Arrangement of metates (grinding stones) found on floor of Room 1.
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(Please enter inner room.) Roofs in Nalakihu had a main beam spanning the room’s shorter axis, with the rafter poles crossing it. Over these, narrow wooden shakes and sometimes stone slabs supported another layer of reeds, branches, bark, or grass, and 3 or 4 inches (7.5 or 10 cm) of clay. Two collapsed roofs were found in each of four rooms so we know a second story once existed over the central portion of the pueblo.
Note the T-shaped doorway through which you passed and also the occasional lines of black volcanic rock in the walls which probably were not for decoration because some courses in the building were covered with plaster.
Cross-sections of various pits near Nalakihu.
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You are now standing on the upper of two terraces. Exactly what they were used for we are not sure, but they may have been “kitchen gardens” similar to those in use today in some of the Hopi villages.
Below the terraces to the right of Nalakihu, archeologists discovered an unusual group of 6 burials and 16 storage, roasting or burial pits. Most of the pits were jar-shaped, some had vertical sides, and there were two pit ovens with flues, sort of teapot-shaped, with the spout actually being the flue. Three of the six burials were those of infants in shallow pits, some lined with stone slabs. Only a bowl or a few sherds (pieces of broken pottery) were placed with them for grave offerings. These pits have been backfilled and are not visible today.
