Vertical cross section of Montezuma Castle.
Floor plan of Montezuma Castle.
A doorway in Montezuma Castle.
Smoke-blackened ceiling in Montezuma Castle.
When the weather was cold, the Indians could safely build their fires indoors on the floors. However, they sometimes used one spot for too many years and wore a hole through the mud floor. The fire would then find its way through to the willows or grass underneath, and there it could smolder for hours without being discovered because the odor of smoke was common within the building. There are several places in the building where fires of this type occurred.
Pioneer visitors supposed that a group of pigmies constructed the Castle because the doors are so small. This is not the case. Studies of the skeletal remains show that the men averaged about 5 feet 4 inches in height. Like many modern Pueblo Indians, they were short but not abnormally small. Doors throughout the building are low for at least two good reasons: they helped keep out the cold, and they would also force any attacker to put his head through first or to back through, which would make it possible for even a woman to defend her home.
There were scarcely any openings in the building to supply light and fresh air—only a few close to the floor level. The Indians had no chairs or tables; like about half of the world’s population today, they lived on the floor. Probably most of the cooking was done outside on balconies and rooftops, but when weather was cold, fires were built inside in open pits on the floor. There was no chimney or smoke vent, so smoke drifted out the door. Much of it stayed in the rooms, which accounts for the smoke-blackened condition of the walls and ceilings.