A new immersion center in Arkansas City is highlighting a settlement that has been called one of the most influential cities in ancient North America.
Some estimates say the city of Etzanoa housed up to 20,000 ancestors of the Wichita Tribe in a complex society. It flourished along the Walnut River from about 1450 to 1700.
The settlement dispersed as Europeans took over the area. However, Etzanoa refused to remain buried.
People in Arkansas City always suspected the area had a large indigenous population. They kept finding arrowheads, bits of pottery and tools.
“People have been finding artifacts in this area since the 1880s,” Etzanoa Conservancy director Georgia Zavala said. “They would plow, and then they'd get stone tools pulling up in their field.”
The story of Etzanoa involves Spanish conquistadors, buried artifacts and an advanced city that challenges common assumptions about how people lived on the Great Plains. But most of all, it involves the Wichita Tribe, whose ancestors built Etzanoa.
Today, the tribe is headquartered in Anadarko, Oklahoma. But their name remains associated with many things in Kansas, including the largest city in the state.
“You can ask people in Wichita, Kansas, and there are so many people who don't know Wichita is a tribe of people,” tribe member Derek Ross said in an interview.
The research in Arkansas City isn’t new information to the Wichita Tribe.
“I'm 62 years old. I've been Wichita all my life,” Ross said. “So I'm knowledgeable about our language, our customs, our heritage and our history. It's not a surprise to me what information people are learning about today.”
Spanish explorers set out across the Great Plains looking for cities of gold and large populations of Native Americans. Conquistadors encountered the city and called it Etzanoa, or The Great Settlement.
These explorers kept detailed notes of their expeditions and encounters with the indigenous people.
The Etzanoa population figure of 20,000 is based on these Spanish expeditions. Some scholars think the Spanish were over exaggerating the population. Others say the large amount of artifacts being found around Arkansas City supports their claim.
After decades of confusion about the orientation of the Spanish maps, archeologists determined Etzanona was centered around Arkansas City.
Wichita State University archeologist Donald Blakeslee used this new understanding of the Spanish maps to start digging in the area. These digs have found evidence of conflicts between Spanish conquistadors and native populations detailed in the notes.
Further investigations, like drone surveys, revealed large earthworks buried around the area. These explorations, along with the consistent flow of artifacts, give a better picture of life at Etzanoa.
That picture challenges several long-held views of Native Americans in the Great Plains. The people of Etzanoa weren’t nomadic hunters and gatherers, but had a complex community and agriculture.
“In order to have a city of 20,000 people, that would require government discipline, structure, social services, education,” Ross said. “When people think about Native Americans, they think about people who are randomly roaming about the prairie.”
Etzanoans lived in grass houses with crops between the residences. They produced enough food, tools and clothing to support the large population.
“Obviously, they hunted bison primarily, and they would sometimes have to travel to find herds for that,” Zavala said. “They practiced agriculture year round, growing corn, squash, pumpkins, as well as sunflowers.”
Along with agriculture, they had a form of centralized government and managed extensive trade routes.
Objects made from materials not usually found in the Great Plains, like obsidian and turquoise, appear at the site. Buffalo pelts were found as far away from Europe, suggesting the Etzanoans traded with incoming explorers.
The artifacts reveal an advanced civilization. Ross said often people think of Native Americans dancing around a campfire, when Etzanoa tells a different story.
“That's people homeschooling their children. That's people raising families. That's people providing social services, probably welfare,” Ross said. “The same things that you would find in Washington, D.C., today were found in the governments and the leadership of Native American tribes.”
The conservancy opened the new immersion center in Arkansas City in June. It aims to educate people about Etzanoa, the city’s rediscovery and its people. The center features informational displays, virtual reality tours and nature trails.
Zavala hopes to eventually build an amphitheater to tell the Wichita Tribe’s story since Etzanoa. She said it’s important for the tribe to be involved.
“People have been living in this area for thousands of years,” Zavala said. “The immersion center is only looking at a small scope of that time period. It's important to acknowledge that we're not the first people here. We won't be the last.”
Ross is currently building a grass house at the immersion center to demonstrate how his ancestors lived. Like most of Etzanoa, it’s a feat of engineering. Made of cedar poles and covered with blue stem grass, the houses were designed to shed water and insulate.
He hopes the story told at Etzanoa is not only looking to the past. The Wichita people continue to contribute to American society. They aren’t just confined to the Great Plains or Anadarko, Oklahoma.
“Etzanoa is a story of resilience, and it's a story of forgiveness and it's a story of moving forward,” Ross said. “All the Indians went away, is what kind of people think. But Native American people, particularly my family and our tribe, are a meaningful part of the world that's going on today.”
Roger Nomer reports from the Wichita area for the Kansas News Service. You can email him at nomer@kmuw.org.
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