The Cliff Ruins of Canyon de Chelly, Arizona: Sixteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1894-95, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1897, pages 73-198Mindeleff, Cosmos
History
The Cliff Ruins of Canyon de Chelly, Arizona: Sixteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1894-95, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1897, pages 73-198
Mindeleff, Cosmos
Arizona -- Antiquities; Chelly, Canyon de (Ariz.); Cliff-dwellings -- Arizona; Pueblo Indians -- Antiquities
Distributed throughout the canyons, wherever a favorable situation could
be found, there are a great number of sites resembling those of the
cliff outlooks, but showing now no standing wall. There is always some
evidence of human occupancy, often many pictographs on the back wall, as
in an example in the lower part of the canyon shown in plate LV. This
occurs at point 2 on the map, in a cove perhaps 100 feet across, with
caves on the northern and southern sides.
[Illustration: Plate LV
Site Marked by Pictographs]
In the southern cave there are no traces of masonry, but the back of the
cave is covered with hand prints and pictographs of deer, as shown in
the plate. In the northern cave there are traces of walls. Many of the
sites do not show the faintest trace of house structures; some of them
have remains of storage cists, and many have remains of Navaho burial
cists, associated with pictographs not of Navaho origin. Some idea of
the number and distribution of these sites may be obtained from the
following list, wherein the numbers represent the location shown on the
detailed map: 2, 8, 9, 11, 18, 19, 21, 22, 23, 25, 26, 30, 38, 39, 40,
42, 43, 53, 54, 57, and 66--in all 21 sites which occur between the
mouth of De Chelly and the junction of Monument canyon, 13 miles above.
Beyond this point they are rare, as the areas of cultivable land become
scarce. A similar distribution prevails in Del Muerto.
DETAILS
SITES
The character of the site occupied by a ruin is a very important feature
where the response to the physical environment is as ready and complete
as it is in the ancient pueblo region. This feature has not received the
attention it deserves, for it is more than probable that in the ultimate
classification of ruins that will some day be formulated the site
occupied will be one of the principal elements considered, if not the
most important. The site is not so important per se, but must be
considered with reference to the specific character of the ruin upon it,
its ground plan, the character of other ruins in the vicinity which may
have been connected with it, and its topographic environment. The
character and ground plan of a cliff ruin would be so much out of place
on an open valley site that it would immediately attract attention. The
reverse is equally remarkable.
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