A Study of Pueblo Architecture: Tusayan and Cibola: Eighth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1886-1887, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1891, pages 3-228Mindeleff, Cosmos
History
A Study of Pueblo Architecture: Tusayan and Cibola: Eighth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1886-1887, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1891, pages 3-228
Mindeleff, Cosmos
Pueblo Indians -- Antiquities; Pueblo architecture
The court or plaza in which the church (Pl. LXXX) stands is so much
larger than such inclosures usually are when incorporated in a pueblo
plan that it seems unlikely to have formed part of the original village.
It probably resulted from locating the church prior to the construction
of the eastern rows of the village. Certain features in the houses
themselves indicate the later date of these rows.
[Illustration: Plate XLV. The Mormon mill at Moen-kopi.]
The arrangement of dwellings about a court (Pl. LXXXII), characteristic
of the ancient pueblos, is likely to have prevailed in the small pueblo
of Halona, about which clustered the many irregular houses that
constitute modern Zuñi. Occasional traces of such an arrangement are
still met with in portions of Zuñi, although nearly all of the ancient
pueblo has been covered with rooms of later date. In the arrangement of
Zuñi houses a noticeable difference in the manner of clustering is found
in different parts of the pueblo. That portion designated as house No. 1
on the plan, built over the remains of the original small pueblo, is
unquestionably the oldest portion of the village. The clustering seems
to have gone on around this center to an extraordinary and exceptional
extent before any houses were built in other portions. House No. 4 is a
portion of the same structure, for although a street or passageway
intervenes it is covered with two or three terraces, indicating that
such connection was established at an early date. The rows on the lower
ground to the east (Pl. LXXXI), where the rooms are not so densely
clustered, were built after the removal of the defensive motive that
influenced the construction of the central pile. These portions,
arranged approximately in rows, show a marked resemblance to pueblos of
known recent date. That they were built subsequently to the main
clusters is also indicated by the abundant use of oblique openings and
roof holes, where there is very little necessity for such contrivances.
This feature was originally devised to meet the exceptional conditions
of lighting imposed by dense crowding of the living rooms. It will be
referred to again in examining the details of openings, and its wide
departure from the arrangement found to prevail generally in pueblo
constructions will there be noted. The habit of making such provisions
for lighting inner rooms became fixed and was applied generally to many
clusters much smaller in size than those of other pueblos where this
feature was not developed and where the necessity for it was not felt.
These less crowded rooms of more recent construction form the eastern
portion of the pueblo, and also include the governor’s house on the
south side.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account