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An Appraisal of Michael Zeilik's “A Reassessment of the Fajada Butte Solar Marker”

Michael Zeilik has recently re-examined part of our evidence for the astronomical significance of the three-slab site on Fajada Butte in Chaco Canyon, New Mexico (Zeilik, 1985b). At this prehistoric site three rock slabs form light-andshadow patterns on two carved spirals. Six distinctive markings on the spirals record the solstices and equinoxes (Sofaer et al., 1979) and the lunar extremes (Sofaer et al., 1982). On the same butte there are seven further markings at two other sites, that record the solstices and equinoxes at meridian passage (Sofaer and Sinclair, 1984; in press). Dr Zeilik does not contradict our evidence, nor does he present further data, but rather propounds a narrow interpretation of the three-slab site to the exclusion of other equally plausible explanations. We will first examine his method of analysis and point out shortcomings, and then show a number of errors and omissions in his paper that weaken his arguments. To reassess the three-slab site, Dr Zeilik takes particular practices of the historic (postA.D. 1880) Pueblos as the "cultural context" (pp. S82, S83)* against which to test specific hypotheses of prehistoric practices (c. A.D. 1000). However the paper that Dr Zeilik cites as the primary reference (Ellis, 1975) "for the continuity of the Puebloan astronomical calendar" (p. S69) explicitly reaches an opposite conclusion (p. 84): "[T]he use of celestial observations ... may have been appreciably more elaborate in late pre-Hispanic times than after its integrity and integration were appreciably broken by a long combination of Spanish and then of Anglo force and persuasive influence." More generally, Dr Zeilik's assumption that "this [historic] astronomical tradition holds in its general character back to prehistoric times" (p. S69) does not allow for the welldocumented changes and disruptions that characterized the intervening millenium (see, for example: Berry, 1982; Cordell, 1984; Upham, 1984). While general insights into prehistoric cosmology can be gained from the historic Pueblo cosmology, specific practices cannot be validated or invalidated by comparison with the historic record. For example, while we find general parallels between the intense interest expressed by the historic Pueblo people in the cycles of the sun and moon, including shadow-and-light markings of the solstices in buildings and on ceremonial objects, we do not find such markings on rock art reported in the historic Pueblo record. The absence of such an explicit correspondence does not invalidate our interpretation of the phenomena on Fajada Butte. Furthermore the general concepts of the sun and moon held by Pueblo people give an important support to this interpretation. We have presented evidence that the three-slab site contains markings of the limits of the 18.6-year lunar standstill cycle (Sofaer et al., 1982; Sofaer and Sinclair, in press). Dr Zeilik, however, concludes that "the case for lunar standstill alignments fails to have support from ethnographic grounds" (p. S84) because there is no evidence that the historic Pueblos a thousand years later