Houses and House-Life of the American Aborigines

by Lewis Henry Morgan

Lieutenant Simpson, in his report, has furnished ground plans of five of these structures with measurements. Mr. Jackson has furnished eleven ground plans with measurements, two of which are without the canyon. They agree substantially, but we shall follow Mr. Jackson, as his are the most complete. The following engravings, with two or three exceptions, are taken from his report. The remainder are from Lieutenant Simpson's report.

The great edifices on the Chaco are all constructed of the same materials, and upon the same general plan, but they differ in ground dimensions, in the number of rows of apartments, and, consequently, in the number of stories. They contained from one hundred to six hundred apartments each, and would severally accommodate from five hundred to four thousand persons, living in the fashion of Indians. Speaking of the Pueblo of Pintado, Lieutenant Simpson remarks as follows: "Forming one structure, and built of tabular pieces of hard, fine-grained, compact, gray sandstone (a material entirely unknown in the present architecture of New Mexico), to which the atmosphere has imparted a reddish tinge, the layers or beds being not thicker than three inches, and sometimes as thin as one-fourth of an inch, it discovers in the masonry a combination of science and art which can only be referred to a higher stage of civilization and refinement than is discoverable in the works of Mexicans or Pueblos of the present day. Indeed, so beautifully diminutive and true are the details of the structure as to cause it at a little distance to have all the appearance of a magnificent piece of mosaic work."

"In the outer face of the buildings there are no signs of mortar, the intervals between the beds being chinked with stones of the minutest thinness. The filling and backing are done in rubble masonry, the mortar presenting no indications of the presence of lime. The thickness of the main wall at base is within an inch or two of three feet; higher up, it is less, diminishing every story by retreating jogs on the inside, from bottom to top. Its elevation at its present highest point is between twenty-five and thirty feet, the series of floor beams indicating that there must have been originally three stories. The ground plan, including the court, in exterior development is about 403 feet. On the ground-floor, exclusive of the out-buildings, are fifty-four apartments, some of them as small as five feet square, and the largest about twelve by six feet. These rooms communicate with each other by very small doors, some of them as contracted as two and a half by two and a half feet; and in the case of the inner suite, the doors communicating with the interior court are as small as three and a half by two feet. The principal rooms, or those most in use, were, on account of their having large doors and windows, most probably those of the second story. The system of flooring seems to have been large transverse unhewn beams, six inches in diameter, laid transversely from wall to wall, and then a number of smaller ones, about three inches in diameter, laid longitudinally upon them. What was placed upon these does not appear, but most probably it was brush, bark, or slabs, covered with a layer of mud-mortar. The beams show no signs of the saw or axe; on the contrary, they appear to have been hacked off by means of some very imperfect instrument. On the west face of the structure, the windows, which are only in the second story, are three feet two inches by two feet two inches. On the north side they are only in the second and third stories, and are as small as fourteen by fourteen inches. At different points about the premises were three circular apartments sunk in the ground, the walls being of masonry. These apartments the Pueblo Indians called estufas, or places where the people held their political and religions meetings." [Footnote: Simpson's Report, p. 76.]

The main building, Fig. 30, is two hundred and thirty-eight feet long, and the wing one hundred and seventy-four feet. It seems probable, from the symmetrical character of most of these structures, that the original plan contemplated an extension of the main building, the addition of another wing, to be followed by the connection of the wings with a wall, thus closing the court. These buildings were not all completed at once, but were extended and increased in the number of stories from generation to generation, as the people increased in numbers and prosperity. The plan upon which these houses were erected favored such extension. The great size of some of these structures can only be explained by the hypothesis of growth through long periods of time. The stone for building this pueblo was found quite near. Mr. Jackson remarks that "on the side of the bluff facing the valley is an outcrop of a yellowish-gray sandstone, showing in some places a seam of from twelve to eighteen inches in thickness, where the rock breaks into thin slate-like layers. It was from this stratum that most of the material in the walls was obtained." [Footnote: Jackson's Report, p. 433.] He further remarks concerning the estufas: "In the northwest angle of the court are two circular rooms, or estufas, the best preserved one of which is built into the main building and forms a portion of it, while the other stands outside, but in juxtaposition, and is evidently a later and less perfect addition. They are each twenty-five feet in diameter. The inside walls are perfectly cylindrical, and in the case of the inner one are in good preservation for a height of about five feet…. There are no side apertures, so that light and access was probably obtained through the roof. These estufas, which figure so prominently in these ruins and in fact in all the ancient ruins extending southward from the basin of the Rio San Juan, are so identical in their structure, position, and evident uses with the similar ones in the pueblos now inhabited, that they indisputably connect one with the other, and show this region to have been covered at one time with a numerous population, of which the present inhabitants of the pueblos of Moki and of New Mexico are either the remnants or the descendants…. Beneath the ground plan [in Fig. 30] is a section through a restoration of the pueblo from north to south, showing the manner in which the stories were probably terraced from the interior of the court outward. There is no positive evidence in any of these ruins that they were thus built, but this arrangement naturally suggests itself as being the only way in which light and ease of access to the inner rooms could be readily obtained. It is also quite certain from the character of the standing walls that they were not terraced symmetrically but irregularly, after the manner of the present pueblos. There is every reason to believe that the first story was, in every case, reached from the outside by ladders, the succeeding stories being also approached from the outside, either by ladders or by stone stairways, after the manner of the Moqui pueblos. There is no positive evidence to sustain any conjecture upon this point, as in every ruin the upper stories are so entirely dismantled that no indications of any sort of stairway have ever been found. The ground-floor was divided into smaller apartments than the second floor, many of the rooms, as shown in the plan, being in the lower story divided into two or three. It would be impossible to say how high this story had been, as the floor is covered to a considerable extent with stones from the fallen walls. The second floor was ten feet between joists, and the third somewhat less, about seven feet, as near as we could judge from below. It is probable that there was a fourth story, but there is now very little evidence of it. Not a vestige of the vigas or other floor-timbers now remain. Some of the lintels over the doors or windows, composed of sticks of wood from one to two inches in thickness, laid close together, are now in fair preservation." [Footnote: Jackson's Report, p. 434.]

Twelve miles down the canyon from the Pueblo Pintado, are the ruins of the Pueblo Wege-gi, Fig. 30. The main building is two hundred and twenty-four feet, and the length of each wing is one hundred and twenty feet, measured on the outside, but which would include the depth of the main building. It is remarkably symmetrical. The rooms, Mr. Jackson says, are small, the largest being eight by fourteen feet, and the smallest eight feet square, and the estufas are each thirty feet in diameter. It is built like the last pueblo "of small tabular pieces of sandstone, arranged with beautiful effect of regularity and finish."

The Pueblo of Una Vida, Fig. 31, seems to have been in process of construction, and designed, when completed, to have been one of the largest in the valley. The main building is two hundred and fifty feet in length, and the wing two hundred feet. It requires for its completion a considerable extension of the main building, and the addition of another wing. If this supposition is tenable, it serves to show that these great houses were of slow construction, by the process of addition and extension from time to time, with the increase of the people in numbers. Upon this theory of construction, the first row of the main building on the court side would first be completed one story high, and covered with a flat roof; after which, by adding one parallel wall with partition walls at intervals, as many more apartments would be obtained; and by a third and fourth parallel wall, with partitions, twice as many more. The second row was carried up two stories, the third three, and the fourth four; the successive stories receding from the court side in the form of great steps or terraces, one above the other. The wings would be commenced and completed in the same manner. Further than this, it seems evident, from the present condition of the structure, that the main building was to be considerably extended, with a second wing like the first to fill out the original design and produce a symmetrical edifice. If these inferences are warranted, the interesting conclusion is reached that these Indian architects commenced their great houses upon a definite plan, which was to be realized in its completeness after years and perhaps generations had passed away. Like the pueblo last named, it is built of tabular pieces of sandstone, and is two miles and a half lower down in the canyon.

The highest portions of the wall still standing in this pueblo are fifteen feet in height, twenty-five feet in Wege-gi, and thirty feet in Hungo Pavie.

The Pueblo of Hungo Pavie or Crooked Nose, Fig. 31, is situated one mile further down in the canyon, upon the north side, and quite near the bordering walls. In exterior development, including the court, it is eight hundred and seventy-two feet, of which the back wall measures three hundred, and the side walls or wings one hundred and forty-four feet each. It is of medium size, but symmetrical, and larger than any single aboriginal structure in Central America in ground dimensions. There are seventy-three apartments in the first story, some of which are unusually large, being about thirteen by eighteen feet, and with fifty-three rooms in the second story, and twenty-nine in the third, contain an aggregate of one hundred and fifty-five rooms. It would accommodate from eight hundred to one thousand Indians.

To complete the representation of the architectural design of these "great houses of stone," the annexed elevation is given, Fig. 32. It is a restoration of the Pueblo of Hungo Pavie, made by Mr. Kern, who accompanied General Simpson as draughtsman, and copied from his engraving. The walls of the canyon are seen in the background of engraving. We may recognize in this edifice, as it seems to the author, a very satisfactory reproduction of the so-called palaces of Montezuma, which, like this, were constructed on three sides of a court which opened on a street or causeway, and in the terraced form. From the light which this architecture throws upon that of the Aztecs, which was contemporary, it appears extremely probable that these famous palaces, considered as exclusive residences of an Indian potentate, are purely fictitious; and that, on the contrary, they were neither more nor less than great communal or joint-tenement houses of the aboriginal American model, and with common Indians crowding all their apartments. From what is now known of the necessary constitution of society among the Village Indians, it scarcely admits of a doubt that the great house in which he lived was occupied on equal terms by many other families in common with his own, all the individuals of which were joint proprietors of the establishment which their own hands had constructed.

Two miles further down, and upon the north side of the canyon, near the bluff, are the ruins of the Pueblo of Chettro Kettle, or the Rain Pueblo, Fig. 33. The main building and the wings face the court, from which alone they are entered, and from which the several stories recede outward. Including the court, this great edifice has an exterior development of one thousand three hundred feet. The exterior wall of the main building measures four hundred and fifty-two feet in length, and the longest of the wings two hundred and twenty feet. These measurements are according to General Simpson.