interesting cliff-dwelling.[32] As this is the best preserved of all
the ruins thus far discovered in the Navaho National Monument, it
should be excavated and repaired for future visitors and students.
Kitsiel is a large ruin, its length (estimated at 300 feet) being
not less than that of the greatest cliff-dwelling of the Mesa Verde
National Park. Like other ruins in the vicinity, it is not so
picturesque as the structures of that region, lacking round towers and
other features so attractive in Cliff Palace.[33] The accompanying
illustration (pl. 13) presents the ground plan of this ruin, the
architectural features of which are similar to those of Betatakin.
[Illustration:
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY BULLETIN 50 PLATE 11
BETATAKIN—CENTRAL PART]
One of the most striking features of Kitsiel is the great log, 35 feet
long, under which the visitor passes to inspect the interior of the
ruin. West of this log, which evidently once supported a retaining
wall, the rooms are well preserved; east of it this wall in places has
slipped down the cliff and its component stones are to be found in
the talus below.
It is difficult to discover how many rooms this great cliff-house
formerly had, but there is little doubt that they numbered more than
150, besides the kivas. This ruin is believed to be one of the largest
known cliff-dwellings of the Southwest, ranking in size the Cliff
Palace in the Mesa Verde, which it does not rival, however, in variety
of architectural features. The masonry in Kitsiel is inferior to that
in the Spruce-tree House and the Balcony House, the walls of which show
the highest aboriginal achievement in stonework north of Mexico.[34]
The walled inclosures of Kitsiel are reducible to a few types of which
the following may be distinguished:
(1) Kivas, or circular subterranean rooms with a large banquette on one
side, the walls being generally broken down and without pilasters or
roof-supports.
(2) Kihus, or rectangular rooms with doors on one side, each having a
low bank, or “deflector,” rising from the floor between the doorway
and the fire-hole. Instead of this bank being free from the wall, as
at Betatakin, it is generally joined to it on one side, the floor at
the point of junction being raised slightly above the remaining level.
Smoke-holes are sometimes, but not always, present in the roof. These
rooms, like the circular rooms, are ceremonial in character. The only
opening in their floors that can be compared with the ceremonial
aperture, or _sipapû_, is a shallow depression a few inches deep. The
diameters of these openings are greater than in the case of the sipapû
in Cliff Palace kivas.
(3) Rectangular rooms, some of which have benches and show evidence of
having been living rooms.
(4) Large rooms each with a fireplace in the middle of the floor.
(5) Rooms with metates set in bins made of stone slabs (milling rooms).
(6) Courts and streets. The longest street extends from the middle of
the ruin to the western end and is lined on both sides by rooms many of
the roofs of which are still intact.
An instructive architectural feature of some of the rooms of this ruin
is the use of upright logs in supporting corners. Part of the roof of
one of these rooms situated deep in the cave is formed by the natural
rock and the remainder by an artificial covering supported by upright
logs forked at the end to receive the rafters.
SCAFFOLD HOUSE
This ruin, about 2 miles from the place where two large canyons open
into Laguna creek, lies in a cavern worn in the side of a large
butte on the left of the stream. It is appropriately called Scaffold
House from a finely made wooden scaffold (fig. 1) which the ancients
constructed in a vertical cleft in the cliff about 50 feet above the
east end of the ruin. Although this scaffold is now inaccessible from
the walls of the room below, all the beams and much of the earthen
floor still remain.
[Illustration: FIG. 1. Scaffold of Scaffold House.]
The construction of the scaffold is as follows: The crevice in which
it lies is rectangular, with the longest axis vertical. Several large
logs placed horizontally, their ends fitted into holes pecked in the
sides of the crevice, support smaller beams laid across them at right
angles. These latter in turn are covered with small sticks on which
are laid bark and clay, leaving a hatchway at a point about midway.
The construction of this scaffold, probably as daring a piece of
aerial building as can be found anywhere among cliff-dwellings, is so
well preserved that it shows no sign of deterioration. We can only
conjecture what its use may have been, but the plausible suggestion has
been made that it was an outlook or place of defense.
[Illustration:
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY BULLETIN 50 PLATE 12
PICTOGRAPHS AT BETATAKIN]
Scaffold House is about 300 feet long. The rooms, which are in fine
condition, extend along the side of the cliff, those situated midway
of the length of the ruin being fairly well preserved. There are not
far from 56 rooms still to be traced, and at least two circular kivas,
the walls of one of which are still in fair condition. The larger kiva
measures about 15 feet in diameter; it is subterranean, with a deep
bench or banquette on one side. There is no trace of the pilasters
so conspicuous in the circular kivas of the Mesa Verde. The inner
walls are smoothly plastered.
Enough of the roof of this kiva remains to show the method of
construction, and as this is the first example of such a roof the
writer has ever examined a brief description of it may prove to be
instructive. (See pl. 14.) The supports or rafters are three in number,
consisting of a large middle log laid across the center of the kiva
halfway between the banquette and the opposite side, and of two smaller
logs, parallel with it, resting on the top of the kiva wall, one across
the banquette, and the other at about an equal distance on the opposite
side. A number of smaller transverse beams, parallel with one another,
are supported by the three logs already mentioned, and upon these lie
the layers of sticks, bark, and adobe which cover the roof. No hatchway
or place for a vertical opening was to be seen, but as the covering of
the banquette is missing it is quite possible that the entrance to the
kiva may have had some connection with this feature.
The top of a vertical stone slab, comparable in shape and position
with a deflector, was seen projecting out of the débris that fills the
lower part of the kiva, and rods in the wall near the roof represent
pegs found at the tops of the pilasters in Mesa Verde kivas. There is a
niche at one side for small objects, a constant feature in all kivas,
circular and rectangular. The fire-hole was covered with débris.
The second circular kiva, which belongs to the same subtype, is
situated not far from the one described, but is much more dilapidated,
about half its walls having fallen. The roof of this kiva appears to
have been supported in part by upright logs isolated from the walls,
inside the chamber, three of which still stand in their original
positions. This feature reminds one of kivas of the Rio Grande region
as described by Castañeda, the historian of the Coronado expedition in
1540-42. In addition to the two circular kivas Scaffold House contains
another room that may have been ceremonial in character, having all the
essentials of the Betatakin rooms herein referred to as kivas. It lies
near the western end of the ruin, its northwestern wall being bound by
the vertical cliff. This room is rectangular, with a lateral entrance
opposite which is a low bank, or deflector; the floor between the
latter and the doorway is raised slightly above the general level. The
fire-hole occupies a position on the other side, as in rooms of this
kind in Betatakin. It was noticed that the sides of the doorway are
considerably worn and that its lintel is made of split sticks.
In addition to the two circular subterranean kivas at Scaffold House
there is at least one kihu in this ruin. This is situated near the
western end, being built against the upright or rear wall of the cavern
to which the two side walls are joined. The doorway is like those of
the kihus in Betatakin and is situated opposite the cliff-wall. The
roof has fallen in, but the beams and wattling remain in place as they
fell. There is a fire-hole in the middle of the floor, and between it
and the doorway is a deflector made of upright staves between which is
adobe work; the whole is plastered with adobe. The threshold of the low
doorway is slightly elevated above the floor, and between it and the
base of the deflector is a raised platform. The lintels are made of
sticks split with wedges, possibly of stone, as shown by their fibrous
surfaces.
There are many pictographs on the cliff at Scaffold House, the most
conspicuous of which represent human hands, snakes (one of them is 15
feet long), mountain sheep or other horned mammals, and nondescript
figures representing tailed human beings.
The ruins at Bubbling Spring, a short distance from Scaffold House, are
inconspicuous.
CRADLE HOUSE
This large ruin,[35] so named from the finding of the cradle described
and illustrated herein, is situated in the side of a bluff rising above
East canyon. It contains about 50 rooms and at least 3 circular kivas
without pilasters, the front walls of which are considerably broken
down.
The rooms of Cradle House as a rule extend along the rear of the cave,
their back walls generally being formed by the vertical wall of the
cliff, there being no recess behind them. The majority of the rooms lie
about midway in the length of the ruin, the kivas being situated in
front of the cluster. In two or three places rooms are found on levels
below or above that of the main cluster, but only rarely are there
rooms in front of others on the same level. On the upper ledge near the
western end a small bin is found at the base of which is a considerable
depression, probably artificial.
LADDER HOUSE
The more or less dilapidated walls of this ruin are to be seen from the
left bank of East canyon, a few miles farther upstream. The position
is indicated by an enormous butte which projects into the canyon and
diverts the stream at that point. One side of this butte is eroded in
such a way as to resemble in outline an elephant’s trunk, this erosion
marking the initial process in the formation of a “natural bridge.” On
the opposite side of this butte there is another large cliff-dwelling,
which was not visited.
[Illustration:
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY BULLETIN 50 PLATE 13
GROUND PLAN
OF THE
KEET SEEL RUIN
NAVAHO IND·RES·ARIZ
BY
W·B·DOUGLASS
U·S·EXAMINER OF SURVEYS
GENERAL LAND OFFICE
]
FOREST-GLEN HOUSE
The fine growth of trees at the base of a large cliff-house about 2
miles beyond Cradle House has suggested the name Forest-glen House.
Some of the walls are in the form of concentric semicircles with the
conspicuous representation of a head attached to one side. Many rocks
have fallen on this ruin from the cave roof, especially at one end, but
the rooms at the western end are still well preserved.
PINE-TREE HOUSE
About 8 miles up East canyon there is a large, almost inaccessible,
ruin, which lies a short distance from the main canyon. A striking
feature of this ruin is its division into three parts, of which the
central section is somewhat lower than the one on each side. A large
pine on the edge of the cliff above has suggested the name Pine-tree
House. Deep below this ruin is a large basin, in which grow many trees
and bushes; among these are a good spring and a small rivulet. This
ruin has two very large circular kivas, without pedestals, 20 to 30
feet in diameter. A deep banquette is present on one side. This ruin
exhibits no evidence of having been dug.
TRICKLING-SPRING HOUSE
After descending to Laguna creek from Marsh pass, crossing the
stream, and following the bank about 2 miles, one comes to a ridge of
copper-bearing rocks, beyond which the road crosses a deep ravine.
On following the right bank this ravine is found to extend into the
cliffs as a canyon. A few miles after entering the canyon a stream is
encountered emerging from a spring and trickling over a cliff. High
above this cliff, in a canyon 60 or 80 feet in size, the entrance
to which is surrounded and more or less concealed by stately pines,
spruces, and cedars, stands a cliff-ruin, possibly never before visited
by white men, for which the name Trickling-spring House is suggested.
Although this ruin is small, it is in several respects unique. The main
architectural feature is a diminutive court or plaza, into which open a
number of small rooms, having well-plastered walls and low entrances.
In this, as in most of the other ruins in the Navaho National Monument,
some of the house-walls are constructed of stone; but many are made of
clay, plastered on sticks or wickerwork supported by upright logs. The
masonry when present is poor as a rule, the component stones rarely
being dressed into shape, but the surface plastering, especially on
the kiva walls, is good. Many walls stand on rocks that have evidently
fallen from the roof of the cave. A metate set in position in one of
the smaller rooms indicates that this particular inclosure served as a
milling room.
[Illustration: FIG. 2. Ground plan of Trickling-spring House.
_A_, _B_, _C_, rooms; _D_, _D_, deflectors; _E_, doorway; _H_, _H_,
hatchways; _M_, metate; _P_, plaza; _R_, _R_, rock fragments.]
Two squarish rooms, with lateral doorways and a deflector or wall
before them, are identified as kihus. One of these has a platform
or floor connecting the base of the ventilator and the doorway. The
deflector is free from the kihu walls at both ends. The walls of a room
with a deflector which opens into the plaza are very much blackened
with smoke. No circular subterranean room was observed. There are
several well-preserved hatchways in the roofs, showing that entrances
of this kind were common in addition to lateral entrances with
well-preserved sills and lintels. One or two of the small windows in
the outer walls have a downward slant, as if to afford a better view of
visitors approaching from below. One of these old doorways was closed
with masonry, constructed possibly when the room was deserted. There
are no signs of vandalism in this ruin.[36]
CHARACTERISTIC FEATURES OF RUINS
The existence of recesses and of refuse heaps back of the buildings
in caves is characteristic of Mesa Verde cliff-dwellings. In the
cliff-houses of the Canyon de Chelly and Marsh Pass regions they rarely
exist, the house walls being built against the rear wall of the cave,
leaving very little space behind them for refuse or fallen débris.
This latter feature, due to the geological character of the caves, is
also prominent in the cliff-dwellings of the Red Rock country, at the
headwaters of the Verde and its tributaries, and is likewise found in a
few cliff-houses of the Gila visited by the writer. From one point of
view the use of the wall or walls of the cave as house-walls marks a
typical form of cliff-dwelling, or a dependent village, distinguished
from a cliff-dwelling like Cliff Palace, the walls of which are
independent or free on all sides from the cliffs.[37]
[Illustration:
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY BULLETIN 50 PLATE 14
_a._ RELATION IN PARTS OF CIRCULAR AND RECTANGULAR KIVAS
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, banquettes with pilasters thereon; _C. O._ ceremonial
opening; _F_, fire-hole; _S_, sipapû (symbolic opening into
underworld); _V_, ventilator.
_b._ SCAFFOLD HOUSE
_A_, large banquette; _C_, adobe roof covering; _D_, deflector; _S_,
stick construction supporting roof.
DIAGRAM SHOWING KIVA ROOF CONSTRUCTION]
The masonry of the Navaho Monument ruins is crude as compared with that
found in the ruins of the Mesa Verde National Park, and walls made of
adobe supported by upright sticks are more numerous. The character
of the masonry may be due in part to the slab-like character of the
building stones, and possibly to their greater hardness. The relative
predominance of adobe walls supported by upright sticks was fostered
by the ease with which they could be constructed and the quantity of
clay available for building purposes. Comparison of the masonry of
ruins in the Navaho Monument with that of the Black Falls region shows
a resemblance much greater than that existing between either group and
the cliff-houses of the Mesa Verde region.
There is no architectural feature in Southwestern ruins more
distinctive than the ceremonial rooms, or kivas, but as these have
never been recognized throughout a large area of Arizona, it is
important to determine the character of the ceremonial rooms of the
Navaho Monument ruins and to compare them with kivas at present used by
the Hopi.
While as a rule there is great similarity in secular rooms in different
culture areas of the Southwest, the more archaic ceremonial rooms of
these regions vary considerably. The rooms ordinarily called kivas
are of two distinct types, circular and rectangular. There are two
kinds of circular kivas,[38] one having pilasters and banquettes to
support the roof, the other without pilasters, apparently roofless,
but surrounded by high walls as if for the purpose of obscuring the
view from neighboring plazas. The circular kivas commonly do not
form a part of the house mass, being separated some distance from
the secular rooms. From all that can be learned it appears that the
round kiva is an ancient type, its position in the rear of the cave in
such cliff-dwellings as Spruce-tree House and Cliff Palace indicating
that this form is as old as the building itself. The circular type,
with pilasters, is confined wholly to the eastern region, having been
reported from the Mesa Verde, the San Juan and many of its tributaries,
Chaco canyon, and certain ruins west of the Rio Grande. Circular kivas
somewhat modified are found also in many of the Rio Grande pueblos,
where they are still in use. A subtype of circular kivas without
pilasters but provided each with one large banquette is the common
form of circular ceremonial room in the Navaho National Monument and
the Canyon de Chelly. The modern representative of this subtype is
the Snake kiva of the Hopi, which has become rectangular, the large
banquette (_tuwibi_, pl. 14) being modified into the “spectators,” or
elevated surface of the floor.
The corresponding ceremonial rooms at Zuñi and in the prehistoric Hopi
pueblos are rectangular in form and of simpler architecture. Similarly
shaped ceremonial rooms, not subterranean, are still in use in modern
Hopi pueblos. As a good example of this archaic form of ceremonial room
at Walpi may be mentioned that in which the Flute altar is erected and
in which the Flute secret rites are performed.[39] This ancestral room
of the clan is a rectangular chamber forming part of the second floor,
and is entered from one side. The Flute clans came from a pueblo,
now a ruin, in the north, but after union with the Ala, who lived
at Tokónabi, they settled at the Snake pueblo, Walpi. So it may be
supposed that their ancestors also had no special kiva, but celebrated
their secret rites in an ordinary house.
The fraternity of Sun priests likewise erect their altar and perform
their secret ceremonies in a room, not in a kiva; so do the Kalektaka,
or warriors. None of these rooms is commonly regarded or enumerated as
a kiva, but such chambers are believed to be the direct representatives
of the ceremonial rooms built above ground as a part of the house, in
the manner more characteristic of ceremonial rooms in Arizona ruins.
The ruins in the Navaho Monument have ceremonial rooms allied on one
side to the kivas of the San Juan region, and on the other to rooms in
the Little Colorado ruins that may have been built for ceremonial use.
The latter are constructed above ground, inclosed by other houses, and
are rectangular in shape, with lateral doorways. Some of these rooms,
as at Betatakin, contain each a fire screen and a fire-hole, as in a
circular kiva, the ventilator being replaced by a lateral doorway. It
is possible that when the Snake people inhabited their northern homes,
before they came to Walpi, their ceremonial rooms were not built, as
at present, partly underground, and placed at a distance from the
secular houses. The ceremonial rooms of this clan and of immediate
relatives when living at Tokónabi or in the Navaho Monument region may
have resembled those of the Black Falls cluster of ruins.[40] Their
subterranean position and separation from other rooms may be regarded
as modifications due to foreign influences after the clan arrived at
Walpi.[41]
[Illustration:
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY BULLETIN 50 PLATE 15
_a._ FOOD BOWL
Cat. No. 257781. Diameter, 4½ inches.
_b._ CLAY DISK WITH PERFORATED BORDER
Cat. No. 258330. Diameter, 5¼ inches.
_c._ DIPPER
Cat. No. 257779. Height, 4½ inches.
_d._ FOOD-BOWL WITH HANDLE
Cat. No. 257780. Diameter, 6 inches.
POTTERY FROM NAVAHO NATIONAL MONUMENT]
The sunken or subterranean situation of the ceremonial assembly room,
or kiva, of the Pueblo region is an architectural survival of a people
whose secular and ceremonial rooms were subterranean. This feature may
not be autochthonous in this area, or limited to it geographically,
having probably been derived from people of kindred culture of the West
coast, as pointed out by Mr. Ernest Sarfert’s argument on this point,
which would seem to be conclusive if subterranean kivas could be found
in the Gila and Little Colorado regions.[42]
The forms of pueblo kivas, circular or rectangular, are not derived
one from the other, but suggest different geographical origins. The
circular form, confined to the eastern Pueblo area, bears evidence of
having been derived from the culture of a people inhabiting a forested
region; while the rectangular form strongly suggests a people with a
treeless habitat. Both circular and rectangular subterranean assembly
rooms existed in aboriginal California in historic and prehistoric
times. The archaic or prehistoric culture of the Pueblo region is
closely related to that of the West coast in other particulars also,
that do not concern the subject of this article.
When the Snake clans lived at Tokónabi, and later at Wukóki (on the
Little Colorado), so far as known they had no subterranean rooms
isolated from the others for ceremonial purposes, but used rooms so
closely resembling other apartments that they may be called “living
rooms.” Even when they came to the Hopi mesas they may not have had
at first a specialized ceremonial chamber. A study of Arizona ruins
reveals no rooms identified as ceremonial that are isolated from the
house masses. This is true of cliff-dwellings and pueblos, and it is
probable that the differentiation and separation of kivas from secular
houses, found in modern Hopi pueblos, are an introduced feature of
comparatively late date. At Zuñi a rectangular room, not separated
from the house mass, serves as a kiva, the custom in this respect
approaching more closely that found among their kindred, the ancient
people of the Little Colorado river, than among the more modified Hopi
of the present time.
While some of the rooms identified as ceremonial in preceding pages
are rectangular in shape and not isolated from secular rooms, the
circular type seems also to have been found in Utah, and at Kitsiel and
ruins near it. South of Marsh pass circular kivas are less abundant,
and it appears that somewhere in this region is a line of demarcation
between ruins with circular kivas and those with rectangular kivas. In
prehistoric ruins from Marsh pass southward[43] to the Gila valley no
rooms have ever been identified as kivas, although in the cavate ruins
called Old Caves, near Flagstaff, are subterranean rooms entered from
the floor of a room above, which may have served for the performance of
religious rites.[44]
From a comparison of some features of the kivas in the cliff-dwellings
of the San Juan and its tributaries with those of the Navaho Monument
it would appear that while the ceremonial rooms of the latter in
certain details are like those of the former, in some cases their form
and position are different. So far as this resemblance goes, it may be
reasoned that the San Juan ancients influenced by their culture the
northern Arizona cliff-dwellers, but there is scant evidence of the
reverse, that is, that the San Juan pueblos borrowed from the culture
of the northern Arizonians any architectural features, especially in
the form and construction of their kivas. The theory would be logical
that the prehistoric migration of culture was down rather than up the
river, and the symbolism of the pottery contributes interesting data
supporting this conclusion.
FOOTNOTES: