Home > Sinagua > Architecture > Pottery > Tools > Food > Agriculture > Trade > Hopi Oral History

How do we know what the Sinagua ate? Archaeologists record, collect, analyze, and interpret the paleoethnobotanical and faunal remains found in the prehistoric middens , hearths, or any other feature containing ancient food debris.

To collect the ancient food remains, archaeologists must carefully screen and float the dirt from these features and remove the delicate (often burned) food parts. During analysis, the archaeologist counts how many pieces of food (usually consisting of burnt seeds, bone, and corn cobs) and further examines the locations where they were found. In doing so, they can figure out how and where food was processed, prepared, thrown away, or left unused. Additionally, osteologists and paleopathologists look at the bones of the ancient skeletons to investigate how much of and what the farmers were lacking in their current diets.

The Sinagua were primarily farmers supplementing their crops by hunting and gathering. The ancient farmers grew and ate corn, beans, and squash. The immediate surroundings augmented their diet with wild weedy plants and game such as deer, antelope, rabbit, bear, muskrat, turtle, and duck.