educator and Wilderness Guide, Museum of Northern Arizona will present “Prehistoric Settlement and Rock Art in the Escalante River Region: Fremont, Archaic, and Anasazi.”
http://www.musnaz.org/exhibits/StoriesOnStone2.html#0114

– Public Lectures Offered in Tucson: A weekly series of free historical lectures begins Saturday as a prelude to the Feb. 11 annual La Reuni