A hundred feet east of the Fire Temple there are two low caves, one
above the other. This cliff dwelling is called New Fire House. The
rooms in the lower cave were fitted for habitation, consisting of two,
possibly three, circular ceremonial rooms and a few secular rooms; but
the upper cave is destitute of the former. The large rooms of the
upper house look like granaries for the storage of provisions,
although possibly they also were inhabited. In the rear of the large
rooms identified as granaries was found a small room with a
well-preserved human skeleton accompanied with mortuary pottery. One
of these mortuary offerings is a fine mug made of black and white ware
beautifully decorated. In the rear of the cave were three
well-constructed grinding bins, their metates still in place.
The upper house is now approached from the lower by foot holes in the
cliff and a ladder. Evidences of a secondary occupation of one of the
kivas in the lower house appear in a wall of crude masonry without
mortar, part of a rectangular room built diagonally across the kiva.
The plastering on the rear walls of the lower house is particularly
well preserved. One of the kivas, has, in place of a deflector and
ventilator shaft, a small rectangular walled enclosure surrounded by a
wall, recalling structures on the floor of the kivas of Sun Temple.
The meaning of this departure from the prescribed form of ventilator
is not apparent.