Pueblos

I don’t know if it is the light, the structure or the adobe brick, but there is really something special about the remains of these ancient communities. Looking out from the  Long House pueblo down a canyon that probably hasn’t changed substantially in 900 years, even with a crowd of people around, you could almost imagine yourself as part of that community, waking to the quiet of the canyon and thinking about getting adequate water or weeding your little patch of squash and beans. One thing I learned that I hadn’t anticipated was that at the back of the cave was a water seep, probably one of the reasons it was selected.  Apparently, water seeps through the sandstone above the structure until it hits an impermeable layer of shale, which forced it out behind the buildings.

At Antelope Canyon, you can see round “kivas” which are believed to be ceremonial areas.  In some canyons there were apparently communities as large as a thousand people.

The actual rooms where people lived were actually quite small, even given that stature was generally smaller than modern day people.  Although a few people may have lived to as old as 60 years, average life span was probably closer to 30.

Breeding usually started young and mortality from childbirth was high. Also, they ground corn into flour between two stones (mano and metate) and their flour had a lot of sand in it, which ground down their teeth relatively quickly.  

An important part of the Native American cultural record are petroglyphs scratched or pecked into rock faces.  Most are on cliff faces, but this one was on a boulder sitting on the ground off of a dirt road in Kane Canyon. It shows a birth, which is apparently uncommon; animals and hunting more generally are depicted.  Like these from inside Arches National Park.

The southwestern native American evolution of cultures is really fascinating and worth a visit if you should ever get a chance.

 

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