A Report of Archaeological Excavations at Antelope Cave and Rock Canyon Shelter, Northwestern Arizona OP #19 (Volume 19) (Occasional Papers)

The northwestern corner of Arizona, known as the Arizona strip, is an area of geographic and political isolation. Archaeological work conducted in this area has been limited. Given these facts, it was with enthusiasm that the Office of Public Archaeology (OPA) at Brigham Young University (BYU) entered into a cooperative agreement with the Arizona Strip District of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to assess two sites on the Uinkaret Plateau--Antelope Cave and Rock Canyon Shelter--deemed significant by BLM personnel and to complete analyses of data recovered from Antelope Cave in the 1950s. Assessment of Antelope Cave and Rock Canyon Shelter consisted of tests conducted at each of these sites under the guidance of fundamental research questions related to chronology, subsistence, settlement, and paleoenvironments. The original intent of this project was to supplement the scanty knowledge of the prehistory of this area and to begin some limited regional and site specific research on the Uinkaret Plateau. As part of the BLM/BYU cooperative agreement, it was proposed that the BLM survey the area within a 10 km radius of Antelope Cave for the purpose of locating sites that would assist in establishing patterns in resource procurement amongst the regions ancient inhabitants.