Salado and Sinagua: The Prehistories of Two Unique Native American Cultures Living in the Southwest

At Tonto National Monument out in Roosevelt, Arizona there are two 700-year-old cliff dwellings that watch over the desert paradise nestled in the valley basin below. A long time ago, before the arrival of the Spaniards, a group known as the Salado Culture settled their and made their homes in these cliff dwellings that visitors far and wide still travel to see. To this day their origin and disappearance remain a mystery that baffles park archeologists, but some of their cultural dynamics were clear.

They arrived in the Tonto Basin circa 1250 CE and left around 1450. Unlike the cultures of the Northern Plains Native Americans, the Salado were able to stay in a single place for greater lengths of time due to their dry farming and irrigation practices which helped supply them with food and fiber. Hunting and gathering were also practiced in order to obtain food. Men and boys participated in the hunting and farming while women participated in the gathering. 

From the plants in their surrounding environment the Salado were able to fashion everything they needed in order to survive from clothes to tools. Paints and clays were collected from around and inside the caves where they built their dwellings for producing their world-renowned polychrome pottery. Homes were built two-stories high and directly atop one another with a single room housing one family. 

However, the Salado were not the only Culture to inhabit the Southwestern United States. 150 miles north of Roosevelt lies the town of Camp Verde where Montezuma's caslte still majestically towers over the verde valley. Over 800 years ago the Sinagua Culture, whose name is Spanish for "without water", built their escaltated homes into the face of limestone cliffs that still overlooks the verde river. Like the Salado, the Sinagua also practiced dry farming and irrigation using the river as well as hunting and gathering. Their home was built on the convergence of an ecotone where juniper-pinyon woodlands mingle with desert-grasslands to create a lush fertile valley filled with food and other raw materials.

Paints and clays were collected from their surrounding geology and differ from the Salado in variation of color and style. While the Salado were reknowned for their Tonto Polychrome pottery which incompassed red, white, and black designs both inside and outside of their vessels, the Sinagua practiced the Polychrome black-on-yellow method where yellow served as the base paint covered in black designs. In addition to pottery, the architecture of the Sinagua was also unique from the Salado. Instead of building one house directly atop the other, the Sinagua built homes that were as many as five-stories high in shape of a staircase climbing up the cliffs. 

Archeological evidence indicates that interaction occurred between these two groups through trade goods such as salt. In addition, the Salado and Sinagua were also found to be multi-ethnic groups composed of Ancestral-Puebloan, Mogollon, and Hohokam cultures. Though their matieral culture slightly differs one thing that remains certain is that their dissapearances still remain one of the greatest mysteries of the southwest. 

References:

Daquila, C. and Hubbard, D. “What Does Salado Mean?” Southwest Learning. (6/19/2008).

Houk, R. Salado: Prehistoric Cultures of the Southwest. © 1992 Western National Parks Association. Tucson, AZ. Printed in Singapore. (1992).

Sinagua Exhibit at Montezuma Castle.