Great kivas as integrative architecture in the Silver Creek community, Arizona

Abstract

This thesis explores the relationship between circular great kiva sites in the Silver Creek area and counterparts in regions across the Southwest. Great kivas, as communal architecture, are important in community integration. Exploring their distribution through the variables of time, space and form helps us understand change in community integration. The patterns in the temporal and spatial distribution of the Silver Creek great kivas correspond to the patterning of these variables in the Upper Little Colorado region. The majority of Silver Creek great kivas appear in a period of westward population movement after A.D. 1000. The Silver Creek great kivas, do not, however, show the same range of formal variation. Since many of the changes in the Upper Little Colorado area are described as resolving problems of increasing population and aggregation, lower population densities in the Silver Creek area may explain the reduced formal variability of its great kivas.