In southwestern New Mexico, in the town of Silver City, below the Gila Mountains lies one of the greatest collections of Mimbres pottery I’ve ever seen and it’s in the Western New Mexico University Museum. It isn’t only filled with Mimbres pottery though. There’s also Mesa Verde Black on White, Salado, Casas Grandes style ceramics, and more. Beyond ceramics, the small museum is also filled with pendants, mugs, sandals, effigies, bowls, rope, a bow, arrows, axes, crystals, turquoise, children’s toys, baskets, carved bone, and so much more. There were quite a few artifacts I had never seen and was thoroughly impressed with the massive collection. The museum does a really good job of highlighting the stylistic changes that happens in each Mimbres sequence and it provides plaques that describe what’s happening as well. The museum even has a small exhibit talking about how the Ancient Ones brewed beer before contact with European contact! It is absolutely worth checking out the strange cultural revolution that was Mimbres style pottery with its focus on animals and humans instead of just designs.

Listen to my podcast episodes which mention the Mimbres, their pottery, the migrations involving them, and this revolution of culture and possibly religion.