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“Santa Cruz de Terrenate and Pitaitutgam Archaeological Sites” Tour
October 17, 2020 @ 9:00 am - 4:00 pm
On Saturday, October 17, 2020, join Old Pueblo Archaeology Center’s “Santa Cruz de Terrenate and Pitaitutgam Archaeological Sites” tour with archaeologist Dr. Deni J. Seymour, starting at the Chevron station at AZ-90/AZ-82 intersection in Whetstone, Arizona. There is a requested $50 donation ($40 for Old Pueblo Archaeology Center and Friends of Pueblo Grande Museum members) helps cover Old Pueblo’s tour expenses and supports its education programs about archaeology and traditional cultures.
Santa Cruz de Terrenate is the best-preserved example of three presidios (forts) established by the eighteenth-century Spanish colonial government in what is now southern Arizona, to provide military protection to the missions, settlers, and Christianized Native Americans of New Spain. The presidio housed soldiers, civilians, Ópata scouts, O’odham laborers, and domestic servants of a variety of origins from December 1775 until it was abandoned in March 1780. Pitaitutgam is the site of a large Sobaípuri O’odham village that was occupied off and on for centuries. The first-ever Sobaípuri archaeological site identified and excavated (during the 1950s), it was the place Father Kino called Santa Cruz del Pitaitutgam. Our tour guide Dr. Deni Seymour recently carried out new excavations at both of these sites, clarifying new ideas about the Sobaípuri O’odham, their village layouts, length of occupation in the San Pedro valley, and many other issues of current interest.
Donations for the tour are due 10 days after reservation request or by 5 p.m. Wednesday October 14, whichever is earlier: 520-798-1201 or info@oldpueblo.org.
Flyer: 20201017(V2)TerrenateAndPitaitutgamArchaeologicalSitesTour Flyer
Before going on the tour, registrants are encouraged to attend Dr. Seymour’s “Revisiting Santa Cruz de Terrenate Presidio” free Zoom presentation starting at 7 p.m. Arizona/Mountain Standard Time on Thursday October 15 to get background information about Terrenate that she will not have time to explain in detail during the October 17 tour: Click here to see the flyer for the October 15 Zoom talk.