The villages in Canyon de Chelly apparently lasted longer than most and may even have provided a temporary haven for refugees from other regions to the north. The four-story tower house at Mummy Cave might have been built for such refugees by skilled masons from the Mesa Verde area. By 1300, however, all the great cliff dwellings were abandoned, and the people of the Canyon de Chelly area had moved on to new lands. Most of them probably joined the tribes that were gathering around Black Mesa to the west, near the location of the modern Hopi pueblos. Others may have turned south, settling finally near the middle of the present boundary between Arizona and New Mexico. Other Anasazi made their way to the upper Rio Grande Valley in north-central New Mexico. In these localities the Pueblo farmers renewed their way of life, and it was there that Spanish explorers found them on their first trip through the region in 1540-42. At White House and a few other ruins there is evidence of structural additions made long after the villages were abandoned. These and other indications of occupation well after 1300 probably represent the work of Hopi Indians who used the canyons seasonally for agriculture, taking the harvest back to their villages about 70 miles to the west. Peach trees, which the Spanish introduced to the Hopi in the 17th century, were evidently brought to Canyon de Chelly in either that century or the next, and the small orchards still scattered through the canyons were started. The use of the canyons by the Hopi probably dropped off rapidly after the Navajos appeared in the area in the 18th century. [Illustration: This pictograph of a soldier on horseback is taken from the Navajo rock painting in Canyon del Muerto near Standing Cow Ruin.] THE NAVAJOS The present Indian occupants of Canyon de Chelly are Navajos. They are not related to the Anasazi who built the masonry villages now in ruins. No one is certain just when the Navajos came to this region nor do we know exactly where they came from. The best available evidence now suggests that these people and their close relatives, the Apaches, both of whom speak an Athapascan language, came south along the eastern edge of the Rocky Mountains as a single group. They may have reached the Southwest between the 13th and the 16th centuries. The earliest mention of people who were probably Navajos is in the Oñate documents of 1598. This account places them in north-central New Mexico, an area they still call their homeland but no longer occupy. The name “Navajo” has never been adequately translated. The first interpretation of the word came from Father Alonso de Benavides, a Spanish priest who started missionary work among the Navajos. In his “Memorial of New Mexico,” which was presented to the court of Spain in 1630, he stated: _But these Apache de Nabahu [Navajo] are very great farmers for this is what Navajo signifies ... great planted fields...._