The Cliff Ruins of Canyon de Chelly, Arizona Part 8

[Ill.u.s.tration: Plate LVI Site Difficult of Approach]

Plate LVI shows a characteristic site in the lower part of the canyon.

It occurs at the point marked 8 on the map, and is now quite difficult of approach, owing to the wearing away or weathering of a long line of foot-holes in the sloping rock, but formerly access was easy enough. It is now marked by a cl.u.s.ter of Navaho burial cists. Figure 66 shows an example that occurs in De Ch.e.l.ly, about 8 miles above the junction, of Monument canyon. At first glance, and at a distance, this site appears to be really inaccessible, but a close inspection of the figure will show that it could be reached with comparative little difficulty over the rounded ma.s.s of rock shown to the left. By cutting off that side of the figure it could be made to serve as an ill.u.s.tration of a wholly inaccessible ruin.

MASONRY

The ancient pueblo builder, like his modern successor, was so closely in touch with nature, so dependent on his immediate physical surroundings, that variations in some at least of his arts are more natural and to be expected than uniformity. Especially is this true of the art of construction, and variations in masonry are more often than not the result of variations in the material employed, which is nearly always that most convenient to hand. Yet there were other conditions that necessarily influenced it, such, for example, as the character of the structure to be erected, whether permanent or temporary. The summer village of Ojo Caliente presents a type of masonry much ruder than any found in the home village of Zuni, although both were built and occupied by the same people at the same time.

Within the limits of Canyon de Ch.e.l.ly, where the physical conditions and the character of material are essentially uniform, a considerable variation in the masonry is found, implying that some conditions other than the usual ones have influenced it. Were the masonry of one cla.s.s of ruins inferior or superior throughout to that of another it might be easily explained, but variations within each cla.s.s are greater than those between cla.s.ses. Conditions a.n.a.logous to those which prevailed in the case of Ojo Caliente and Zuni may have governed here, or there may have been other conditions of which we now know nothing. It may be that sites originally occupied as farming shelters subsequently became regular villages, as has happened in other regions. The position of the kivas in many of the ruins suggests this. As a whole the masonry is inferior to that found in the Mancos canyon and the Chaco, and superior to that of Tusayan, but, as in Tusayan, where the masonry is sometimes very roughly constructed, the builders were well acquainted with the methods which produced the finer and better work.

The highest type of masonry in the pueblo system of architecture consists of small blocks of stone of nearly uniform size, dressed, and laid in courses, and rubbed down in situ. No attempt was made to break joints. This system requires the careful preparation of the material beforehand, and examples of it are not very common in Canyon de Ch.e.l.ly.

As a variant we have walls composed of stones of fairly uniform size, laid with the best face out and with the interstices c.h.i.n.ked with small spalls. The c.h.i.n.king is carried to such an extent in some places, as in the Chaco ruins, that the walls present the effect of a mosaic composed of small spalls. c.h.i.n.king is almost a universal practice, and in some localities had pa.s.sed, or was pa.s.sing, from a mere constructive to a real decorative feature. Here we have the beginning of that architecture which has been defined by Ferguson as "ornamental and ornamented construction"--in other words, of architecture as an art rather than as a craft.

The use of an exterior finish of plaster was conducive to poor masonry.

Such plastering is found throughout the region, but it is much more abundant in the modern than in the ancient work. Perhaps we may find in this a suggestion of relative age; not in the use of plastering, but in its prevalence.

Pueblo masonry is composed of very small units, and the results obtained testify to the patience and industry of the builders rather than to their knowledge and skill. In fact, their knowledge of construction was far more limited than would at first sight be supposed. The marked tabular character of the stone used rendered but a small amount of preparation necessary for even the best masonry. For over 90 per cent of it there was no preparation other than the selection of material. The walls and buildings were always modified to suit the ground, never the reverse, and instances in which the site was prepared are very rare, if not indeed unknown. There are no such instances in De Ch.e.l.ly, where sites were often irregular, and a small amount of work would have rendered them much more desirable.

Plate LVII shows a type of masonry which is quite common in De Ch.e.l.ly.

It is the west room of ruin 16, near the mouth of Del Muerto. An attempt at regularity, and possibly at decorative effect, is apparent in the use of courses of fairly uniform thickness, alternating with other courses or belts composed of small thin fragments. Beautiful examples of masonry constructed on this method occur in the Chaco ruins, but here, while the method was known, the execution was careless or faulty. c.h.i.n.king with small spalls has been extensively practiced and gives the wall an appearance of smoothness and finish. A similar wall, rather better constructed, occurs at the point marked 3 on the map, and in this case the stones composing the wall were rubbed down in situ. Another wall, which occurs in the same ruin, is shown in plate LVIII. In places very large stones have been used, larger than one man could handle conveniently, but the general effect of the wall face is very good. This effect was obtained by placing the best face of the stone outward and by careful c.h.i.n.king.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Plate LVII Masonry in Canyon De Ch.e.l.ly]

c.h.i.n.king was sometimes done, not with slips of stone driven in with a hammer, after the usual style, but with bits of mud pressed in with the fingers. The mud was used when about the consistency of modeling clay, and bears the imprints of the fingers that applied it; even the skin markings show clearly and distinctly. From this use of mud to its use as an exterior plaster there is but a short step; in fact, examples which are intermediate can be seen throughout the canyon. In places mud has been applied to small cracks and cavities in larger quant.i.ties than was necessary, and the excess has been smoothed over the adjacent stones forming a wall partly plastered, or plastered in patches. Plate LIX, which shows the interior of a room in ruin 10, will ill.u.s.trate this.

Here the process has been carried so far that the wall is almost plastered, but not quite. In plastered walls the process was carried a step farther, and the surface was finished by the application of a final coat of mud made quite liquid. The interior plastering of kivas was always much more carefully done than that of any other walls. Owing to blackening by smoke and recoating, the thickness of the plastering in kivas can be easily made out. Often it is as thin as ordinary paper.

Plate LX shows walls in which an abundance of mud mortar was used, and the effect is that of a plastered wall. The difference between these walls and those shown in plate LVII is only one of degree, the wall shown in plate LIX being of an intermediate type. No instance occurs in the canyon where a coating of mud was evenly applied to the whole surface of a wall, in the way, for example, that stucco is used by us.

It seems probable, therefore, that the application of plaster as a finish grew out of the use of stone spalls for c.h.i.n.king, and its prevalence in modern as compared with old structures is suggestive. It is not claimed, however, that because we have examples of the intermediate stages in De Ch.e.l.ly that the process was developed there.

The step is such a slight one that it might have been made in a hundred different localities at a hundred different times or at one time; but it is well to note that in any given group of ruins or locality it is likely to be later than masonry c.h.i.n.ked with stones. Surface finis.h.i.+ng in mud plaster is the prevailing method at the present day, and well-executed masonry of stone carefully c.h.i.n.ked is almost invariably ancient. The use of surface plaster is largely responsible for the deterioration of stonework that has taken place since the beginning of the historic period. The modern village of Zuni, which dates from the beginning of the eighteenth century, although built on the site of an older village, is essentially a stone-built village, though that fact would never appear from a cursory examination, so completely is the stonework covered by surface plaster.

In Tusayan (Moki) walls have been observed in progress of erection. The stones were laid up dry, and some time after, when the rains came and pools of water stood here and there in pockets on the mesa top, mud mortar was mixed and the interstices were filled. This method saved the transportation of water from the wells below up to the top of the mesa, a task entailing much labor. Doubtless a similar method was followed in De Ch.e.l.ly, where the stream bed carries water only during a part of the year. But stone was also actually laid in mud mortar, as shown in plate LII, which ill.u.s.trates a rough type of masonry.

It is probable that the practice of c.h.i.n.king grew up out of the scarcity of water, when walls were erected during the dry season and finished when the rains made the manufacture of mud mortar less of a task. The rough wall shown in the ill.u.s.tration is the outside of an interior wall of a kiva, and it was probably covered by the rectangular inclosing wall that came outside of it. It will be noticed that c.h.i.n.king, both with mud and with spalls, was extensively practiced and seems here to have been an essential part of the construction. In this example it could have no relation to the finish of the wall, for the wall was not finished.

Much of the masonry in the canyon is of the type described, but examples differ widely in degree of finish and in material selected. Some of the walls appear very rough and even crude, so much so that they almost appear to be the first efforts of a people at an unknown art, but a closer inspection shows that even the rudest walls were erected with a knowledge of the principles which were followed in the best ones, and that the difference resulted only from the care or lack of care employed. The rudest walls are much superior to the masonry of the Navaho cists which are found in conjunction with them and which are constructed on a different method.

Although walls were often built on sloping rock, and the builders had experience and at times disastrous experience to guide them, the necessity for a fiat and solid foundation was never appreciated. Walls were sometimes built on loose debris; even refuse which had been covered and formed an artificial soil was considered sufficient. There are many instances in the canyon where lack of foresight or lack of knowledge in this respect has brought about the destruction of walls. Walls resting on foreign material occur throughout the region; they are not confined to anyone cla.s.s of ruins or to any part of the canyon, but are found as much or more in the most recent as in the most ancient examples. Mummy Cave ruin and Casa Blanca are good examples. In the latter the small room on the left of the upper group (plate XLVII) is especially interesting. The side walls appear to rest on a deposit of refuse nearly 2 feet thick, which in turn rests on the sloping rock. The front wall is supported by a b.u.t.tress as shown; without this support it would certainly have been pushed out. The b.u.t.tress appears to have been built at the same time as the front wall, although its use in this way is not aboriginal. The whole arrangement is such as would result if this room, originally represented by a low front wall perhaps, were constructed when the site became inadequate and consequently at a late period in its occupancy.

The character of the refuse and debris upon which some of the walls rest is worth notice. It is well known that sheep were introduced into this country by the Spaniards, and the presence in the ruins of sheep dung, or of a material which closely resembles it, is important. Much of this is due to subsequent Navaho occupancy, and many ruins are used today by these Indians as sheepfolds. It is said, moreover, that at the time of the Navaho war, when the soldiers bayoneted all the sheep they could find, large flocks were driven up into some cliff ruins that are almost inaccessible, and kept there for a time in security. But many instances are found where the walls rest directly upon layers of compacted dung.

An example is shown in plate LII, and others are mentioned in the text under the descriptions of various ruins.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Plate LVIII c.h.i.n.ked Walls in Canyon De Ch.e.l.ly]

It has been suggested that the compacted dung found in the ruins was the product not of sheep, but of some other domesticated animal which existed in this country at the time of the first Spanish invasion, but the evidence to support this hypothesis is so very slight that so far the suggestion is only a suggestion. Not the slightest trace of this animal has been found, although it is alleged that it was domesticated among the pueblos three hundred and fifty years ago.

Although the idea of a strengthening or supporting b.u.t.tress is thought to be a foreign introduction, a hypothesis that is strengthened by the occurrence of other features, the masonry itself is aboriginal in its principles and probably also in execution. The conservatism of the Indian mind in such matters is well known. The Zuni today use stone more than adobe, although for a hundred years or more there has been an adobe church in the midst of the village.

Adobe construction in this region is only partially successful. North of the Gila river, in the plateau country, the climate is not suited to it; the rains are too heavy and the frosts are destructive. Constant vigilance and prompt repairs are necessary, and even then the adobe work is not satisfactory. Certainly in the northern part of the country the aborigines would not have developed this method of construction in the face of the difficulties with which it is surrounded; yet there are examples of adobe work in some of the most important ruins in De Ch.e.l.ly, as has already been stated. The fact that the only previously known examples of adobe work occur in ruins which are known to have been inhabited subsequent to the Spanish conquest, such as the ruin of Awatobi, in Tusayan, is suggestive. Moreover, adobe construction in this region belongs to a late period; for the walls are almost always very thin, usually 6 or 7 inches. The old type of ma.s.sive walls, 2 or even 3 feet thick, are seldom or never found constructed of adobe, although such thickness is more necessary in this material than in stone.

There is another method of construction which, although not masonry, should be noticed here. This is the equivalent of the Mexican "jacal"

construction, and consists of series of poles or logs planted vertically in the ground close to each other and plastered with mud either outside or on both sides. The only example of this found in the canyon occurs in the western part of the lower Casa Blanca ruin, and has already been mentioned. Did it not occur elsewhere it could be dismissed here as simply another item of evidence of the modern occupancy of the ruin, but Dr W. R. Birdsall mentions walls in the Mesa Verde ruins which are "continued upward upon a few tiers of stone by wickerwork heavily plastered inside and outside"[14] and Nordenskiold mentions a similar construction in the interior of a kiva. Whether a similar foundation or lower part of stone existed in the Casa Blanca ruin could not be determined without excavation.

[Footnote 14: Bull. Am. Geog. Soc., vol. xxiii, p. 598.]

OPENINGS

The ruins in De Ch.e.l.ly are so much broken down that few examples of openings now remain; still fewer are yet intact; but there is no doubt that they are of the regular pueblo types. Most of the openings in the De Ch.e.l.ly ruins are rectangular, of medium size, neither very large nor very small, with unfinished jambs and sills, and with a lintel such as that shown in plate LVIII, composed of one or two series of light sticks, sometimes surmounted by a flat stone slab. This example occurs at the point marked 3 on the map, in what was formerly an extensive village. The wall on the left, now covered by loosely piled rocks, was pierced by a narrow notched doorway. The opening shown in the ill.u.s.tration, which is in the northern wall, is 2 feet high and 14 inches wide; its sill is about 18 inches from the ground. The lintel is composed of six small sticks, about an inch in diameter, surmounted by a flat slab of stone, very roughly shaped, and separated from the sticks by 2 inches of mud mortar.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 67--Notched doorway in Canyon de Ch.e.l.ly.]

Plate LVII shows an opening which occurs in ruin No. 16. The building consisted of two rooms, between which there was no communication. The eastern room was entered by the doorway shown in the ill.u.s.tration, which is 2 feet above the ground and 2 feet high. To facilitate ingress a notch was dug in the wall about 8 inches from the ground. The western room was entered through a large doorway, shown in plate LI. The sill is about 8 inches above the ground; the opening is 3 feet high and 14 inches wide. The lintel is composed of small sticks, with a slab of stone above them, and the top of the opening and perhaps the sides were plastered.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Plate LIX A Partly Plastered Wall]

The notched or T-shape doorway, which is quite common in the Mesa Verde ruins and in Tusayan, is not abundant in De Ch.e.l.ly, but some examples can be seen there. One is shown in figure 67, which ill.u.s.trates the type. There is no doubt that doorways of this kind developed at a time when no means existed for closing the opening, except blankets or skins, and when loads were carried on the backs of men. It often happened that doorways originally constructed of this style were afterward changed by partial filling to square or rectangular openings. The princ.i.p.al doorway in the front wall of the White House proper was originally of T-shape; at some later period, but before the white coating was applied, the left-hand wing and the standard below it were filled in, leaving an almost square opening. This later filling is not uncommon in De Ch.e.l.ly, and is often found in Tusayan, where openings are sometimes reduced for the winter season and enlarged again in the summer. Many openings are completely closed, either by filling in with masonry or by a stone slab, and examples of both of these methods are found in De Ch.e.l.ly. In the third wall from the east, in the upper part of Casa Blanca ruin, there is a well-finished doorway sealed by a thin slab of stone set in mud. On the right side of the opening, about the middle, a loop or staple of wood has been built into the wall, and in the corresponding place on the left side a stick about half an inch in diameter projects. An opening into the small room west of the White House proper has a similar contrivance, and another example occurs in the front wall of the small single room in the eastern end of the ruin. Oddly enough the three examples that occur in this ruin are all found in adobe walls.

This feature appears to have been a contrivance for temporarily closing openings which were provided with stone slabs, and the latter were sealed in place with mud mortar when it was desired to close the room permanently. Examples, identical even in details, have been found in the Mancos canyon, and one is described and ill.u.s.trated by Chapin,[15] who states that the slab was 14 inches wide at one end, 15 at the other, and 25 inches high, with an average thickness of an inch. He mentions staples on both sides. Nordenskiold[16] ill.u.s.trates another or possibly the same example. He notes, however, an inner frame composed of small sticks and mud against which the slab rested. He thinks the notched doorways belonged to rooms most frequented in daily life, while the others belonged in general to storerooms or other chambers requiring a door to close them.

[Footnote 15: Land of the Cliff Dwellers, pp. 149-150, pl. opp.

p. 155.]

[Footnote 16: Cliff Dwellers of the Mesa Verde, pp. 52-53, fig. 28.]

Taken as a whole, the settlements in De Ch.e.l.ly appear to have been well provided with doorways and other openings, and there is no perceptible difference in this respect between the various cla.s.ses of ruins.

Openings were freely left in the walls, wherever convenience dictated, and without regard to the defensive motive, which, in the large valley pueblos, brought about the requirement that all the first-story rooms should be entered from the roof, a requirement which has only recently given way to the greater convenience of an entrance on the ground level.

ROOFS, FLOORS, AND TIMBER WORK

In the pueblo system of construction roofs and floors are the same; in other words, the roof of one room is the floor of the room above, and where a room or house is but one story high no change in the method of construction is made. The erection of walls was only a question of time, as the unit of the masonry is small; but the construction of a roof was a much harder task, as the beams were necessarily brought from a distance, sometimes a very long distance. The Tusayan claim that some of the timbers used in the construction of the mission buildings, which were established prior to the insurrection of 1680, were brought on the backs of men from San Francisco mountains, a distance of over 100 miles, and references to the transportation of timber over long distances are not uncommon in Pueblo traditions. In De Ch.e.l.ly great difficulty must have been experienced in procuring an adequate supply, as in that portion of the canyon where most of the ruins occur no suitable trees grow. Doubtless in many cases, where the location, under overhanging cliffs permitted, roofs were dispensed with, but this alone would not account for the dearth of timber found in the ruins. If we suppose the canyon to have been the scene of a number of occupancies instead of one, the absence of timber work, as well as the much obliterated appearance of some of the ruins, would be explained, for the material would be used more than once, perhaps several times. The Navaho would not use the timber in cliff ruins under any circ.u.mstances, and they would rather starve than eat food cooked with it. Many of the cliff outlooks, being occupied only during the farming season and being also fairly well sheltered, were probably roofless.

Timber was used as an aid to masonry construction in two ways--as a foundation and as a tie. Many instances can be seen where the walls rest on beams, running, not with them, but across them. These beams were placed directly on the rock, and the front walls rested partly on their ends and partly on the rock itself. Plate LII shows the end of one of these beams. In nine cases out of ten the beams do not appear to have served any useful end, but perhaps if the walls were removed down to the foundations the purpose would be clear. Sometimes a beam was placed on the rock in the line of the wall above it. The single or separate room occupying the western end of the upper cave in the Casa Blanca ruin is an example of this use. The front wall rests on beams, as shown in plate XLVI. Some of the back adobe walls in the eastern part of the upper ruin rest on timbers, and instances of this feature are not uncommon in other parts of the canyon. The southeastern corner of the tower in Mummy Cave ruin in Del Muerto rested on timbers apparently laid over a small cavity or hole in the rock. The timber was not strong enough to support the weight placed upon it, and consequently gave way, letting the corner of the tower fall out.

Cross walls were sometimes tied to front or back walls by timbers built into them, but this method, of which fine examples can be seen in the Chaco ruins, was but slightly practiced here. Timber was used also to prevent the slipping of walls on sloping sites, being placed vertically and built into the masonry; but as this use is a constructive expedient it is discussed under that head.

STORAGE AND BURIAL CISTS

Facilities for the storage of grain and other produce are essential in the pueblo system of horticulture, as in any other. As a result, storage cists are found everywhere. In the modern pueblos the inner dark rooms, which would otherwise be useless, provide the necessary s.p.a.ce, but in the settlements in De Ch.e.l.ly, which were very small as a rule, there were few such rooms, and special structures had to be erected. These differed from the dwelling rooms only in size, although as a rule, perhaps, the openings by which they were entered were not so large as those of the dwellings and were sometimes, possibly always, provided with some means by which they could be closed.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Plate LX Plastered Wall in Canyon De Ch.e.l.ly]

Immense numbers of these storage cists are found in the canyon, some of them with masonry so roughly executed that it is difficult to discriminate between the old pueblo and the modern Navaho work.

Sometimes these cists or small rooms form part of a village, more often they are attached to the cliff outlooks, and not infrequently they stand alone on sites overlooking the lands whose product they contained. It is probable that many of the cliff outlooks themselves were used quite as much for temporary storage as for habitations during the farming season.

These two uses, although quite distinct, do not conflict with each other. Doubtless many excellent sites, now marked only by the remains of storage cists, were occupied also during the summer as outlooks without the erection of any house structures. Some of the modern pueblos now use temporary shelters of brush for outlooks.

It is not meant that the crops when gathered were placed in these cists and kept there until used. The harvest was, as a rule, permanently stored in the home villages, and the cists were used only for temporary storage. Doubtless the old practice resembled somewhat that followed by the Navaho today. The harvest is gathered at the proper time and what is not eaten at once is hidden away in cists of old or modern construction.