Anasazi

Anasazi Pottery

In this case, Anasazi is a "form" of design that traces its lineage through Chaco Canyon, the Four Corners region, northern New Mexico, northeastern Arizona, and southern Colorado and Utah. Some of the designs are also termed "Cibola", "Kayenta" or "Tsegi". Some can be traced to the Fremont people who lived west of the Colorado River and north of the Virgin River.

There are designs in their palette that are older yet, some traced to South America and the time of great pyramid and platform building in the deserts of Peru (3000-1500 BCE), and some traced to Teotihuacan in central Mexico (about 0 CE).

As a term, "Anasazi" has fallen out of favor as it's a Dineh word that translates loosely as "hated ancestors of our enemies." The more preferred term these days is "Ancestral Puebloans." That said, Anasazi has stuck as a definition of certain styles of pottery and their accompanying design palette. Primarily, Anasazi pottery has black designs on bisque white clay. The black was achieved using a vegetal paint and then firing the pottery in a reduction atmosphere (which was often achieved by turning the bowls painted with designs inside, upside-down in the fire).

Anasazi designs are primarily geometric patterns. On pottery, they tend to repeat in two- or four-panel designs around an interior or exterior, or both.