On my arrival at Chuhuichupa I found everything satisfactory. There are extensive grass-lands here, and a few years after our visit the Mormons established a colony. The name Chuhuichupa is interesting, as it is the first one we came upon that was of undoubted Tarahumare origin “chuhui.” being the Spanish corruption of “Chu-i,” which means “dead.” The name signifies “the place of the dead,” possibly alluding to burial caves.
Ancient Cave-Dwelling at Garabato.
Part of Cave-Dwellings at Garabato.
Here Mr. Taylor had discovered very interesting cave-dwellings, fifteen miles southeast to east in a straight lilac from the camp, but fully twenty-five miles by the track he had followed. The Mexicans called the cave Garabato, a Spanish word, which in Mexico is used in the sense of “decorative designs,” and refers here to ancient paintings or scrawlings on the house walls. The cave is situated in a gorge on the northern slope of the Arroyo Garabato, which drains into the Rio Chico. It is in conglomerate formation, faces east, and lies about 215 feet above the bottom of the gorge. The ascent is steep and somewhat difficult. At a little distance the high, regular walls of the houses, with their many door and window openings, presented a most striking contrast to their surroundings of snow-covered jagged cliffs, in the lonely wilderness of pine woods. Some of the walls had succumbed to the weight of ages, but, on the whole, the ruins are in a good state of preservation, and although I found cave-dwellings as far south as Zapuri, Chihuahua, none of them were nearly as well preserved nor on such an extensive scale. Time would not allow me to visit the cave myself, and the following description is based on notes taken by Mr. Taylor on the spot, as well as on his photographs and his verbal explanations.
The space covered by the houses and fallen walls was 125 feet from side to side, and at the central part the dwellings were thirty-five feet deep. The roof of the cave, or rather, the overhanging cliff, was at the highest point eighty feet above the floor. The houses were arranged in an arc of a circle so large as hardly to deviate from a straight line. The front row seems to have been of but one story, while the adjoining row back of it had two stories. The roof of the houses at no place reached the roof of the cave. Each room was about twelve feet square, and the walls, which showed no evidence of blocks or bricks, varied in thickness from fifteen inches at the base to seven inches at the top of the highest. At some places large stones were built into the walls; in another wall wooden posts and horizontal sticks or laths were found. The surface of the walls, which were protected against the weather, was smooth and even, and the interior walls showed seven or eight coatings of plaster. The floors, where they could be examined, were smoothly cemented and so hard as to effectively resist the spade. The pine poles which formed the roof were smooth, but not squared; they were three to four inches in diameter; and some of them were twenty-four feet long. According to all appearances, they had been hewn with a blunt instrument, as they were more hacked than cut. Many of them were nicely rounded off at the ends, and several inches from the ends a groove was cut all around the pole.
Design in Red on Second Story Wall.