THE RUINS OP SOUTHERN ARIZONA. 51 



large number of people dependent upon such products alone, for if such were the case, part 

 of the population would inevitably have starved in dry years. 



At the present time the region to the west of the Santa Cruz Valley is inhabited only 

 by Indians. They utihze what little water is to be found and carry on a Uttle hunting. A 

 large part of their sustenance, however, is derived from the cattle and horses introduced 

 from Europe. Besides this they have deep wells, a convenience unknown to the Hohokam 

 because of their lack of iron tools. Moreover, the modern Indians utilize wheat, barley, 

 and other plants introduced by the Spaniards; and, finally, they go out in hard times to 

 work in mines or in the towns of the white man. In spite of all the advantages which the 

 modern Indian has over the old Hohokam, the population of the Indian region west of the 

 Santa Cruz amounts to an average of only one per square mile, and could not be increased 

 greatly, if at all, without the introduction of some new means of livelihood. Take away 

 from the modern Indian his cattle, wells, wheat, and other results of the white man's 

 presence, and the population would be cut in half. No race, whether Hohokam or Indian, 

 could hope to exist in any but the scantiest numbers without the aid of irrigation. 



Coming back once more to the amount of irrigated land and the number of people 

 which it could support, we recall that 6,000 acres of good land under full cultivation would 

 support approximately 3,000 people under present conditions of agriculture. Primitive 

 methods of agriculture, however, as Professor Forbes puts it, without stock, wheat, wells, 

 or any means of raising water by mechanical power, such as the steam pumps which run 

 night and day on many farms, would by no means permit of one person for every two acres. 

 Russell gives some figures (pp. 86-8) as to the amount of land cultivated by the modern 

 Pimas. According to him each family cultivates from 1 to 5 acres of thoroughly ii-rigated 

 land. On the next page, however, he says that the individual holdings of each family 

 vary from 100 to 200 steps in width, according to the size of the family. He defines the 

 step as 5 feet, which would make the smallest plots 6 acres in size and the largest 25, so 

 we are left in doubt as to the actual amount under cultivation per individual. Moreover, 

 if we knew the amount of land per individual among the Pimas, we should still know 

 nothing as to the Hohokam, for the Pimas get at least half their living from the wliite 

 man's cattle, from government grants, from work in the towns, and from many sources 

 unknown to the Hohokam. Hence we come back to the figures of Professor Forbes. If 

 the white man with his steam pumps for irrigation and his iron tools for digging canals and 

 making dams can only cultivate 6,000 acres, the Hohokam could scarcely cultivate more. 

 If the white man with his winter wheat, his knowledge of fertilizers, and his domestic 

 animals for plowing and for utilizing hay, straw, and other materials inedible by man, 

 can support only 3,000 people, or one for every two acres, the primitive Hohokam, even 

 though his standard of hving was lower and he was aided by game and wild fruits, could 

 scarcely have made the same 6,000 acres support more than 4,500 people, or half as many 

 again as the white man's Umit. 



Granting that 4,000 or 5,000 is a reasonable maximum limit to the number of Hohokam 

 who could find a living in the Santa Cruz Valley under present climatic conditions, let us 

 next see where they would be located. Inasmuch as the location of the ruins and the 

 consensus of opinion among ethnologists prove that the Hohokam were preeminently an 

 agricultural race, they must have lived where both land and water were available. At 

 present about 1,500 of the 6,000 cultivable acres are at the Indian Reservation of San 

 Xavier, 9 miles up the Santa Cruz to the south of Tucson; 600 or 700 Indians now live 

 there, cultivating the land, raising cattle, and going out to the neighboring city to work. 

 In the days of the Hohokam a fairly dense population lived at San Xavier, as is proved by 

 various mins, including a large fort on the hilltop half a mile away from the present village. 

 (See Plate 2, b.) Around Tucson itself lies another irrigated tract embracing 2,000 or 

 more acres. We can not tell exactly how extensive an area was here occupied by the 



