Part 9 Summary and Analysis

In the Searching for Ancestors (1983), the author describes the beginnings of his search (through Northern Arizona in the company of a couple of noted scientists, including noted anthropologist Robert Euler) through the history of a prehistoric tribe of indigenous peoples known as the Anasazi, ancestors to (among others) the Hopi and Zuni. As he describes the commitment to thought, consideration and analysis practiced by Euler and other researchers, the author relates how he came to (realize? recall?) that the evidence the searchers are looking for and examining relates not only to what a people did, but who they were and what they believed, indicating a people with "an obvious and pervasive spiritual and aesthetic life."

The author then describes the process of walking through the area in which Anasazi settlements have been found and excavated, looking at things like the foraged...