Just west of Fire Temple there is a group of rooms which were evidently habitations, since household utensils were found in them. One of these rooms has in the floor a vertical shaft which opens outside the house walls like a ventilator. The former use of this structure is unknown. Although the Fire Temple was not inhabited, there were undoubtedly dwellings nearby.
NEW FIRE HOUSE
A hundred feet east of the Fire Temple there are two low caves, one above the other. This cliff dwelling is called New Fire House. The rooms in the lower cave were fitted for habitation, consisting of two, possibly three, circular ceremonial rooms and a few secular rooms; but the upper cave is destitute of the former. The large rooms of the upper house look like granaries for the storage of provisions, although possibly they also were inhabited. In the rear of the large rooms identified as granaries was found a small room with a well-preserved human skeleton accompanied with mortuary pottery. One of these mortuary offerings is a fine mug made of black and white ware beautifully decorated. In the rear of the cave were three well-constructed grinding bins, their metates still in place.
The upper house is now approached from the lower by foot holes in the cliff and a ladder. Evidences of a secondary occupation of one of the kivas in the lower house appear in a wall of crude masonry without mortar, part of a rectangular room built diagonally across the kiva. The plastering on the rear walls of the lower house is particularly well preserved. One of the kivas, has, in place of a deflector and ventilator shaft, a small rectangular walled enclosure surrounded by a wall, recalling structures on the floor of the kivas of Sun Temple. The meaning of this departure from the prescribed form of ventilator is not apparent.
CEDAR TREE TOWER
Hidden in the timber about one-half mile east of the main entrance highway, and 1 mile north of Park Headquarters, stands a prehistoric tower. This ruin has been named Cedar Tree Tower because of the ancient juniper tree that grows adjacent to the north wall. The excavation of the tower and the area about its base led to the discovery that although it appeared to stand alone there were two subterranean rooms connected with its base. The larger of these rooms is a kiva, typical of the Mesa Verde cliff dwelling. Communication between kiva and tower was by means of a subterranean passage. This passage bifurcates, one branch opening through the tower floor, the other into a small square room. In the middle of the solid rock floor of the tower a circular hole, or sipapu, symbolic of the entrance to the underworld, had been drilled.
The masonry is excellent and the massive character and workmanship of the walls indicate some important use. No living rooms were found adjacent to the tower. The walls of the tower are uniformly two feet in width and they still stand to the height of 12 feet.