Chapter III: Part 3

The longest dimension of the western section (pls. 12, 14, _c_) is approximately east-west; that of the eastern is nearly north-south. The eastern section (fig. 8, _E-L_), like the western, has a tower (_L_), which is situated between two circular depressions or kivas (_K_). On the north and south ends the eastern section is flanked by rectangular rooms. Those at the north end were better constructed, and even now stand as high as the walls of the western tower. The views show that their corners are not as well preserved as their faces, which is due to defects in masonry, as lack of bonding. Although much débris has accumulated around the kivas, especially in their cavities, it is evident that these ceremonial rooms were formerly one storied, and practically subterranean on account of the surrounding rooms. Several fragments of walls projecting above the accumulated débris indicate rooms at the junction of the eastern and western sections of the ruin, but their form and arrangement at that point are not evident and can be determined only by excavation. The inner kiva walls show evidences of mural pilasters and banquettes like those of cliff-dwellings and other pure pueblo types.

RUIN 3

The square tower (pl. 11, _a_), standing on a large angular rock in the canyon below Hovenweep Castle, is a remarkable example of prehistoric masonry so situated that it is shut in by cliffs, rendering the outlook limited. Several published photographs of this tower give the impression that it stands in the open and was an outlook, but that this is hardly the case will be seen from a general view looking west up the South Fork.

RUIN 4

This ruin is a small tower situated in a commanding position on the point of the mesa where the canyon forks. The section of the wall still standing indicates a circular form, the north side of which has fallen; the part still intact, or that on the south side, exhibits good masonry about 8 feet high (pl. 15, _c_).

RUIN 5

The walls of the north segment of a tower stand on a large angular block of stone rising from a ledge above the arroyo, or bed of the canyon, below Ruin 4, on the South Fork. What appears to have been a doorway opens on its north side; this opening is defended by a wall, remains of a former protected passageway into the tower.

On the perpendicular cliff of the precipice near Ruin 5 and below the point on which Ruin 4 stands there are several almost illegible pictographs, below which are rather obscure evidences of a building, the features of which can be determined only by excavation.

Instructive features of Tower No. 5 are two parallel walls, one on each side of the doorway, like those of the circular towers on the promontory at the junction of the Yellow Jacket and McElmo. Other towers on the canyon rim show defensive walls, as in Ruin 9, constructed about their entrances from corners of the buildings to the mesa rim, effectually preventing passage. Morley and Kidder have suggested that the walled recess in the cliff below Ruin 9 was probably built to prevent access from below. This feature is found in the floor entrances of a building near the Great House of the Holly group.

RUIN 6

This ruin is a small tower whose curved walls are so broken down that the form is not evident. It is situated in the base of the talus at the head of the South Fork (pl. 26, _a_).

ERODED BOWLDER HOUSE (RUIN 7)

This house, more remarkable from its site than its structure, was constructed in an eroded cave of a bowlder halfway down the talus of the cliff. The front walls are somewhat broken down, but others built in the rear of the cave still remain intact. On the top of the bowlder is the débris of fallen walls, suggesting a former tower, but not much remains in place to determine its outlines. Where the walls are protected the mortar shows impressions of human hands and at one place there are the indentations of a corncob used by the plasterers to press the mortar between the layers of stone. There were formerly at least two rooms in the rear of the cave, the front walls of which have fallen and are strewn down the talus to the bottom of the canyon.

TWIN TOWERS (RUIN 8)

The so-called Twin Towers, which seen together from certain points appear as one ruin (pl. 15, _a_, _b_), rank among the most impressive buildings in Square Tower Canyon. They stand on the south side of the canyon on a rock isolated by a cleft from the adjoining cliff. The larger (fig. 9, _A-E_) has an oval ground plan and a doorway in the southwest corner; the smaller (_F_, _G_, _H_, _I_) is horseshoe shaped with a doorway in the east wall, which is straight. The arrangement of rooms is seen in figure 9. Small walled-up caves are found below the foundation on the northwest base of the larger room.

RUIN 9

The ground plan of this ruin is rectangular in form, 19 feet 6 inches long by 10 feet wide. The standing walls measure 11 feet in altitude. It is situated on the south rim at the mouth of the South Fork, just above Ruin 7, a few feet back from the cliff. A doorway opening in the middle of its north wall was formerly made difficult of entrance by walls, now fallen, extending from the northeast and northwest angles to the edge of the cliff. The masonry throughout is rough; projecting ends of rafters indicate a building two stories high. There are peepholes with plastered surfaces through the southeast and west walls, which suggest ports. A short distance east of the building is a circle of stones reminding the author of a shrine.

UNIT TYPE HOUSE (RUIN 10)

This pueblo (pl. 19, _c_), from a comparative point of view, is one of the most interesting ruins in the Hovenweep, and is situated on the very edge of the canyon on the North Fork not far from where it begins. It is the simplest form of prehistoric pueblo, or the unit[47] of a pure type, made up of a centrally placed circular ceremonial room (fig. 10, _K_) embedded in rectangular rooms, six in number (_A-F_). The resulting or external form is rectangular, oriented about due north and south; the southern side, which formerly rose from the edge of the canyon, being much broken down and its masonry precipitated over the cliff.

[47] The “unit type” was first recognized by Doctor Prudden in his illuminating studies of the pueblos of the San Juan Basin. The author was the first to point out its existence in cliff-houses of the same area.

The central kiva (fig. 10) is made of exceptionally fine masonry and shows by what remains that it had mural banquettes, and pilasters to support the roof, with other features like a typical kiva of the Mesa Verde cliff-houses. A side entrance opens in one corner into a small room (fig. 10, _G_) in which ceremonial objects may have been formerly stored (pl. 32, _b_).

The kiva of Unit type House is architecturally the same as those with vaulted roofs at Spruce-tree House, Cliff Palace, and Far View House on the Mesa Verde. A similar structure, according to Prudden,[48] occurs at Mitchell Spring Ruin in the Montezuma Valley, and near the Picket corral. The same type was found by Morley[49] at the Cannonball Ruin and by Kidder[50] in a kiva on Montezuma Creek in Utah, where clusters of mounds would appear to be composed of single or composite ruins of this type. This small pueblo was probably inhabited by one social unit, and may be regarded as the first stage of a compound pueblo.

[48] Circular Kivas in San Juan Watershed. Amer. Anthrop., n. s. vol. 16, no. 1, 1914.

[49] Excavation of the Cannonball Ruins in southwestern Colorado. Amer. Anthrop., n. s. vol. x, no. 4, 1908.

[50] Explorations in southeastern Utah. Amer. Journ. Archæol., 2d ser., vol. xiv, no. 3, 1910.

STRONGHOLD HOUSE (RUIN 11)

Ruin 11 is composed of a cluster of several small buildings, one of which is situated on the north edge of the mesa somewhat east of Ruin 10 (pl. 25, _b_); another, called by Morley and Kidder Gibraltar House, formerly of considerable size, was built on the sloping surface of an angular bowlder (pl. 17, 21, _b_). Although many walls have fallen, enough remains to render it a picturesque ruin, attractive to the visitor and instructive to the archeologist, by whom it has been classed as a tower. This building from the east appears to be a square tower, but it is in reality composed of several rooms perched on an inaccessible rock.

RUINS IN HOLLY CANYON

The towers in Holly Canyon (fig. 11) are in about the same condition of preservation as those in Square Tower Canyon. They cluster about the head of a small canyon (pl. 18, _a_) and may be approached on foot along the mesa above Keeley Camp, about a mile distant. Two of the Holly ruins belong to the tower type and were built on fallen bowlders. One of these has two rooms on the ground floor. (Pls. 19, _a_, _b_; 20, _a_, _c_.)

RUIN A, GREAT HOUSE, HACKBERRY CASTLE

Ruin A (pl. 21, _a_), the largest building of the group, which stands on the edge of the canyon, is rectangular in form, measuring 31 by 9 feet, and is 20 feet high (fig. 11, _A_). Evidences of two rooms appear on the ground plan, one of which is 14 feet long, the other 12 feet inside measurement. The partition separating the two rooms is not tied into the outer walls, an almost constant feature in ancient masonry. The ends of the rafters are still seen in the wall at a level 12 feet above the base. Fallen stones have accumulated in the rooms to a considerable depth, and the tops of the remaining wall, where the mortar is washed out, will tumble in a short time.

Ruin B (pl. 20, _b_), situated a short distance north of Ruin A, also stands on the canyon rim. The north wall is entire, but the south wall has fallen. What remains indicates that the ruin was about square, with corners on the north side rounded, imparting to it a semicircular form. The entrance into this room may have been through the floor.

TOWERS [C AND D]

These towers (pl. 23, _a_, _b_) show some of the finest masonry known in this region, being constructed on fallen bowlders which their foundations almost completely cover. Holly Tower (pl. 23, _b_) measures 16 feet high and 21 feet in diameter. It is 7 feet wide, its top rising to a height level with that of the mesa on which stand buildings already considered. One of the two rooms of this tower is narrower and wider than the other, shown in an offset as if constructed at a different time. Its foundations are 17 feet long by 8 feet wide, the highest wall measuring, at the southeast corner, 12 feet 8 inches. There is a fine doorway, wide above and narrow below, in the north wall. The approach at present is difficult on account of the height of the rock on which it stands, but there are evidences of former footholes.

HOLLY HOUSE

Several broken-down walls, some of which are over 6 feet high, situated east of Ruin A, appear to belong to a pueblo of considerable size (fig. 11, _E_, _F_), but the large foundation rock on which it is situated has settled, its top having separated from the edge of the canyon, so that the corner of the building (_F_) is out of plumb. The walls on the adjoining cliff are also much broken down, although several sections of them rise a few feet above the general surface. The cause of this change in level of the base may have been an earthquake or the settling or sliding of the bowlder on the talus down the hill. The united building appears to have been a pueblo of rectangular form. Its walls are so broken down that it was not possible to determine its exact dimensions.

RUINS IN HACKBERRY CANYON

HORSESHOE HOUSE

The large building in Hackberry Canyon, one of the terminal spurs of Bridge Canyon, a mile northeast of the cluster in Holly Canyon, is particularly instructive from the fact that surrounding the remains of a circular tower, for two-thirds of its circumference, is a concentric wall with compartments separated by radial partitions (fig. 12, 1).

Horseshoe House (pl. 23, _c_) stands on the north edge of the canyon (fig. 12, 1), having its straight wall on the south side, as is usually the case, the well-preserved north side being curved. The northeastern corner still stands several feet high. The southeastern corner formerly rested on a projecting rock, which recalls the cornerstone of Sun Temple. The masonry of most of the southern segment of the enclosed circular room or tower has fallen down the cliff. There does not appear to have been a doorway on the south side, and there is not space for rooms on this side on account of the nearness to the edge of the cliff. While the form (fig. 13) of Horseshoe Ruin recalls that of Sun Temple, in details of room structure it is widely divergent. The length of the south wall, or that connecting the two ends of the horseshoe, is 30 feet, its width 27 feet; the highest wall on the northwest side is 12 feet. Figure 13 shows the arrangement of the rooms and the mutilation of the south wall of the ruin. The distance between the outer and inner concentric walls averages 4 feet; the circular room is 17 feet in diameter.

In the same cluster as Horseshoe Ruin (pl. 24, _a_) there is another well-made tower (fig. 12, 4), constructed on a point at the entrance to the canyon, and below it in a cave are well-preserved walls of a cliff-dwelling.

A short distance due north of Horseshoe House, at the head of a small canyon, a tributary of Bridge Canyon, there are two large pueblos and a round tower. The pueblos are mentioned by Prudden, who gives a ground plan which indicates an extensive settlement.

TOWERS IN THE MAIN YELLOW JACKET CANYON

Of the several towers and great houses of the main Yellow Jacket Canyon two may suffice to show their resemblance to those in Square Tower Canyon. The two towers considered belong to the D-shaped variety, the straight wall, as is almost always the case, being on the south side.

DAVIS TOWER

Mr. C. K. Davis, who lives not far from the Yellow Jacket Spring, conducted the author to a tower of semicircular ground plan (fig. 14) near his ranch. This ruin (pl. 26, _b_), is situated on a rocky ridge on top of the talus halfway down to the bottom of the canyon, on its right side.

LION (LITTRELL) TOWER[51]

This tower (pl. 29, _b_) is built on a bowlder situated in Yellow Jacket Canyon a mile from Mr. Littrell’s ranch and about 5 miles south of the Yellow Jacket post office; approximately 20 miles from Dolores, Colorado. Its ground plan (fig. 15) is D-shaped, the lower story being divided by partitions into four rooms. The wall of the middle room seems to be double, or to have been reenforced. It measures 40 feet on the straight side, the highest wall being about 25 feet above the base. The foundations rest on the irregular surface of a bowlder to which it conforms.

[51] This tower is reputed to be the home of a mountain lion, hence the name Lion House.

M’LEAN BASIN

McLean Basin is 3 miles from the Old Bluff City Road near Picket corral, 32 miles from Dolores. It has been a favorite wintering place for stock and is well known to herdsmen. One can approach the ruin from the road to Bluff City and the towers here referred to are easily reached by a trail down the mesa to the highest terrace. There are said to be several ruins in the McLean Basin, the two towers (pls. 26, _c_, 27, 28, _a_, _b_) visited being placed in an exceptional position in reference to surrounding rooms. One of these towers is circular, the other D-shaped or semicircular in ground plan (fig. 16, _A_, _B_).

Previously to the author’s study of the southwestern towers two forms of these structures were recognized; the square or rectangular, and the circular or oval. It is now known that several of the towers previously described as circular are in reality D-shaped, and this form is probably more common than the circular.

The rectangular building in the McLean Basin has a circular tower (pl. 28, _b_) on the southwest angle and a D-shaped tower (pl. 28, _a_) on the northeast. They resemble two turrets rising above the remaining walls that form the sides of the rectangles. These towers average about 12 feet high, and are well constructed, while low connecting walls of coarse masonry rise slightly above the surface. It would appear from the amount of débris that the remaining walls indicate a row of buildings, one story high, with circular subterranean kivas, but this can not be accurately determined without excavation of the ruin. Outside of the rectangle, however, there are at least two circular areas, possibly kiva pits. The rectangular building measures about 50 feet square. The ground on which the buildings formerly stood slopes to the south, and back of it on the north rises a low perpendicular bluff which effectually shelters it in that direction. The union of a circular and a semicircular tower with, a rectangular ruin is a feature not common in the McElmo-Yellow Jacket region but appears in Hovenweep Castle, elsewhere described. Lower down the sides of the basin and near by are many indications of walls of buildings.

The pottery in the neighborhood belongs to the same black and white types commonly found in the Hovenweep and Mesa Verde areas.

Except for their peculiar relation to the rectangular building the McLean towers do not differ essentially from others, which leads to the inference that they were used contemporaneously and for the same purpose. There is a well-made doorway (fig. 17) in the Round Tower.

TOWER IN SAND CANYON

Sand Canyon, which opens into McElmo Canyon near Battle Rock, has several types of prehistoric ruins, viz, towers, cliff-houses, and large rim-rock pueblos. The tower type of architecture represented by the example here figured (pl. 5, _a_) is isolated from other forms of buildings. This tower is figured by Doctor Prudden, who mentions another in the neighborhood which the author did not visit.

TOWERS IN ROAD (WICKYUP) CANYON

The nomenclature of the northern canyons of the McElmo has considerably changed in the last 40 years. What we now call the Yellow Jacket was formerly known through its entire course as the Hovenweep. A small canyon opening near its mouth, now known as Road Canyon, was formerly called the Wickyup. The Old Bluff City Road from Dolores, Colorado, to Bluff City, Utah, divides into two branches a short distance before it descends into the McElmo, its left branch passing through Road Canyon, the right bank of which follows the Yellow Jacket, which the traveler fords a short distance above its junction with the McElmo. Wickyup Canyon may be called picturesque, its cliffs being worn into fantastic shapes by water and sand. It has important antiquities, among the most striking of which are two towers (pl. 24, _b_), crowning the tops of low buttes or hills. The walls of these towers are well constructed, one being a simple structure with a single room, the other having appended rectangular rooms extending toward the northwest, some distance along a ridge of rocks. An examination of these two towers, which are about one-quarter of a mile apart, shows that they belong to the same type as the simple forms of those above mentioned, and as the entrance to Square Tower Canyon is not far away, they probably belong to the same series. The first of the towers, called “Bowlder Castle,” is situated a few hundred feet east of the road, from which it is easily seen. This ruin is rectangular in shape and rises from a basal mass of débris indicating broken-down walls of rooms. At a level with the top of this débris on its southern side stands a well-constructed tower with well-made doorway, the threshold and lintel of which are smooth stones, whose edges project slightly from the surface of the wall. One remarkable feature of this tower is that the doorway has been walled up with rude secondary masonry (pl. 25, _a_). The south wall of this building has tumbled over, as is usually the case, but the north wall rises several feet above the base. The masonry of the second tower is also broken down on the south side, but the standing remains of the north wall, which is circular, are over 10 feet high. The indications are that the ground plan of this building was oval in shape and that it inclined inward slightly from foundation to apex. Scattered over the surface are the remnants of fallen walls, and near it there is a well-marked depression, not unlike those found in unit type mounds, indicating kivas.

TOWERS OF THE MANCOS

The author’s examination of the towers in the region considered embraced likewise a few in the Mancos Canyon and valley. In all essential features the Mancos towers resemble those of Mesa Verde, the McElmo, and the Yellow Jacket Canyons, and were evidently built by the same people who constructed the towers on Navaho Canyon and elsewhere on the Mesa Verde National Park. A brief reference to two or three of these Mancos River towers may suffice to point out their general structure.

HOLMES TOWER

One of the towers figured by Holmes in 1877 is still among the best preserved in this region and can be visited by following up the Mancos Canyon from the west about 10 miles from where the Cortez road crosses the Mancos River before going on to Ship-rock. There is at this point a bridge and near the crossing an industrial farm of the Ute Reservation where accommodations were obtained. The Mancos Valley widens after leaving the canyon, the southern side of Mesa Verde appearing as a series of high mesas separated by canyons. In the neighborhood of the western end of Mesa Verde are lofty buttes, one called Chimney Rock, another the Ute Woman. This valley and the canyons extending into the Mesa Verde contain numerous piles of stone indicative of buildings of rectangular shape with numerous circular depressions. No cluster of mounds like those in Montezuma Valley was seen, but about 40 sites of buildings were distributed at intervals. None of these have standing walls above ground.

Following up the Mancos Canyon is a wagon about 9 miles an arroyo was encountered and from there horses were taken and the river crossed to its south bank, above which, on the shelving terrace, is the Holmes Tower, visible many miles down the canyon. This tower (pl. 29, _a_) is in much the same condition as when sketched by Holmes over 40 years ago. It is circular in form, about 10 feet in diameter, and about 16 feet high, with a broken window on the north side. The sky line is irregular. It is one of the best preserved towers, but not as high or as well constructed as some of the Hovenweep specimens.

Accompanying this tower on the north there are mounds indicative of rooms and two circular saucer-like depressions. Excavations revealing a few human bones, including a well-worn human skull, have been made in a burial place southeast of the tower, where the surface is covered with fragments of pottery. Except in size Holmes Tower does not differ from others already described, but, like them, is connected with rectangular rooms. Farther up the Mancos Canyon there are other towers, one of which, Great Tower, is mentioned by Holmes in his report.

On the way up the canyon, perhaps two-thirds of the distance from the bridge to the Holmes Tower, midway in the alluvial plain and on the right bank of Mancos Creek, stands a circular ruin which conforms to Holmes’s description of Great Tower but is too poorly preserved to be positively identified. All that now remains of this building is a large pile of rocks with a central depression, but no signs of radiating partitions, although such may have existed when it was constructed and for many years after it began to fall into ruin.

TOWERS ON THE MANCOS RIVER BELOW THE BRIDGE

TOWER A

There are two towers situated on the south side of the Mancos below the bridge on the Ship-rock Road, one about 6, the other 7 miles distant. The walls of the first of these (pl. 30, _b_) are visible for some distance and are about 6 feet high, evidently very much broken down on the south and east sides. Its shape is round and there is a pile of stones indicating rooms on the east side separated from the tower by a depression. It would be a valuable contribution to our knowledge of these ruins if some one would determine the nature of these pits, which can hardly be regarded as reservoirs, but suggest kivas.

TOWER B

The tower (pl. 31, _a_) situated farther down the Mancos River has a more commanding position than Tower A and is conspicuous because it stands on a projecting precipice, below the rim of which are walled-up artificial caves. These caves have apparently never been entered by white men; the walls of masonry are unbroken and there are square openings, windows or doorways, which can be made out long before reaching the place.

This tower (pl. 30, _a_) is almost perfectly round, about 10 feet in diameter, and stands at least 6 feet high. The south wall has fallen. In the pile of rocks on that side may be readily seen the top of a straight wall reaching to the edge of the cliff as if for protection, but no other fallen walls may now be seen in the neighborhood. The face of the cliff below this tower (pls. 7, _b_; 31, _b_) is almost perpendicular, the component strata of soft shale alternating with harder rocks, the former well fitted for artificial excavations.

The author was not impressed with the idea that any considerable number of troglodytic inhabitants dwelt in the small cliff rooms (pl. 31, _b_)[52] dug in it. Farther on there are other caves the walls of the entrance to which are still in sight. It is true the surface of the cliff may have been eroded and fallen in the time since they were abandoned. They appeared to be storage cists rather than inhabited rooms.

[52] A good figure of these cavate rooms is given by Holmes, op. cit. Comparing the photograph with his figure it appears that their surrounding shale has worn away somewhat in the last four decades.

Along the valley by the side of the road down the Mancos from the bridge to the ruins many heaps of stone were noticed in the valley but none of these were extensive or had walls standing above ground. Nor were they arranged in clusters as is common in the Montezuma Valley. On top of these heaps were found large fragments of slag in which was embedded charred corn, indicating a great fire. Similar slag also with burnt corn has often been found by the author on the floor of excavated rooms.

MEGALITHIC AND SLAB HOUSE RUINS AT MCELMO BLUFF

The ruined walls on the bluff situated at the junction of the McElmo and Yellow Jacket Canyons are archeologically instructive. As the mesa between the two canyons narrows in a promontory, about 100 feet in altitude, its configuration reminds one of the East Mesa of the Hopi. It is inaccessible on three sides, but on the fourth, where the width of the mesa is contracted, there are remains of a low zigzag wall, extending from one side to the other. At the western base of this promontory, on the ledge higher than the river, there are artificial walls built on bowlders in the sides of which shallow caves are eroded and near by them circular depressions. There are likewise remains of a small pueblo with walls much broken down and across the river the ruins of a community house, one of the largest in the district. The exceptional character of the ruins on top of this promontory has been mentioned or described by several visitors, as Holmes, Jackson, and Morley and Kidder, and various conjectures have been made as to their character and relation to the other ruins in this neighborhood.

The ruins on this mesa are of two kinds: small inclosures made of slabs of stone set on edge and semicircular structures (fig. 18), also constructed of upright stone slabs or megaliths. Three of the latter have concentric surrounding walls with a “vestibule” entrance (?) at the south somewhat like rooms at the bases of towers. One of these is said by Morley and Kidder to have three concentric walls. The small box-like structures are numerous, and are rudely constructed, united in an imperfect ring about the circular rooms.

In verification of the various theories that have been suggested to account for these rectangular structures—their interpretation as storage bins, burial places, and cremation rooms—we have no proof. Similar rooms of megaliths exist on Sandstone Canyon and at other places to the north and in Montezuma Canyon to the west. The rude, massive character of the masonry leads me to refer them to the slab house culture of Kidder and the imperfect masonry suggests they were habitations in a period antedating that of the pure pueblo culture. Such fragments of pottery as were found were, like the architecture, rude and archaic, adding weight to the interpretation that they belonged to a very old epoch.

The author regards the structures made of stones set on edge as very old, possibly examples of the most primitive buildings in the McElmo region, antedating the pueblos with horizontal masonry farther east. West of the mouth of the Yellow Jacket, especially on the Montezuma Mesa, these megalithic walls are more pretentious, as if this was the center of the earlier phase of house buildings. In the eastern ruins these slabs of stone set on edge sometimes appear as at Far View House with horizontal masonry, but more as a survival.

Since their discovery and description by Jackson and Holmes 40 years ago, little has been added to our knowledge of these inclosures, although similar remains have been reported at various points from Dolores far into Utah. They are called cemeteries and crematories by the farmers and stockmen, but skeletons or burnt bones do not occur in them; the charcoal shows wood fiber, and is not bone ash. More knowledge must be obtained through excavations before their significance can be determined. Their association with circular rooms appears in Jackson’s account[53] of the stone structures on the promontory at the mouth of the Yellow Jacket. He says:

[53] Tenth Ann. Rept. U. S. Geol. Surv. (Hayden Survey) for 1876, p. 414, 1879.

“The perpendicular scarp of the mesa ran round very regularly, 50 to 100 feet in height, the talus sloping down at a steep angle. On cave-like benches at the foot of the scarp is a row of rock shelters, much ruined, in one of which was found a very perfect polished-stone implement. Gaining the top of the mesa with some difficulty, we found a perfectly flat surface, 100 yards in width by about 200 in length, separated from the main plateau by a narrow neck, across which a wall had been thrown, but which is now nearly leveled. Almost the entire space fenced in by this wall was covered by an extended series of small squares, formed by thin slabs of sand-rock set on end. All were uniform in size, measuring about 3 by 5 feet, and arranged in rows, two and three deep, adjusted to various points of the compass. There were also a few circles disposed irregularly about the inclosed area, each about 20 feet in diameter, their circumferences being formed of similar rectangular spaces, leaving a circular space of 10 feet diameter in the center. These rectangles occur mainly in groups, and are found indiscriminately scattered through the whole region that has come under our observation upon the mesa tops and in the valleys. They all have the same general shape and size, and are seldom accompanied by even the faintest indication of a mound-like character. We have always supposed them to be graves, but have not as yet found any evidence that would prove them such. Some that we excavated to the depth of 5 and 6 feet in a solid earth that had never been disturbed did not reward our search with the faintest vestige of human remains. In nearly every case, however, a thin scattered layer of bits of charcoal was found from 6 to 18 inches beneath the surface. In one instance, near the Mesa Verde, the upright slabs of rock which inclosed one of these rectangles were sunk 2 feet into the earth and projected 6 inches above it.”

Holmes (op. cit., pp. 385-386) describes similar structures:

“The greater portion of what are supposed to be burial places occur on the summits of hills or on high, barren promontories that overlook the valleys and cañons. In these places considerable areas, amounting in some cases to half an acre or more, are thickly set with rows of stone slabs, which are set in the ground and arranged in circles or parallelograms of greatly varying dimensions. At first sight the idea of a cemetery is suggested, although on examination it is found that the soil upon the solid rock surfaces is but a few inches deep, or if deeper, so compact that with the best implements it is very difficult to penetrate it.

“On the west bank of the Dolores, near the second bend, I came upon a cluster of these standing stones on the summit of a low, rounded hill, and in the midst of a dense growth of full-grown piñon pines.”

The rows of stones at this place, according to the same author, were composed of undressed slabs, many of which had fallen, the parallelograms averaging 3 by 8 feet in dimensions. Thin layers of bits of charcoal and pottery occur in the neighborhood. The date these slabs were placed upright was very early, for trees growing in the inclosures were estimated to be three or four hundred years old. These stones were sometimes “embedded in the sides and roots of the trees.” Holmes had the “impression that these places, if not actually burying grounds, were at least places used for the performance of funeral rites ... the remains of the dead being burned or left to decay in the open air.”

The interiors of the inclosures were found on excavation to be filled to a depth of about a foot with soil mixed with ashes. There were many fragments of pottery, and some other objects near them, but nothing to indicate, as suggested by previous observations, that they were burial cists or even crematories for burying the dead. No charred human remains occur, but charcoal is abundant. It may have been that these places were used as ovens for roasting corn or for some culinary purposes, the neighboring circular rooms being possibly used for the same purposes as towers by the people who formerly inhabited this region. They are not large enough for dwellings and the soil in them is too shallow for burial purposes. They belong to a type which is widely distributed over the district visited by the author. Especially fine examples occur north of Sandstone Canyon district.

At the base of the great cliff, on the top of which the remains in question are found, under the shelter of an overhanging bowlder, may be seen one of the finest collections of pictographs of animals and human beings. Not far from the last-mentioned bowlder the walls of a large pueblo can readily be traced along the banks of the McElmo Canyon. In his studies of the antiquities of this region the author did not penetrate west of the mouth of Yellow Jacket Canyon, but he was told by stockmen and sheep herders of the existence of many other ruins contiguous to the road all the way from this point to Bluff City. The most important of these have already been described in a general way.

GRASS MESA CEMETERY

Grass Mesa, a plateau with precipitous sides overlooking the Dolores River, is about 10 miles down the river from Dolores on the right bank of the stream. There remain few signs of former buildings at this place, but very many artifacts, pottery, stone implements, and fragments of well-worn metates occur at various places, some of which are among the best ever seen by the author. This bluff seems to have been the site of a settlement, possibly pre-Puebloan, like that on McElmo Bluff, with rough walls, resorted to for refuge, and later used as a cemetery. It is well adapted for these purposes, its top being almost inaccessible on the river side. There are many other similar sites of Indian settlements farther down the river, but this is one of the most typical. The scenery along the road that follows the banks of the river from Dolores is ever to be remembered on account of high cliffs on each side.

RESERVOIRS

Many artificial reservoirs dating to prehistoric times were observed in the area covered by the author’s reconnoissance. These fall into two well-marked types, one form being a circular depression, apparently excavated and sometimes walled up with earth or stones. The other form was not excavated by man, but the sloping surface of rock was surrounded on the lowest level by a bank of earth, forming a dam or retaining wall. Both types of reservoirs are commonly formed near some former center of population, but sometimes occur far from mounds, wherever the surface of the land has a convenient slope and the water can be compounded by a retaining wall. The height of the bank that holds back the water of these prehistoric reservoirs has been increased in some cases by stockmen; the walls of others still remain practically the same height they were when constructed by the aborigines. One of the best examples of the second type of reservoir, the retaining wall of which is shown in plate 32, _a_, is crossed by the road to Bluff City near the ruins in Holly Canyon, not far from Picket corral. A few miles north of this reservoir, at the edge of the cedars, the road crosses another of these ancient reservoirs, whose retaining bank has been considerably increased in height by stockmen. The ancient reservoir at Bug Mesa covers fully 4 acres, and the reservoir near Goodman Point Ruin is almost as large, and, although somewhat changed from its aboriginal condition, is still used by farmers dwelling in the neighborhood. The latter belongs to the first type; the former to the second. Reservoirs of one or the other type are generally found in the neighborhood of all large heaps of rocks, the so-called mounds that indicate the former existence of pueblos. The reservoir of the Mummy Lake village on the Mesa Verde belongs to the excavated type.

PICTOGRAPHS

At many places covered by this reconnoissance there were found interesting collections of engraved figures of ancient date cut on bowlders or vertical cliffs. These are generally situated in the neighborhood of ruins, but sometimes exist far from human remains. They generally have geometrical forms, rectangular and spiral predominating. Associated with these occur also representations of human beings, birds, and animals, and figures of bird tracks, human hands, and bear claws. There is a remarkable similarity in all these figures which sometimes occur on the stones composing the masonry of the buildings which indicates they were contemporaneous. They were pecked on the stones with rude stone chisels, but as a rule show no indication of paint. None of these figures could be regarded, without the wildest flights of the imagination, as letters or hieroglyphics, and there is no indication that inscriptions were intended. Their general character, as shown in a cluster (pl. 33), indicates rather clan symbols; in some instances spiral forms were probably made to indicate the presence of water. The incised figures on the walls of buildings were probably decorative in character, the first efforts of primitive man to embellish the walls of his dwellings, an art which reached a very high development in Mexico and Central America. There are, however, indications that these figures were covered with plaster and were therefore invisible, so that we might suppose them to be masons’ signs, indicating the clan kinship of those who constructed the walls. Perhaps the largest group of these pictographs occurs on an eroded bowlder near the mouth of the Yellow Jacket Canyon, just below the great promontory separating it from the McElmo, on the surface of which are the remarkable dwellings composed of slabs of stone set on edge. Another large cluster, the members of which are of the same general style as that already mentioned, was seen in Sandstone Canyon, a few miles south of the road from Dolores to Monticello. There are several groups of pictographs in the neighborhood of the large towers elsewhere described. The most noteworthy of these is situated at the head of the south fork of Square Tower Canyon on a vertical cliff below the ruined Tower No. 4. The face of the cliff is very much eroded, and the figures are in places almost illegible. They consist of bird designs, accompanied with figures of snakes, rain clouds, and other designs, portions of which are obliterated and impossible of determination. As a rule, these pictographs resemble very closely those in the cliff-houses of the Mesa Verde and add their evidence of a uniformity of art design in these two regions.

In addition to pictographs cut on the surface of the cliff, we also find in sheltered caves others not incised but with indications of color, showing the former existence of painted figures. Some of these, however, are not ascribed to the Indians who built the towers, but to a later tribe who camped in this region after the house builders had disappeared. They were probably made by wandering bands of Ute Indians, and are not significant in a comparison of the different kinds of buildings described in this article.

MINOR ANTIQUITIES

The preceding pages deal wholly with the immovable antiquities, as buildings, reservoirs, and the like. In addition to these evidences of a former population, there should be mentioned likewise the smaller antiquities, as pottery, stone objects, weapons, baskets, fabrics, bone and other implements. No excavation was attempted in the course of the reconnoissance, so that this chapter in the author’s report is naturally a very brief one. The few statements which follow are mainly based on local collections, one of which, owned by Mr. Williamson, of the First National Bank of Dolores, is comprehensive. The most suggestive of these minor antiquities are objects of burnt clay or pottery, which occur generally in piles of débris or accompany human burials. It was the custom of these people, like the cliff-dwellers, to deposit, near the dead, food in bowls and other household utensils, varying in shape, technique, decoration, and color. The most important fact regarding these ceramics is that they belong to the same archaic type as those from the ruins of the Mesa Verde. The predominating colors are white or gray with black figures, within and without, almost universally geometrical in form. There occurs also a relatively large number of corrugated vessels, and those made by using coils of clay, the figures on their exterior being indented with some implement, as a bone, stone, or even with the finger nail. While the majority belong to the black-and-white group, the red ware decorated with black figures is found but comparatively rarely, which is also true of the pottery of the cliff-dwellers. In the large variety of forms of burnt clay objects, the most remarkable in shape is a double water jar, connected by a transverse tube, the ends of which project beyond the opening into the jar, much in the form of an animal with a head at one end, body elongated, terminating in a short tail, the legs not being represented. While the number of unbroken mortuary bowls obtained from this region thus far known is comparatively small, we find in many places large quantities of broken fragments, all of which belong to the varieties of ware above enumerated.

None of the bowls, vases, dippers, or other ceramic objects from the region of the ruins described have that significant feature commonly called the “life line;” the encircling lines are continuous around the vessel, and not broken at one point. The broken line never occurs on archaic pottery like black-and-white ware, and we may accept the hypothesis that the conception which gave rise to it was foreign to the people of the Mesa Verde and adjacent areas. It would be instructive to map out the distribution of this custom which was so prevalent in pottery from the Gila and Little Colorado and its tributaries, and absent in that from ruins on the San Juan and Mimbres. It occurs in ware from certain Rio Grande prehistoric ruins, as if it were a connecting link with the ancient culture of the Little Colorado.

Of the stone implements found in this region the most characteristic is the celt called _tcamahia_ which is not found in regions not affected by the San Juan culture. These objects are found from Mesa Verde to the Hopi pueblos.[54] A peculiar form of prehistoric chipped chert implement occurs at Mesa Verde and elsewhere in the area. A flint knife in the Williamson collection at Dolores was purchased from a Ute woman who said it was found on a ruin. She wore it attached to her belt by a buckskin thong fastened to a bead-worked cover.

[54] The use of these objects as heirlooms in the Antelope altar of the Hopi supports the tradition of the Snake people that their ancestors brought them from the San Juan.

Bone objects were mainly needles, dirks, and bodkins, presenting in the main no essential differences from those repeatedly described, especially by Nordenskiöld in his important memoir on the cliff-dwellers of the Mesa Verde. Objects made of marine shell are rare. The presence of flattened slabs of stone or metates showing on the surface evidences of grinding occur with human bones in many localities, indicating either that a custom still extant among the Pueblos of burying the metates with the dead was observed, or that the burials were made under floors of these long-abandoned houses. It would seem, on the former hypothesis, that these objects were buried with the women, but as the condition of the skeletal remains is poor the sex could not be determined by direct observation.

The unprotected nature of the sites and the condition of the ruins prevented the preservation of fragile articles like baskets and fabrics, which frequently occur in caves, in one or two instances buried under the floors. There is little doubt that excavations in cemeteries of the open-sky ruins would reveal considerable material of this nature, which would probably duplicate that which has been produced from the adjacent cliff-houses. Many parts of wooden beams, mainly the remains of flooring and roofs, were seen still in the walls, but these as a rule were fragmentary. The ends of the timbers still adhering to the walls show that they were cut into shape by stone implements, aided by live embers. They appear to have been split by means of wedges made of stone and often rubbed down smooth with polishing instruments of the same material. The majority of these wooden beams plainly show the action of fire, but no roof was intact. From the size of the logs shown in fragments of beams, it is evident that the roof supports had been brought there from some distance; trees of the magnitude they imply do not now grow in the neighborhood of some of the ruins where these beams occur.

HISTORIC REMAINS

The various objects found in the ruins or on the surface of the ground as a rule are characteristic of a people in the stone-age culture, ignorant of metals, and therefore prehistoric, but here and there on the surface have been picked up iron weapons which belonged to the historic period. The old “Spanish Trail” mentioned in preceding pages was the early highway from Santa Fe, New Mexico, to the Great Salt Lake, and followed approximately an old Indian trail that was probably used by the prehistoric inhabitants or the builders of the towers. Not far from the head of Yellow Jacket Canyon a ranchman discovered on his farm a few years ago the blades of two Spanish iron lance heads or knives, still well preserved, the hilts, however, being destroyed. These objects, now in Mr. Williamson’s collection at Dolores, may have belonged to a party of Spanish soldiers who explored this region, but their form, in addition to the material, is so characteristic that no one would assign them to aboriginal manufacture. Fragments of a stirrup of metal, parts of the harness or saddle, also belonging to the Spanish epoch, have also been found. The indications are that these objects are historic, but their owners may have been Indians who obtained them from Europeans. They probably do not antedate the middle of the eighteenth century, when two Catholic fathers, with an escort of soldiers, made their trip of discovery from Santa Fe into what is now Utah. They shed no light on the epoch of the aborigines who constructed the castles and towers considered in this paper.

CONCLUSIONS

In the preceding pages the author has considered several different types of buildings, which, notwithstanding their variety in forms, have much in common and can be interpreted as indicating an identical phase of pueblo development. A comparative study of their distribution shows us that they occur in a well-defined geographical area. In comparison with stone buildings in other parts of the Southwestern States, this phase shows superior masonry. It is considered as chronologically antedating the historic epoch and post-dating an earlier, and as yet not clearly defined, phase out of which it sprung in the natural evolution from simple to complex forms.

These buildings express the communal thought of the builders, since they were constructed by groups of people rather than by individuals. Architecture representing the thoughts of many minds is conservative, or less liable to innovation or departure from prescribed forms and methods. These community houses express the thought of men in groups at different times, and, so far as archeology teaches, are the best exponents of what we call contemporary social conditions, while pottery and other small portable objects, being products of individual endeavor, furnish little on social organization, or general cultural conditions of communities. Although determination of cultural areas built on identity of pottery often coincides with those determined by buildings, this is not always the case. Specialized culture areas determined by highly conventionalized designs on ceramics are localized, more numerous, and as a rule more modern. Hence a culture area determined by architectural features may include several subareas determined by pottery.

The author has thought it possible to differentiate two distinct epochs or phases of house building in the upper part of the San Juan drainage, viz. the early and the middle stages of development. There are included in the early condition certain crude architectural efforts similar to the non-Pueblos represented in regions adjoining the Pueblo area. This early condition, though not clearly defined, is beginning to be revealed by intensive studies of the so-called slab house dwellings and isolated brush houses. Evidences of this stage have been found in several localities, as on McElmo Bluff, or combined with walls of what may be called true pueblo buildings. The differences between some of the buildings of the early stage and those of the aborigines in southern California, or of the Utes and Shoshonean tribes, are slight; resemblances which point to relations are not considered in detail.