Antiquities of the Mesa Verde National Park: Cliff PalaceFewkes, Jesse Walter
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Antiquities of the Mesa Verde National Park: Cliff Palace
Fewkes, Jesse Walter
Colorado -- Antiquities; Mesa Verde National Park (Colo.)
Room 28 is a two-story structure of excellent masonry, with an entrance
on its southern side and a window frame of stone. Its second story
formerly opened on the western side into room 29. Not much now remains
of the plastering that once covered the inner walls of room 28, but the
interior walls of room 29 still show well-preserved plaster. Although
the latter room has excellent masonry, its southern wall, or that facing
kiva J, is entirely destroyed. The floor was so well preserved that but
little work was required to put it in good condition.
Rooms 30 to 33 are represented almost entirely by the side walls, the
front walls being more or less destroyed. Their floors lie on the same
level as those of the second terrace, and their roofs may have been
continuous with the third terrace. There is indication of a room
(unnumbered) in the southwestern corner of plaza J, and another, too
mutilated to be described, on the second terrace below it.
Room 34 is irregularly rectangular in shape; its floor is on the level
of the roof of kiva H. It has good masonry and a smoothed stone sill
with a groove cut in the upper surface for the slab that formed the
door. Its interior walls show evidences of plastering.
Room 35, situated on the same level as the kiva roof, has no window, but
there is an opening directly into kiva H. Its roof is a continuation of
that of the kiva, and has the old rafters, some still in place,
supporting a few of the flat stones which formed the upper walls. As
this chamber opens directly into the kiva, we may regard it as a
repository for kiva paraphernalia;[40] the Hopi designate a similar
chamber _Katcinakihu_, "Katcina house." On the roof of this room the
writer set in place a smooth, ovoid stone with flat base, artificially
worked. Possibly this stone was formerly used as an idol.
[Footnote 40: The Mongkiva at Walpi has such a chamber which is closed
by a door and is opened only when paraphernalia for certain ceremonies
are desired. In the Warrior House at Walpi there is a similar chamber,
ordinarily closely sealed, in which the fetishes of the Warrior Society
are kept. Masked dancers among the Pueblos are called Katcinas, and the
masks they wear would naturally be kept in a house (_kihu_) called
"Katcinakihu."]
In Hano, a pueblo on the East mesa of the Hopi, masks are kept in a
special room back of a living room, a custom common to all the Hopi.
There is no evidence that the Cliff Palace people performed masked
dances.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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