Pueblo Indian, Any of the historic descendants of the prehistoric Ancestral Pueblo (Anasazi) peoples who have for centuries lived in settled pueblos in what is now northeastern Arizona and northwestern New Mexico, U.S. The contemporary pueblos are divided into eastern and western. The eastern group includes settlements along the Rio Grande in New Mexico (most notably Taos Pueblo), while the western group includes the Hopi villages of northeastern Arizona and the Zuni, Acoma, and Laguna villages of northwestern New Mexico. The original Pueblo culture was characterized by both agriculture and the hunting of deer and antelope. Today agriculture predominates. Modern Pueblo social life centres on the village. Pueblo Indians have retained their pre-Spanish way of life to a surprising degree. Even though they have added to their inventory of material goods, the basic fabric of the Pueblo social system—and especially the emphasis on kinship, community, and traditional religion—has survived. Early 21st-century population estimates indicated some 74,000 Pueblo individuals.
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