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
On the historical site, too, we know that Cruzate on the occasion of the
attempted reconquest of the country visited this village in 1692, and
the ruin must therefore be less than two centuries old, yet the
completeness of destruction is such that over most of its area no
standing wall is seen, and the outlines of the houses and groups are
indicated mainly by low ridges and masses of broken-down masonry, partly
covered by the drifting sands. The group of rooms that forms the south
east side of the pueblo is an exception to the general rule. Here
fragmentary walls of rough masonry stand to a height, in some cases, of
8 feet above the débris. The character of the stonework, as may be seen
from Pl. V, is but little better than that of the modern villages. This
better preserved portion of the village seems to have formed part of a
cluster of mission buildings. At the points designated A on the ground
plan may be seen the remnants of walls that have been built of straw
adobe in the typical Spanish manner. These rest upon foundations of
stone masonry. See Pl. VI. The adobe fragments are probably part of the
church or associated buildings. At two other points on the ground plan,
both on the northeast side, low fragments of wall are still standing, as
may be seen from the plate. At one of these points the remains indicate
that the village was provided with a gateway near the middle of the
northeast side.
The general plan of this pueblo is quite different from that of the
present villages, and approaches the older types in symmetry and
compactness. There is a notable absence of the arrangement of rooms into
long parallel rows. This typical Tusayan feature is only slightly
approximated in some subordinate rows within the court. The plan
suggests that the original pueblo was built about three sides of a
rectangular court, the fourth or southeast side--later occupied by the
mission buildings--being left open, or protected only by a low wall.
Outside the rectangle of the main pueblo, on the northeast side, are two
fragments of rude masonry, built by Navajo sheep herders. Near the west
corner of the pueblo are the vestiges of two rooms, outside the pueblo
proper, which seem to belong to the original construction.
Awatubi is said to have had excavated rectangular kivas, situated in the
open court, similar to those used in the modern village. The people of
Walpi had partly cleared out one of these chambers and used it as a
depository for ceremonial plume-sticks, etc., but the Navajo came and
carried off their sacred deposits, tempted probably by their market
value as ethnologic specimens. No trace of these kivas was visible at
the time the ruins were surveyed.
The Awatubi are said to have had sheep at the time the village was
destroyed. Some of the Tusayan point out the remains of a large sheep
corral near the spring, which they say was used at that time, but it is
quite as likely to have been constructed for that purpose at a much
later date.
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