When Earl Morris excavated the Aztec West great house at Aztec Ruins, he found a number of black smudged vessels that stand out from the rest of the assemblage, which he identified as tradeware from the Mogollon region to the south. More recent excavation has identified a few more examples, and it has also become clear that some of these black pots were locally made. In this project undertaken with Lori Stephens Reed of Aztec Ruins National Monument, we have analyzed and identified all the known black smudged vessels at Aztec and at the American Museum of Natural History. These vessels are found in some of the latest deposits at Aztec, from the late 1200s CE, and we seek to consider the contexts and meanings of these unique vessels in a time when people were beginning to migrate away from the region.