ORCA distributes a variety of archaeological contexts produced by other organizations. ORCA also hosts Reviews in Colorado Archaeology (RCA), which publishes updated syntheses, reviews, thematic studies, and methodological primers for archaeologists and historic preservationists working in Colorado and surrounding regions. History Colorado also hosts a number of context documents that can be found here. Also visit the Library and Water in the West on ORCA to see additional useful resources. 

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CCPA Contexts

In 1999, the Colorado Council of Professional Archaeologists released a series of archaeological context documents for the five major river basins in Colorado--the Northern Colorado, Platte, Arkansas, Rio Grande, and Southern Colorado. These were followed in 2007 by a statewide historical archaeological context. These documents provide a great starting point for archaeologists, avocationals, and educators; however, with publication costs rising and demand for print versions waning, the CCPA Executive Committee voted in 2023 to host digital versions of these documents on ORCA. Read more about the contexts and the future updates in the first article of RCA here. 

Download Notes: Complete (low resolution) volumes are provided when possible. Due to file size limits, some volumes are split into two or more parts; these can be downloaded and combined with Adobe Acrobat or similar PDF software.  

 Northern Colorado River Basin // Platte River Basin // Arkansas River Basin // Rio Grande River Basin // Southern Colorado River Basin // Historical Context

 

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Northern Colorado River Basin

Title	Author	File Size
Colorado Prehistory: A Context for the Northern Colorado River Basin	Reed and Metcalf	28.3 MB

 

Platte River Basin

Title	Author	File Size
Colorado Prehistory: A Context for the Platte River Basin PART I (Chapters 1-5)	Gilmore, Tate, Chenault, Clark, McBride, and Wood	18.7 MB
Colorado Prehistory: A Context for the Platte River Basin PART II (Chapters 6-8)	Gilmore, Tate, Chenault, Clark, McBride, and Wood	25.6 MB

 

Arkansas River Basin

Title	Authors	File Size
Colorado Prehistory: A Context for the Arkansas River Basin	Zier and Kalasz	40.2 MB

 

Rio Grande River Basin

Title	Authors	File Size
Colorado Prehistory: A Context for the Rio Grande Basin	Martorano, Jodry, Spero, and Taylor	28.7 MB

 

Southern Colorado River Basin

Title	Author(s)	File Size
Front Matter and Chapter 1: Introduction	Lipe	14.7 MB
Chapter 2: Environment	Adams and Petersen	20.7 MB
Chapter 3: History of Archaeology	Lipe	28.0 MB
Chapter 4: Paleoindian and Archaic Periods	Lipe and Pitblado	22.1 MB
Chapter 5: Basketmaker II	Lipe	18.8 MB
Chapter 6: Basketmaker III	Wilshusen	17.9 MB
Chapter 7: Pueblo I	Wilshusen	24.2 MB
Chapter 8: Pueblo II	Lipe and Varien	26.1 MB
Chapter 9: Pueblo III	Lipe and Varien	32.0 MB
Chapter 10: Post-Puebloan	Wilshusen and Towner	10.9 MB
Chapter 11: Native American Issues and Perspectives	Varien, Naranjo, Connolly, and Lipe	23.5 MB
Chapter 12: Concluding Comments	Lipe	19.6 MB
References Cited		37.2 MB
Appendix A: Annotated Bibliography		25.1 MB

 

Colorado Historical Context

Title	Authors	File Size
Colorado History: A Context for Historical Archaeology	Church, Baker, Clark, Carillo, Horn, Späth, Guilfoyle, and Cassells	9.8 MB

Northern Colorado River Basin // Platte River Basin // Arkansas River Basin // Rio Grande River Basin // Southern Colorado River Basin

 

CCPA Occasional Papers

Occasional Paper No. 1 (1988): Archaeology of the Eastern Ute: A Symposium

Occasional Paper No. 2 (1995): Archaeological Pottery of Colorado: Ceramic Clues to the Prehistoric and Protohistoric Lives of the State's Native People

 

Other Contexts

Synthetic Cultural Resource Overview of the Bureau of Land Management’s Royal Gorge Field Office, Eastern Colorado (2017, Alpine Archaeological Consultants, Inc.)

The BLM hired Alpine to complete a Class I overview and synthesis of cultural resources within the administrative boundary of the Royal Gorge Field Office (RGFO), which encompasses the entire eastern half of Colorado. The overview presents a synthetic description of the prehistoric archaeology of the RGFO. This is accomplished through concise summaries of the salient data presented in the 1999 prehistoric contexts for the Arkansas and Platte river basins, with accompanying discussions of archaeological work conducted since the publication of the contexts. The discussions are organized by problem domains such as chronology, technology, settlement patterns, interregional relationships, and subsistence, focusing on data gaps and the implications of recently obtained archaeological data. The resulting synthesis refines the models of prehistoric occupation of the region as presented in the 1999 contexts. In addition to the prehistoric synthesis, the document includes a lengthy chapter describing historical cultural resources present on BLM-managed lands within the RGFO. The information in the historical chapter provides context for archaeologists and historians working in the RGFO and includes discussions of data gaps and suggestions for future research.