An Anasazi pictograph.
The famous “Burial of the Weaver” was found in a small cliff alcove not far from Antelope House. The grave was against the cliff, and a curved masonry wall in front held back the earth. Inside was the tightly flexed body of an old man lying on his left side. His hair was streaked with gray and tied back in a bob; a billet of wood served as a pillow. The body’s outer wrapping was a feather blanket made from the breast down of golden eagles. Under the feather cloth was a white cotton blanket, excellently made and appearing as clean and new as if freshly woven; and under the white blanket was an old gray cotton blanket. Beneath that blanket, lying on the mummy’s breast, was a single ear of corn.
A reed mat covered the floor of the grave, and the amount and variety of objects laid away with the body suggest that the individual was highly respected in life. A long wooden digging stick, broken to fit into the grave, lay across the burial bundle. Beside this, and also broken, was a bow so thick that only a powerful arm could have pulled it. With the bow was a single reed arrow with a fire-hardened wooden point. Five pottery jars, one broken, together with four bowl-shaped baskets woven from yucca leaves, were also in the grave. These containers were filled with cornmeal, shelled corn, four ears of husked corn, pinyon nuts, beans, and salt. Tightly packed around the body and offerings were thick skeins of cotton yarn which measured more than 2 miles in length. A spindle whorl—a wooden disc on a reed stem which probably had been used to spin the cotton—lay on the yarn.
A National Park Service archeologist examines a storage jar found at Antelope House.
STANDING COW
This cave in Canyon del Muerto was named for a large white and blue pictograph of a cow, drawn in the historic period and undoubtedly the work of a Navajo. Not much can be seen of this ancient ruin, for Navajos have lived on the site in recent times and still use the old bins for storing corn and the leveled areas for drying peaches.
On the cliff near this ruin is an interesting old Navajo painting of Spanish cavalrymen.
This blue-headed cow, painted by an early Navajo artist on the shelter wall, gave Standing Cow Ruin its name.