Hence Today We Find People Talking About
The Aztecs And Their Ruined Homes In Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado And
Utah.
We used to read of the wonder of the discoverers of these dwellings,
at finding them so small.
The doorways were small, the rooms themselves
less than six feet in width and length, and the ceilings so low that a
five-foot man could not stand upright in them. It was reasonable therefore
to infer, said these discoverers, that the builders and inhabitants of the
cliff-dwellings were an exceedingly small people, dwarfs, as in no other
way could the rooms be occupied. And thousands of people who have read
about these ruins still hold to the idea that they were inhabited by
dwarfs. But who the dwarfs were, or where they have gone to, no one seems
to have the remotest idea. But by and by, such men as Bandelier, the
Mendeleffs, Stevenson, Cushing, Fewkes, Hough, Hodge and Hewett, began to
investigate. They took the field, and carefully explored hundreds of ruins.
Then, some of them with a profound knowledge of the Spanish tongue, went
through all the records and diaries of the old conquistadores and the
padres who accompanied them. They found out all that the early Spaniards
had discovered and conjectured. In the meantime, they began to study the
languages of the Indians of the regions nearest to the ruins, and question
them as to their myths, legends, and traditions bearing upon the ruins, and
their researches speedily bore fruit.
Storage Houses. First of all they classified their discoveries. Though
scores of skeletons were found, there was not a single dwarf specimen among
them. This seemed to be a death blow to the dwarf theory. Stone slabs were
used as doors. Necessarily these were comparatively small, since even
though large slabs might have been found, they could not have been moved by
the cliff-dwellers, on account of their weight. This, in itself, accounted
for the size of the doorways. It had long been noticed that these small
dwellings were scattered profusely where there were larger dwellings, and
finally it became known that the small dwellings were not used for
habitations at all. They were merely storage houses for corn and other
edibles, farmed by the inhabitants of the larger dwellings. On one
occasion, some years ago, I was exploring one of the side gorges of the
Havasu. We had seen scores of the cliff dwellings, perched high in the
walls of the canyons, until at length one particularly well-built, though
exceedingly small structure attracted my attention. My guide was the most
intelligent and communicative of the Havasupai Indians, and he immediately
responded to my query by crying out: "Meala-hawa! Meala-hawa!" (Corn
house). Further inquiry revealed the fact that all the small dwellings were
but storage houses for corn and other foods.
Textiles. Excavation brought forth delicate textiles in cotton and yucca
fibre, well-woven, and in a remarkable state of preservation - silent
testimony to the dry climate, and the fact that the dwellings were so
constructed that rain and snow were practically excluded.
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