Sisyphus Shelter facts for kids

Sisyphus Shelter is an ancient place where people used to live a long time ago. It's an archaeological site that was found in Colorado. Workers discovered it when they were building I-70, a big highway.

Finding this site led to a special project. The Colorado Department of Highways teamed up with the Bureau of Land Management to dig up and study the area. The digging work finished in 1980. Archaeologists like John Gooding and Wm. Lane Shields, along with many others, carefully uncovered the site.

During their work, they found 26 things made by humans. They also found many stone tools and two items that could break easily. These items seemed to be from the Late Archaic period. This means they are very old! Scientists used special tests to find out how old the items were. The oldest things found were about 4400 years old. The archaeologists think that people didn't live in the shelter all the time. They probably came and went depending on the seasons.

Where is Sisyphus Shelter?

Sisyphus Shelter was found because the new path for I-70 was going right through it. This site is a rock shelter. Imagine a natural cave or overhang made by rocks. Sisyphus Shelter actually has two parts, with a natural wall of fallen rocks around them.

It is located in Garfield County, Colorado. This area is part of the Grand Valley. It's about halfway between two towns, Rifle and Grand Junction. The shelter is about 1570 meters (or 5151 feet) above sea level.

Two important natural landmarks are close by. Battlement Mesa is about 11 kilometers (7 miles) to the southeast. The Colorado River is even closer, about 1.5 kilometers (0.9 miles) to the southeast. Archaeologists compared Sisyphus Shelter to other nearby sites. These included the DeBeque Rockshelter, which is also a rock shelter, and the Kewclaw Site, which was an open pit-house.

What was the Environment Like?

The area around Sisyphus Shelter has a special kind of forest. It's called a pinyon-juniper woodland. Here, you'd mostly see Utah Juniper trees and Pinyon Pine trees. There are also plants like big sagebrush and Mormon Tea.

Closer to the Colorado River, there's a different kind of forest. It's a cottonwood forest with rabbitbrush and skunkbrush plants. North of the shelter, on gentle slopes, you'd find more big sagebrush.

Rocks and Landforms

The ground in this area is mostly made of tan sandstone with gray shale rocks mixed in. This type of rock often forms slopes and creates a landscape called "badlands." Rock shelters, like Sisyphus Shelter and DeBeque Rockshelter, often form in these kinds of rocky areas. Sisyphus Shelter itself is made of gray to tan sandstone. Below this sandstone, there is green mudstone.

Climate and Water

Because the shelter is close to the Colorado River, plants and animals in the area get some moisture. However, the climate in this part of Colorado is semi-arid, which means it's quite dry. The amount of rain can change a lot.

Temperatures in the area usually range from about 20°C (68°F) in July to -6°C to -8°C (17-21°F) in January. The archaeologists noted that the shelter itself would have been warmer. This is because it faces south, catching more sunlight. Before they started digging, scientists took samples from the site. They looked for things like pollen and other materials that could be carbon dated. This helped them learn about the ancient environment and when people lived there.

What Did They Find?

At Sisyphus Shelter, archaeologists found different kinds of items. These included stone tools, projectile points (like arrowheads and spearheads), and two items that don't last long, called perishable items. Most of the things found, about 99%, were made of stone.

These artifacts were found at different depths in the ground. The deepest level was called Level I, and the level closest to the surface was Level X.

The archaeologists also found special features. These were things like hearths (old fireplaces), two pits, and a set of three post holes arranged like a tripod. They also found one larger area that was likely a living space. All the artifacts and samples from Sisyphus Shelter are now kept at the University of Colorado Museum of Natural History.

Stone Tools and Points

The stone tools and projectile points were made from different types of rock. These included chalcedony, chert, quartzite, metasediment, and sandstone. Most of the 23 projectile points were made from chert or chalcedony. Only two were made from quartzite.

Among the stone tools, they found a few biface knives. "Biface" means the edges were shaped on both sides. These knives were also made from chert or chalcedony.

The stone artifacts were grouped into different types based on what they were used for:

• Cutting tools: These were the most common, with 131 pieces. They included 23 projectile points, 37 knives, 13 tools that could do many things, 20 blades, 3 backed blades, 2 drills, and 33 broken biface pieces.
• Scraping tools: There were 31 of these. They were used for different purposes, and the scraping edge was in different places on the tools.
• Incising tools: These were the fewest, with 22 pieces. They were used for making cuts or marks.
• Striking tools: Used for hitting or pounding.
• Flakes: Many small pieces of stone, called flakes, were also found. These were used for various tasks.

Perishable Items

The two perishable items found at Sisyphus Shelter were a piece of basketry and a part of an arrow shaft. The archaeologists believe these items came from the last time people lived at the site, about 580 to 520 years ago.

They couldn't figure out what material the arrow shaft was made of. However, a strong collar around the end of the arrow (called the nock) was made of yucca plant fibers. The basketry piece was also made from yucca.

Hearths and Structures

Most of the hearths (fireplaces) and the tripod were found near the main living structure. This living structure was the largest feature at the site.

The tripod was not connected to any of the hearths. So, archaeologists think it wasn't used for cooking. Instead, they guess it might have been used as a type of backrest, like those used by Native American groups in the past.

Two pits were also found. Archaeologists don't think these pits were used for fire. One seemed to be a storage pit, where people might have kept things. The other was an ash pit, likely for disposing of ashes from fires.

In total, 18 hearths were found at many different levels of the site. This shows that people lived there at various times. The hearths were either surface hearths (built on the ground) or basin hearths (dug into the ground). Basin hearths were more common and seemed more advanced.