The rear walls of rooms 89 and 90 are well preserved, but those in front have been completely destroyed. The former has a banquette like that of the Speaker-chief's House. The walls of rooms situated north and east of kiva U, now reduced in height, formerly extended to the roof of the cave, which is here somewhat lower than in the middle of the cavern. The existence of these former walls is indicated by light bands on the smoke-covered surface of the cave roof, and fragments of clay still adhering to the side of the cliff show that the walls here were two and three stories high.
In rooms 84, 85, and 86 the builder took advantage of the cliff for rear walls. The middle of the floor of 84 has a depression lined with vertical slabs of stone, evidently a fireplace, as it contained a quantity of wood ashes. In the floor on the eastern side of this fireplace there is a short trench also lined with stone and containing wood ashes, the relation of which to the other inclosure is unknown. It appears that this exceptional structure was not used in the same way as the fireplaces so constantly met with in other rooms, but that it might have been used for baking paper-bread, called piki by the Hopi. In a corner of room 91 there is another depression, half under the floor, covered with a flat stone, that appears quite likely to have been used for this purpose. Unlike the fireplaces sunken in the floor, the one in room 84 is partially or wholly above the floor, its confining stones being several inches above the floor level.
Room 92 is the best example of a milling room in Cliff Palace. It has four grinding bins, or metatakis, arranged side by side, with all the parts entire and in working condition. When excavation was begun in this part of the ruin these structures were wholly concealed under fallen rocks. As streams of water from a vertical cleft in the cliff poured down upon them after exposure during periods of rain, it was necessary to construct a roof to protect them.[42] The discovery of this and of other grinding rooms shows that the cliff-house metatakis are the same in structure as those in the Hopi pueblos. In an inclosure south of these metatakis was found a granary. Fragments of walls projecting from the cliff west of room 93 show the former existence of rooms in this section, but as their front walls have been obliterated by the downpour of water their form is obscure.
Kivas
There are in Cliff Palace 23 ceremonial rooms that may be called kivas.[43] These consist of two types: (1) generally circular or cylindrical subterranean rooms, with pilasters to support the roof, and with fireplace, deflector, and ventilator. (2) Circular or rectangular rooms with rounded corners, without pilasters, fireplace, or deflector. In the first group may be placed provisionally a subtype (kiva M, for example), without pilasters but with a single large banquette. As this subtype is the dominant one in the western part of the San Juan drainage, it may be necessary later to regard it as a type. As a rule rooms of the second type are not subterranean, but are commonly surrounded by high walls, being entered by a doorway at one side. There are 20 rooms pertaining to the first type and three to the second type in Cliff Palace.[44]
The majority of the kivas are situated in front of the secular buildings, but several are in the rear of the cave, with high rooms in front of them. The largest cluster of kivas on the cave floor lies in the so-called plaza quarter, which takes its name from the open space occupied by the kivas in that section. The rooms on the terraces, especially those near the southern end of the ruin, were covered with fallen rocks and other débris when the excavation and repair work began. The walls of most of the kivas, whether in front or in the rear, were greatly dilapidated and in all instances it was necessary to rebuild them to the level of the plazas in which the kivas are situated.
Following comparisons with modern pueblos, there is every reason to suppose that the kivas preserve the oldest types of buildings of the cliff-dweller culture, and it is believed that the form of these archaic structures is a survival of antecedent conditions. They belonged to the men of different clans, as in a measure is the case among the Hopi at the present day, with whom every kiva is spoken of as that of a certain man who is a clan chief. The male and female members of every Hopi clan have affiliation with certain kivas (a survival of archaic conditions), and in certain clan gatherings, as the dramatic exhibition which occurs in March, the celebration takes place in their respective kivas.
| BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY | BULLETIN 51 [PLATE 21] |
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| STONE HATCHETS | |
