Pottery type
Cibola White Ware
Cibola White Ware700 - 1300 A.D.Ancestral Puebloan PotteryKey facts
- Age
- 700 - 1300 A.D.
- Cultural period
- Ancestral Puebloan Pottery
- Material
- Low-iron, fine clay bodies that fire to light gray, white, or buff, tempered with fine to medium quartz sand. Designs are usually painted in iron-oxide mineral pigments that fire black to dark brown depending on the firing atmosphere.
Description
Fine, light gray to buff-bodied pottery with a white to pale slip and black mineral-paint designs. Decoration commonly uses banded layouts with hatched triangles, stepped elements, and rectilinear motifs. Forms include bowls, jars, mugs, and seed jars typical of late Pueblo II–III Ancestral Puebloan villages.
Size
Bowls commonly range from 15–30 cm in rim diameter and 8–15 cm deep. Jars are typically 20–40 cm tall with rim diameters of 15–25 cm. Mugs and seed jars are smaller, often 10–20 cm high.
Distribution
Produced primarily on the Colorado Plateau of eastern Arizona and western New Mexico and widely traded into the Northern Rio Grande and adjacent regions.
Mainly found in
Additional information
Cibola White Ware is the dominant decorated ware over much of eastern Arizona and western New Mexico from Pueblo II into Pueblo III and is a major trade ware in surrounding regions. It includes many named types (e.g., Red Mesa, Gallup, Chaco, Reserve) and is central for dating late Ancestral Puebloan sites.