Reyman is a retired professor of anthropology at Illinois State University, and served for over a decade as curator of the American Southwest, Mesoamerican, and South American collections at the Illinois State Museum. His book presents the results of his meticulous research, begun more than 50 years ago with his desire to examine “likely” Mesoamerican influences on Chaco Canyon through materials excavated by the Hyde Expedition (1896-1901), housed at the American Museum of Natural History and the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation. Finding many of the fieldnotes and key details of this expedition, the first large-scale excavation in Chaco Canyon, and other past investigations and stabilization projects at Chaco to be unpublished, his research eventually took him to 22 institutions across the U.S.
Reyman’s slim volume is packed with detailed information about Chaco burials and other insights gleaned from unpublished fieldnotes, diaries, and archaeological analyses, highlighting the great value of unpublished records housed in archives, museums, and libraries that contain essential primary data. Some of the early excavations at Chaco were solely focused on obtaining collections, with no thorough excavation of the rooms or accounting of human remains, and important data about these and other Chaco finds are revealed in unpublished fieldnotes. Reyman argues that the apparent lack of burials at Chaco is largely a problem of unpublished data, since the canyon supported thousands for at least three to four centuries. While the Chaco Digital Initiative at the University of Virginia is making much of the unpublished record for Chaco available, it is still a work in progress. Reyman’s examination of unpublished records, particularly those relating to Pueblo Bonito, Chaco’s largest and most thoroughly excavated site, provides new information regarding mortuary practices and suggests recent estimates of ancient Chacoan populations are too low, since they are largely based on the apparent paucity of burials there. His extensive appendices and photographs provide research resources and sensitive details about Chaco skeletal materials that some may find disturbing. A useful index and numerous site maps, illustrations, and field sketches are also included.
