The Mesa Verde World

Archaeologists with field and laboratory experience explore the long history of human habitation throughout the Mesa Verde, Colorado area, discussing such topics as the environment, the earliest hunters and foragers, Tewa origin stories, sacred landscapes, fire and archaeology, ancient violence, and archaeology in the region over the past century.

Discusses the Native Americans known as the Anasazi, who migrated to southwestern Colorado in the first century A.D.

Climb the arid slopes of Colorado to discover the cave dwellings of the ancestral Pueblo Indians. Why were the homes built in the cliffs? How were they used and why did the Pueblo move? Travel along with scientists to find out how their discoveries shed light on the mysteries surrounding this important historical site. Unlocking the secrets of the past is just an artifact away!

*Includes pictures. *Includes footnotes and a bibliography for further reading. When the Spanish came into contact with different tribes in the Southwest, they were so intrigued by the structure of the communities that they gave the natives the name Pueblo, a term they used to measure certain sizes for their own settlements.. Thus, while most Americans have heard of the Pueblo and Navajo, many remain unfamiliar with distinctions within the tribes. The Spaniards' interest was understandable, because the Pueblo fascinated those who came across their settlements, especially those located in desert regions and the sides of cliffs that involved the use of adobe mud, stone, carving homes out of cliffs. One such settlement, Oraibi, was created around 1100 A.D. and remains one of the oldest continuously inhabited settlements in North America, but the most famous of the cliff dwellings can be found at Mesa Verde, which was turned into a national park in the early 20th century, about 1500 years after the Ancient Pueblo established the settlement. Today's Puebloan tribes are descended from tribes known as the "Ancestral Puebloan People", one of which was the Anasazi, but anthropologists believe that the Anasazi were a common ancestor of every Pueblo group, so the Ancient Pueblo are often referred to simply as the Anasazi. The name Anasazi came from their enemies; it is a Navajo word that means "enemy ancestor". While that name understandably continues to offend the descendants of the Anasazi, it also underscores that there is still a lot of uncertainty regarding the history of the Anasazi. In fact, it is still unclear what the Anasazi called themselves, and though they resided near the "Four Corners" area of Utah, Arizona, Colorado and New Mexico for more than 700 years, they mysteriously abandoned their settlements shortly after they truly began to flourish around 1050-1150 A.D. Despite the mystery surrounding the Anasazi, it's widely agreed that they occupied Mesa Verde and its unique structures for a period of nearly 700 years, beginning as early as the 7th century. Thanks to its occupants taking advantage of the surrounding geologic formations, Mesa Verde is an amazing collection of cliff dwellings, as well as houses that utilize caves and rock overhangs, and structures consisting of adobe and sandstone. Unfortunately, the natural conditions that make Mesa Verde so special also likely played a role in its abandonment, with overpopulation and drought forcing inhabitants out near the end of the 13th century. Mesa Verde: The History of the Ancient Pueblo Settlement covers the establishment of Mesa Verde from its origins until its establishment as a national park. Along with pictures, footnotes, and a bibliography, you will learn about Mesa Verde like never before.

The thirteenth century A.D. was a time of many changes and reorganization in the ancient Pueblo world in the Mesa Verde region. Still unresolved are the causes of the migration of Pueblo people from the Mesa Verde region to the south and southeast in the end of the century. The theories most cited and most supported by scientific data include environmental changes, increasing conflict and violence, social changes, and the attraction of a new cult or ideologies from the south. However, it seems that none of these theories can fully explain the total depopulation of the region. One reason often cited for the depopulation of the area is increasing conflict and violence. Evidence of conflict is clearly visible archaeologically: sites located in places difficult to access; defensive buildings, and settlement layouts; human remains with evidence of a violent death; and rock art depicting violent interactions. During the thirteenth century A.D. many types of defensive architecture including towers, underground tunnels connecting structures in a settlement, loopholes, and massive stone walls that partly or fully enclosed villages were constructed in the central Mesa Verde region. These architectural changes were associated with population aggregation and relocation; during the thirteenth century, most people probably lived in large settlements situated such that they were difficult to access and easy to defend. In many villages, water sources were secured within the boundary of the settlement or were at least nearby. However, it is difficult to determine whether the defensive architecture and defensible locations were not enough of an obstacle against possible attackers as Pueblo Indians emigrated from the Mesa Verde region near the end of the thirteenth century A.D. into what are now northern and central Arizona and New Mexico.

Mesa Verde National Park was America's first cultural park and also the world's first cultural heritage park. Created in 1906, it preserves the sites and materials of the prehistoric Puebloan people. Located in southwestern Colorado near the famous Four Corners, where the states of Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico meet, the magnificent Mesa Verde is situated in Montezuma County, just south of Cortez and directly west of Durango. The park's rich archaeological history was played out amid some of the most ruggedly beautiful landscapes in the West. The greater story of the evolution of the park encompasses the Ute people, Theodore Roosevelt, novelist Willa Cather, and other personalities. These remarkable vintage photographs tell that saga, which is as fascinating as that of the Puebloans.

It is one of the great mysteries in the archaeology of the Americas: the depopulation of the northern Southwest in the late thirteenth-century AD. Considering the numbers of people affected, the distances moved, the permanence of the departures, the severity of the surrounding conditions, and the human suffering and culture change that accompanied them, the abrupt conclusion to the farming way of life in this region is one of the greatest disruptions in recorded history. Much new paleoenvironmental data, and a great deal of archaeological survey and excavation, permit the fifteen scientists represented here much greater precision in determining the timing of the depopulation, the number of people affected, and the ways in which northern Pueblo peoples coped—and failed to cope—with the rapidly changing environmental and demographic conditions they encountered throughout the 1200s. In addition, some of the scientists in this volume use models to provide insights into the processes behind the patterns they find, helping to narrow the range of plausible explanations. What emerges from these investigations is a highly pertinent story of conflict and disruption as a result of climate change, environmental degradation, social rigidity, and conflict. Taken as a whole, these contributions recognize this era as having witnessed a competition between differing social and economic organizations, in which selective migration was considerably hastened by severe climatic, environmental, and social upheaval. Moreover, the chapters show that it is at least as true that emigration led to the collapse of the northern Southwest as it is that collapse led to emigration.