The second broad period in the history of the San Juan area is that in
which the Indians built communal dwellings called pueblos. These were
stone and adobe structures, sometimes multistoried, facing a central
plaza which contained one or more kivas. Very similar structures and
village plans can be seen in a number of the existing pueblos of the Rio
Grande today, notably Taos, Santo Domingo, and San Ildefonso.
Over the previous centuries the inhabitants of the San Juan Basin, and
especially the Animas Valley, had gradually developed a different way of
life from that of the early Basketmakers. Certainly, they still grew
corn, beans, and squash; still hunted and snared game; still grew old,
died, and were buried. But in addition to having some of the better
material things in life such as pottery and the bow and arrow, they now
placed a greater emphasis upon agriculture; hunting and seed gathering
were secondary sources of food. In the spring, the corn seeds were
carefully planted, watched over, watered, and cared for. As the plants
matured, the men and young boys spent more time in the fields. During
the day it was necessary to drive off the squirrels and birds; at night
the green tender plants must be protected from the deer, rabbits, and
nocturnal rodents. Water in this semiarid land had to be carefully
managed, whether flood irrigation or planned canal irrigation was used.
If all these factors were not judiciously controlled, there would be no
crop. The forces of nature seemed increasingly important; too much sun
could be as disastrous as too much water. Ceremonies were devised to
propitiate the spirits and the gods, who, to the Indians resided in all
aspects of nature. More time was devoted to seasonal religious
activities, and great care was taken to educate the young in the proper
performance of the ceremonies so they, too, might continue to prosper
and live in harmony with nature.
Cotton was probably introduced at about the beginning of the Pueblo
period, along with loom weaving. This allowed the making of true cloth,
suitable for blankets, poncho-like shirts, sashes, wrap-around skirts,
and other necessary items. One other important change at this time
affected physical appearance. The soft cradle of the Basketmakers was
replaced by the hard cradleboard of the Pueblos. Since the infant
usually was bound securely upon his back in the cradle and was unable to
roll around, the pressure of the hard board, instead of the softer
cradle, caused the back of its head to become flattened, thus giving the
whole head a much broader and rounder appearance. This skull flattening
in no way affected the mentality of the child, but it must have been
obvious to the parents what was causing it. Through continued use of the
cradleboard, skull flattening must quickly have become a mark of
distinction and charm and, in a few generations, it must have become the
traditional head shape of the Pueblo Indians.
Dogs and turkeys were still the only domesticated animals, the turkeys
probably kept as much for their feathers (and thus periodically plucked)
as for their food value. Burials of both dogs and turkeys occur,
indicating they were evidently regarded as more than mere food. Bones
from the refuse piles indicate the people hunted—or acquired by
trade—bear, elk, bison, wolf, mountain sheep, deer, and rabbits.
There was no sharp break between this period and the preceding
Basketmaker. The Indians themselves did not know when they left one
period and embarked upon the next. Actually, such “periods” are the
classification devices of the archeologists, who need names to apply to
the times at which different cultural and evolutionary changes occur. In
retrospect, the archeologist can see certain important changes which
began to take place about A.D. 750. Liking to classify and categorize
the remains they study, archeologists first divided this broad Pueblo
period into five substages labeled Pueblo I, II, III, IV, and V. Later,
the first two substages were grouped together as the Developmental
Pueblo Period, the third was called the Great Pueblo Period, the fourth
became known as the Regressive Pueblo Period, and the last as the
Historic Pueblo Period. These terms are more meaningful and will be used
hereafter. The last two do not concern us, for at the end of the Great
Pueblo Period, seemingly at the time of the well-known drought (A.D.
1276-99), most of the pueblo-dwelling peoples left the San Juan area,
never to return.
The most obvious change in the Developmental Pueblo Period, as compared
to the preceding Basketmaker, was a gradual shift in the type of house
construction. The single-unit mud, slab, and jacal semisubterranean
house was giving way to the huge multistoried stone and adobe
structures, which were to predominate in the Great Pueblo Period 250
years later. In some areas, even earlier than A.D. 750 a few people
began to build single-room houses aboveground in a contiguous
arrangement, often crescent-shaped, forming small villages. The
construction varied from district to district. Some houses were
quadrangular in form and wholly aboveground, made of adobe and mud with
upright, supporting posts; others were still semisubterranean; some even
showed the beginnings of true stone masonry.
At this time also, a new type of structure was coming into existence
(though a few examples are known from late Basketmaker times). This new
structure, the kiva, was simply a modification of, and change in, the
use of the old pithouse. A kiva is a ceremonial room and clubhouse for
the men, usually constructed underground (or, where aboveground, so
clustered in other rooms as to appear belowground in its relation to the
surrounding rooms). It is circular like the early pithouses, but
normally contains a fireplace, a deflector (to prevent the draft from
fanning the fire too much), and a ventilator shaft by which to bring in
the fresh air. A “sipapu” (a small hole which supposedly leads to the
underworld) was located in the floor on the opposite side of the
fireplace from the deflector. Usually there was a bench around the
inside of the kiva near the floor, which may either have been used as a
place on which to store religious objects and other paraphernalia or may
have served the functional purpose of strengthening the lower part of
the kiva wall. Smaller kivas frequently had pilasters built upon the
bench and extending upward a short distance; these supported the cribbed
roof structure. Large kivas had four centrally located posts which
helped support the roof. Entrance to a kiva was normally gained by means
of a ladder through the central smoke hole in the roof.
[Illustration: GROUND PLAN OF A TYPICAL KIVA]
[Illustration: CROSS SECTION OF A TYPICAL KIVA 1. SIPAPU 2. FIREPIT 3.
DEFLECTOR 4. AIR SHAFT (VENTILATOR) 5. PILASTER (ROOF SUPPORT)]
It is difficult to assign the same dates to this Developmental Pueblo
Period in all areas of the San Juan Basin. Culturally some sections
seemed to lag behind others; some ideas, concepts, and artifacts spread
and were accepted faster than others. Also, certain regions have been
much better explored archeologically, and we know more about them.
Unfortunately, the Animas is one of the river valleys in the San Juan
drainage which has not been particularly well surveyed or investigated
archeologically. Accounts by early settlers, and passing references in
some of Morris’ reports, indicate that in aboriginal times (certainly
during Pueblo times), the valley was no doubt heavily populated. It
should have been. Good water is readily available in the river and the
climate is healthful; prehistorically, game must have abounded in the
nearby foothills and mountains. Settlement and clearing of lands in more
recent times have eliminated many of the prehistoric remains, but the
higher banks along the river terraces still show low mounds of rubble,
obviously man made, with indications of cobble and sandstone walls,
which evidently were dwellings of the Pueblo Period.
Best known in this valley area are the cave and open sites that Morris
excavated north of Durango and which contained the remains of early
Basketmaker peoples already mentioned and the great pueblo of Aztec,
near the town of the same name about 15 miles above the confluence of
the Animas and San Juan Rivers. As described elsewhere, this latter
structure was also excavated by Morris in 1916-21. Without doubt, parts
of the valley were more or less continuously occupied from early
Basketmaker times until the final abandonment of the Four Corners
country about A.D. 1300. Although we have no firm data on which to base
conclusions, it would be safe to assume that the Developmental Pueblo
Period in the Animas Valley lasted from about A.D. 750 or 800 to 1050 or
1100, and that conditions in the living patterns of the people elsewhere
were reflected in the Animas Valley.
As the Developmental Pueblo Period progressed, house arrangements became
more complex. The next step seems to have been an extension of the
earlier linear or crescent-shaped alinement of contiguous houses by
adding on one or more wings, so that the resulting plan was L-shaped or
formed a rectangular U. In these cases, the semisubterranean kiva was
still retained in the courtyard as a definite religious structure. These
types of planned communities are called “unit houses.” Most were single
storied, though some may have had a second story added on the back tier
of rooms.
Changes in pottery styles, and especially in decoration, are very marked
during this period. Although plain gray ware was still made, pottery
with black designs on a white background shows up in great quantities.
In the western part of the San Juan area, painted pottery with a
pinkish-orange background and red designs makes its first appearance;
examples of this type show up as trade pieces in eastern San Juan sites.
The differences between culinary and nonculinary wares become more
marked. The former are usually corrugated vessels, formed by pinching or
indenting the clay coils while they were still plastic and before the
pot was fired. Later in the period, this type of corrugation became
quite decorative in itself and some of the better cooking ware
aesthetically rivals the painted wares.
[Illustration: Corrugated cooking pot. Diameter at mouth, 11½″; Maximum
diameter, 16⅓″; Height, 16″.]
There was a greater variety of vessel forms and painted designs. For
example, designs were no longer confined to the interiors of the bowls,
but were also painted on the exteriors and upon a great variety of
vessel forms. Many of these designs still seem to be derived from those
inherent in basketry, others may have been taken from textile designs,
and still others originated especially for use on pottery vessels.
Principal design elements seem to have been parallel lines—sometimes
straight, sometimes stepped or wavy—zigzags, triangles, checkerboards,
and interlocking frets. In the latter part of the period, these elements
became broader and heavier and were rendered with greater assurance. A
slip or wash of very fine clay was now smeared on the vessel before
firing to give it a smooth finish.
Burials were generally in refuse heaps, abandoned storage pits and
rooms, or beneath the floors of houses. Infants and small children were
frequently buried beneath the floors of houses, as though the parents
either desired to keep them around as long as possible, or believed that
the soul of the dead child would return with the birth of the next one
if the body were close by. Grave offerings consist mainly of pottery,
but we may be sure that various perishable objects also accompanied the
dead; however, conditions for preservation are so poor in these open
sites that most traces of perishable materials have long since
disappeared.
In a few areas there are rather puzzling features about some of the
burials. For example, along the La Plata drainage there are too few
burials to account for the rather large population that must have lived
there. Diligent searching has failed to reveal how the La Plata people
disposed of most of their dead. In other places skull burials are
found—without any bodies—and sometimes bodies are found without any
skulls. Perhaps some of these people practiced taking trophy heads of
warriors killed in combat or ambush. Now and then burials are found with
an arrow embedded in the body, or with scrape marks on the skull which
indicate that a person had been scalped, or with the skull smashed in,
as though by a stone ax.
While open-armed warfare, as we know it today, was unfamiliar to the
Pueblo Indians, life may not have always been calm and peaceful. Raiding
or ambush parties, economic strife, the strains of increasing
population, arguments over land and water rights, all may have
contributed to making life uncertain during this period. And
difficulties of a slightly different sort are shown in skeletons from
Alkali Ridge in southwestern Utah, which show marked signs of
malnutrition and diseases.
This was evidently a period of growth, development, transition, and some
struggle. As in other periods, it is difficult to place sharp lines of
demarcation between the Pueblo Period and the earlier Basketmaker and
between it and the later Great Pueblo Period. In all of the San Juan
Basin, at any given moment, examples could be found of both old and new
trends. Even in adjacent areas, there was no uniformity of cultural
development. But by the end of this period, in one area or another, all
the basic Pueblo traits were established. All that remained was for
certain of these areas to become specialized along different lines, to
become cultural “centers,” diffusing their ideas to neighboring groups,
and in turn absorbing ideas from them. Throughout the San Juan Basin,
the people were physically much alike; their language may well have been
the same, or closely related, and there were probably free movements of
people between towns and even between the more isolated groups and the
larger centers of activity.
It is doubtful if any group was completely isolated. Intermarriage must
have been common. Whole family and clan groups may have left one village
and joined another, sometimes only a short distance away, sometimes far
away. It would be almost impossible to trace such minor shifts in
population; large-scale mass migrations might leave their imprint on the
archeological record, but such evidence does not seem to exist, and it
is doubtful if any mass movements of people occurred at this time.
At the close of this period, what were conditions in the lower Animas
Valley, especially in the immediate vicinity of what is now the Aztec
Ruins? Was there a small, early-type Developmental Pueblo Village at
this particular spot? Or possibly a large “unit house” type structure?
Lack of knowledge about the Animas Valley precludes a definite answer,
and early excavations at Aztec Ruins were largely confined to the main
ruins themselves. In most places the digging did not penetrate to what
may have been the underlying and earlier remains. In a few places
beneath the great ruins, where the excavations went deep enough and
where the later building of the great pueblo had not eradicated them,
there seem to be indications that there were kivas of an earlier type,
and possibly a few scattered aboveground dwellings. An early-type
Developmental Pueblo village may have stood at this same spot.