The popularity of baskets was in no way lessened by the appearance of pottery and some of the finest baskets were made at this time. Sandals improved in quality and the shape changed slightly. In the preceding period the sandals were square-toed but now the toe became V-shaped, or scalloped. Often the sandals were elaborately decorated with colored designs and with designs produced by variations in the weave. There is much evidence that the culture became more and more stabilized with each succeeding generation. Farming methods improved and the harvests became more abundant. With dependable supplies of food, the added comfort and security of the dwellings and the improvement of living conditions the population increased. By the early part of the eighth century a large population of farming Indians occupied the Mesa Verde and surrounding regions. It must have been a peaceful time for the villages were widely scattered over the mesas and open valleys, evidently with little thought of concentration for safety. Ruins of this period are found in abundance in the Mesa Verde. Scores of pithouse and slab-house villages have been found on the mesa tops and one pithouse village has been found in a cave. In most cases pithouses which were built in caves are now underneath the cliff dwellings which were built later. Step House Cave, however, proved to be an exception. In this cave, located in Long Canyon, the cliff dwelling occupies only the north end of the cave leaving a large clear space at the south end. This area was covered with several feet of trash which the occupants of the cliff dwelling had thrown out. In 1926, Supt. Jesse L. Nusbaum excavated under this trash layer and found three pithouses which had been built about 600 A.D. This discovery indicates that some of the early pithouses were built in caves and that excavation under some of the cliff dwellings should reveal further evidence of cave occupation during Modified Basket Maker times. DEVELOPMENTAL PUEBLO PERIOD. 750 to 1100 A.D. As we move into this new period it should be stressed that there was no radical change in the culture. The same people continued to occupy the Mesa Verde and they showed the same progressive tendencies which we have seen in the earlier periods. At this time, however, the people did a surprising thing. They adopted a new cradle. Offhand, this may not seem especially important but it had a startling effect and early archeologists were confronted with a baffling problem. The new cradle caused such a radical change in the appearance of the Indians that until recently the archeologists thought a new people had moved into the region.