......So please site some evidence of the “wide spread commerce” you speak of......
The reference is “The History of the Ancient Southwest” by Stephen H. Lekson. This is an excellent book that deals with the history of the Anasazi, the Hohokem and the Mogollon peoples that had large populations and cities in the Colorado Plateau, the Phoenix basin and the highlands in between.
They were contemporary but separate societies and were also contemporary and known to trade with the folks at Cahokia.
His thesis is “Every body knew everything” and “Distance was not a problem”
You are correct in the people of our south west were not Aztecs but they knew of the societies further south and there was trade.
Stephen Lekson has spent his dues time in the field and his work gathers all the work of the southwestern archeologists from the beginning to the present and connects the dots. Most south western archeology work is site specific and the investigators concern themselves with their own little patch of dirt. He takes a much broader scale in both time and distance in pulling it all together.
His book consists of about 250 pages of narrative and another 250 pages of notes. He writes in a very unstuffy manner and is a joy to read. I have been reading about the area for years and find his book to hands down be the best.
“This is an excellent book that deals with the history of the Anasazi, the Hohokem and the Mogollon peoples that had large populations and cities in the Colorado Plateau, the Phoenix basin and the highlands in between”
What you site is a study that suggests “widespread” inter-tribal trade across the southwest and north of the Rio Grande.
You suggested, in your original comment, that the widespread trade was with groups south of the Rio Grande.
I continue to contend, as I said, the tribal groups in the southwest and north of the Rio Grande, had awareness of and contact with groups far south of the Rio Grande, but THAT contact did not constitute “widespread trade” from north to south of the Rio Grande. The vastly more correct “widespread” thesis is ACROSS the southwest, north of the Rio Grande, as study you cited suggests.