BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGYBULLETIN 51PLATE 27PLATE 27PLATE 27PITCH BALLS AND VASE
It is evident that this ceremonial passage had nothing to do or at least had no connection with the ventilator and deflector of the kiva. The opening is situated under the floor, passing in its course beneath the deflector, and its external opening is by a vertical passage outside the ventilator. It also differs from the ventilator in having a lateral branch likewise situated under the floor. Passing to kivas outside the Mesa Verde region, we find homologous passages recorded as present under the floor in Pueblo Bonito, a ruin on the Chaco, and in the kiva of a ruin not far from Chama, where the passage under the floor is excavated in solid rock. Evidently we have in this structure a ceremonial opening the true significance of which is yet to be determined. Is it connected with the Tewa concept that the fire-hole is a sipapû, or was it used in fire rites that were performed about the fireplace? These and other questions that might be proposed must remain unanswered until more is known of similar passages in other cliff-dwelling kivas.
The method of roof construction, which is the main difference that distinguishes a kiva of the subtype from one of the first type, is due to the absence of pilasters. Kiva M of Cliff Palace may be assigned to this subtype, although many examples of it occur in ruins farther down the San Juan, as well as in the Navaho National Monument and in Canyon de Chelly. Kivas of the subtype are similar to those of the second type in that pilasters are absent, but they differ from them in the presence of a large banquette and in the subterranean position, which features also characterize the first type. The only circular kivas known to the ruins near the East Mesa of the Hopi of Arizona belong to the first type, two of which are found at Kukuchomo, the two ruins on the summit of the mesa above Sikyatki.
The method of roofing a kiva of the subtype may be clearly observed in the kiva of Scaffold House in the Navaho National Monument.[61]The rafters here are parallel, and extend across the top of the kiva, their ends resting on the wall. The middle beam, which is the largest, is flanked on each side by another. Upon these supporting beams are laid others at right angles, and on these were placed the brush, bark, and clay that covered the roof. Entrancewas gained by means of a hatchway on one side of the roof near the large banquette, which occupies a position, as respects the entrance and the place supposedly occupied by the ladder and the fire-pit, similar to the spectator's platform of a modern rectangular Hopi kiva, except that it is higher above the floor and is relatively smaller. If the banquettes were depressed and enlarged into a platform, the form of the kiva being changed from circular to rectangular, thus modified the banquette would form a structure like the spectator's platform of a typical modern Hopi kiva.[62]
Perhaps of all the ceremonial rooms repaired the walls of kiva M were in the most dangerous condition. The front of the northern wall of room 39 had been undermined and was without foundation, hanging without basal support except at the ends. A support was constructed under this hanging wall, and to give additional strength the foundations were rebuilt a little broader at the base than formerly, causing the wall to bulge almost imperceptibly into the kiva. Although no pilasters were seen, the deep banquette on the northwestern side places it among the kivas of the first type.
The architecture of the two kivas O and R are so different from those already considered that they are set apart from the others in a second type. The form and structure of kiva W indicate that this room also may be classed as of the same type. In the side canyon north of that in which Cliff Palace is situated, where water was obtained throughout the summer, there is another kiva, also supposed to belong to the second type.[63]
The main difference in construction between the two types of kivas is the absence of pilasters, which implies the absence of a roof in the second type. The suggestion that a kiva of the second type is simply an unfinished form of the first type has little to support it, but whether the architectural difference in the two types has any functional importance or meaning is unknown. It has been suggested that one type was used by the Winter, the other by the Summer people.[64]
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGYBULLETIN 51PLATE 28PLATE 28RESTS FOR JARS
Kiva O is rounded below and square above, with a north-south diameter of 11 feet 10 inches, and an east-west diameter of 10 feet 6 inches. The ventilator opens in the western wall. There are 2 mural niches.
Both the plastered floor and the deflector are lacking, and there is no fire-hole nor sipapû. No roof or pilasters to support it were detected. It is difficult to measure the surrounding wall on account of its varying height. The masonry is good, but there are no signs on the walls that a fire had ever burned within the chamber. It would appear that this kiva was roofless, and that it had broad banquettes at the northern and southern sides.
In shape this kiva is oval below and square above, without pilasters or other evidences of a roof. There are no signs of a floor, a deflector, or a fire-hole. The surrounding wall of the kiva is high; apparently there was an entrance at the eastern side. Banquettes are present on the northern and southern ends, and a narrow ledge skirts the other two sides.
There are 4 mural niches: (1) south by east, measuring 15 by 11 by 13 inches; (1) north by east, measuring 11½ by 8 by 15 inches; (2) in the north wall, measuring 13 by 8 by 12 inches, and 12 by 8 by 13 inches; the latter three being placed in a row and separated by slabs of stone. In the south wall there is a tunnel terminating bluntly and bifurcated at the end.
Although kiva R was regarded by Nordenskiöld as furnishing evidence of a transition form connecting circular and rectangular kivas, it seems to the author a new type rather than a modification of the circular or the rectangular kivas.
Kiva W is not generally included among the Cliff Palace ceremonial rooms on account of its isolation from the houses, but there is no doubt that it should be so enumerated. It lies about 50 feet west of the end of the last room in the cliff-dwelling, and is not accompanied with secular rooms. Although situated on the same level as the houses, its walls rise two tiers high, but no part of the inclosure is subterranean.
From the height of the walls it at first seemed as if in kiva W there were evidences of a room above. This condition would be contrary to the rule and, to the Hopi mind, ceremonially impossible; but if its upper walls are regarded as homogeneous with the high walls thatsurround kivas O and R, and we interpret this as an example of the second type of kiva, the anomaly is explained.
Although this kiva is placed provisionally in the second type mainly because of these lofty side walls, on account of its isolation at the end of Cliff Palace several observers have not regarded it as belonging to the ruin. Neither Nordenskiöld nor Morley and Kidder included it in their ground plans, nor does Nordenskiöld mention it in his enumeration of Cliff Palace kivas.
As kiva W is almost wholly unprotected by the cave roof, its walls have greatly suffered from the downpour of rains to which they are exposed. The masonry is fairly good. Evidently it was an important building, and was isolated from other rooms possibly for some special purpose. As there are few or no walls of secular rooms near it, one may believe that it was resorted to by the villagers on special occasions and did not belong to any one clan.
In the preceding pages have been described the major antiquities, such as walls and those permanent objects which could not be removed from the places where they were constructed without more or less harm. There remain to be considered the minor antiquities, or the smaller objects which are movable and of a more perishable nature, especially if left in the places where they were found. It was mainly in search of such objects that much of the mutilation of Cliff Palace was done.
It was not expected that excavations would yield any considerable number of specimens, since for years Cliff Palace had been dug over in search of them, and many hundreds of objects had already been found and carried away to be sold either to museums or to individuals. Notwithstanding these unfavorable conditions, the collection of objects, now deposited in the National Museum, is sufficient to afford some idea of the culture of the Cliff Palace people.
Among the objects that may be mentioned in the category of minor antiquities are pottery, basketry, implements of stone, bone, and wood, fabrics of various kinds, ornaments, fetishes, and the like—all those objects commonly called artifacts that make up collections from cliff-dwellings generally.
The excavations at Cliff Palace have revealed no specimens strikingly different from those already described as from Spruce-tree House. We would expect some variation in the symbols on pottery from the two ruins, but the differences are not conspicuous in the few specimens that have been compared. Nor is there any peculiarity in the form of the pottery, as the ceramic objects from Cliff Palace practically duplicate those from Spruce-tree House, already described, and probably are not much unlike those still buried in Long House, Balcony House, and the House with the Square Tower.
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGYBULLETIN 51PLATE 29PLATE 29PLATE 29BASKET HOPPER—SIDE AND BOTTOM VIEWS
As many ceremonial objects, being highly prized, may have been removed from Cliff Palace when the place was deserted by its inhabitants, the few that remained present scant material from which to add to our knowledge of the ceremonial life of the people. The existence of so many kivas would point to many rites, although a large number of sacred rooms does not necessarily indicate more complex or elaborate rites than a smaller number: multiplicity of kivas does not necessarily mean multiplicity of ceremonies, nor few kivas a limited ritual. In no pueblo are there more complicated ceremonies than at Walpi, where there are only five of these sacred rooms; but it must be remembered that many of the religious rites of Walpi are performed in kihus, or secular rooms. The same may have been true of Cliff Palace.
The writer's belief is that in historic times, by which is meant since the advent of missionaries, altars have become more elaborate and rites more complex at Walpi than in prehistoric times, and that through the same influence the use of images or idols has also increased. This increase in the complexity of rites may be traced to the amalgamation of clans or to a substitution of the fraternities of priesthoods for simple clan ancestor worship. The elaborate character of ceremonial paraphernalia may likewise be due to acculturation,[65]which increases in complication with the lapse of time.
The stone implements from Cliff Palace consist of axes, mauls, paint grinders, pecking stones, metates, balls, flakes, spear and arrow points, and various other articles (pls. 20-22). There is great uniformity in these implements, the axes, for instance, being generally single edged, although a good specimen of double-edged hatchet is in the collection. A fragment of the peculiar stone implement calledtcamahia[66]by the Hopi was found.
While as a rule the hatchets are without handles, one specimen (pl. 20) is exceptional in this particular. The handle of this hatchet from Cliff Palace, like that from Spruce-tree House, elsewhere described, is a stick bent in a loop around the stone head.
Anyone who will examine the amount of stone-cutting necessary to lower the floor of kiva V, for instance, to its present depth, or to peck away the projecting rock in some of the other kivas, will realize at once that the Cliff Palace people were industrious stone workers. A number of the pounding stones (pl. 22,a) with which this work was done have been found. These stones are cubical in form, or rounded or pointed at one end or both ends, and provided with two or more pits on the sides. They were evidently held directly in the hand and used without handles. Although generally small, they sometimes are of considerable size. The stone of which they are made is foreign to the vicinity; it is hard, as would be absolutely necessary to be effectual in the use to which they were put.
The most common variety of grinding stones is, of course, the metate, or mill-stone, used in grinding corn. These implements have a variety of forms. They may be flat above and rounded below, or flat on both sides, triangular on each face, or simply convex on each side. None of them have feet like the Mexican metates. The stone with which the grinding was done, or the one held in the hand, also varies in shape, size, and evidences of use.[67]Stones with a depression in one face served as mortars. A stone in the form of a pestle, flat on the end, served as a paint grinder. Several flat stones with smooth surface, showing the effect of grinding, and others with slight concavities, undoubtedly served the same purpose. Smooth stones showing grinding on one or more faces were evidently the implements with which the builders smoothed the walls of the houses after the masonry had been laid; others were used in polishing pottery.
Many stone balls, large or small, were found. Some of these show chipping, others are ground smooth. Certain of these balls were evidently used in a game popular at Cliff Palace, in which they were rolled or dropped into deep pits and grooves. It appears that this game was played by occupants of the sacred rooms, as the pits are common in the kiva floors. Other stone balls were formerly tied to the end of a handle with a thong of hide and used as a weapon.
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGYBULLETIN 51PLATE 30PLATE 30PLATE 30SANDALS
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGYBULLETIN 51PLATE 31PLATE 31PLATE 31PLATE 31PLATE 31SANDALS
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGYBULLETIN 51PLATE 32PLATE 32PLATE 32PLATE 32PLATE 32SANDALS
A half oval stone, smooth and flat at one pole, is supposed to have been an idol, possibly the earth goddess, who is repeatedly represented by the Hopi in a similar way. It was left near where it was found at the northwest corner of kiva H. Our masons used rectangular slabs of soft stone, which were doubtless door-closes, as mortar boards. They were held in place in the door opening by jambs made of mortar laid on sticks, and by a horizontal rod which passed between two osier eyelets set in the uprights of the door-frame and projecting from it. These stone doors were sometimes held in place by a groove cut in the threshold or by a ledge of adobe.
Two thin, flat, circular stone disks (pl. 22,c), with smooth surfaces and square edges, accompanied the calcined human bones in the inclosure at the northern end of the large refuse heap. It is probable that some of these disks were used as covers for mortuary vases. Irregularly shaped flat stones with pits and incised figures pecked in their surface were used in a game, and a slab covered with incised figures but without the pits (pl. 23,c) probably served a similar purpose.
Several large stones, which the builders of Cliff Palace had begun to dress and had later rejected, show the method adopted by them in cutting stones the required size. When stones were found to be too large to be laid, or had projections that interfered with the required shape, a groove was pecked where the fracture was desired and the stone broken along the groove.
No ruin in the Mesa Verde National Park has yielded more specimens of pottery than Cliff Palace, many pieces of which are preserved in various museums in Colorado and elsewhere. The collection gathered by the writer was small compared with some of these, and although only a few whole pieces were found, by restoration from fragments a fair number of specimens, ample perhaps for generalization, were procured. In the following mention of the pottery obtained from the ruin a very comprehensive idea of the perfection in the ceramic art attained in Cliff Palace can hardly be hoped.
Southwestern pottery may be divided into two types, so far as superficial appearance goes: (1) coiled or indented undecorated ware; (2) smooth polished ware. Of the latter there are two sub-types: (a) pottery with a surface slip, generally white, on which designs are painted, and (b) decorated pottery without a superficial slip, and generally reddish in color. Cliff Palace pottery, when decorated, belongs to the last two divisions, but some of the best made specimens belong to the coiled or indented type. Although there are several fragments of red pottery ornamented with designspainted in black, and one or two specimens in which the basal color is orange, the majority of the specimens belong to the so-called black-and-white ware, which may therefore be called a type of this region.
The whole pieces of pottery collected were chiefly mortuary vessels, and probably contained food offerings, indicating, like the sipapûs in the kivas, that the cliff-dwellers had a distinct conception of a future life. In addition to the limited number of pieces of unbroken pottery, many of the fragments were decorated with novel patterns. Fragments of corrugated and indented ware are by far the most numerous, but although many of these were obtained, not a whole piece was found, with the exception of a single specimen plastered in a fire-hole and three others similarly fixed in the banquettes of kivas. These were left as they were found.
The same forms of pottery, as dippers, ladles, vases, canteens, jars, and similar objects, occur at Cliff Palace as at Spruce-tree House (pl. 23-27). All varieties were repeatedly found, some with old cracks that had been mended, and one is still tied with the yucca cord with which it had been repaired. It is evident from the frequency with which the Cliff Palace people mended their old pottery that they prized the old vessels and were very careful to preserve them, being loth to abandon even a cracked jar (pl. 23,d). None of the Cliff Palace pottery is glazed.[68]Some specimens of smooth pottery are coarse in texture and without decoration; others have elaborate geometrical figures; but animate objects are confined almost entirely to a few pictures of birds or other animals and rudely drawn human figures. The pictography of the pottery affords scant data bearing on the interpretation of the ancient symbolism of the inhabitants, as compared with that of Sikyatki, for example, in the Hopi country.
Food bowls.—In form the food bowls[69]from Cliff Palace (pls. 23-25) are the same as those from other prehistoric sites of the Southwest, but as a rule the Cliff Palace bowls are smaller than those of Sikyatki and the ruins on the Little Colorado. They have, as a rule, a thicker lip, which is square across instead of tapering to a thin edge or flaring, as is sometimes the case elsewhere. The surface, inside and out, is commonly very smooth, even glossy. The pottery was built up by coiling the clay, and the colors were made permanent by the firing.
The basis of the study of symbolism was of course the pottery decoration. As a rule the center of the inside of the food bowls is plain, but several have this portion ornamented with squares, triangles, and other figures. The outside of several bowls from Cliff Palace and Spruce-tree House is decorated, notwithstanding Nordenskiöld speaks of exterior decoration as rare in his collections from the Mesa Verde. The geometric ornaments consist of rectangular figures.[70]
Mugs.—Some authors have questioned whether the prehistoric people of the Southwest were familiar with this form of pottery. The collections from Cliff Palace (pl. 24-26) and Spruce-tree House set at rest any reasonable doubt on this point. There are, however, peculiarities in the form of mugs from Mesa Verde. The diameter of the base is generally larger, tapering gently toward the mouth, and one end of the handle is rarely affixed to the rim. The inside of the mug is not usually decorated, but the exterior bears geometrical designs in which terraces, triangles, and parallel lines predominate. Curved lines are rare, and spirals are absent. Mugs with two handles are unrepresented. There are no ladles in the collection, but several broken handles of ladles were found in the refuse. One of these is decorated with a series of parallel, longitudinal, and transverse lines, a design as widely spread as Pueblo pottery, extending across the boundary into Mexico.
Globular Vessels.—The globular form of pottery was used for carrying water and seems to have been common at Cliff Palace. One of these vessels (pl. 25,b) has a small neck, and attached to it are two eyelets for insertion of the thong by which it was carried. Some of the globular vessels (pl. 25,a) have the neck small, the orifice wide, and the lip perforated with holes for strings. Double-lipped globular vessels, having a groove like that of a teapot, have been found in Cliff Palace as well as in other ruins of Mesa Verde and Montezuma canyon. The rims of these are generally perforated, as if for the insertion of thongs to facilitate carrying. The bottoms of these vessels are rarely concave. They are sometimes decorated on the outside, but never on the interior.
Vases.—Small vases with contracted neck and lip slightly curved, and larger vases with the same characters, occur sparingly. These (pls. 26,27,b) are decorated on the exterior in geometrical designs; the interior is plain. The bases are rounded, sometimes flat, and in rare instances concave.
Disks.—Among pottery objects should be mentioned certain disks, some large, others small, some perforated in the middle, others imperforate. Several are decorated. These disks served as covers for bowls, and similar disks were employed as counters in games or asspindle whorls. None of the clay disks from Cliff Palace has a central knob or handle like those from Spruce-tree House.
In the report on Spruce-tree House, using pottery as a basis, the prehistoric culture of the Southwest, including the Gila-Salt area, which can not strictly be designated Pueblo, has been provisionally divided into several subcultural areas. Among these are the Hopi, a specialized modification of the Little Colorado, the Little Colorado proper, the San Juan, and the Gila-Salt areas.
Cliff Palace pottery symbols are not closely related to those on old Hopi ware, as typified by the collections from Sikyatki.[71]Neither Cliff Palace nor Spruce-tree House pottery is closely allied to that of the Little Colorado, as exemplified by Homolobi ware, but both have a closer likeness to that from Wukóki, a settlement ascribed to the Snake clans, situated near Black Falls, not far from Flagstaff, Arizona. As a rule the symbolism on pottery from the Little Colorado, which includes that of its upper tributaries, as the Zuñi, Puerco, Leroux, and Cottonwood washes, is a mixture of all types. This river valley has exerted a distributing influence in Pueblo migrations, and in its ruins are found symbols characteristic of many clans, some of which, following up the tributaries of the Salt and the Gila, have brought Casas Grandes decorative elements; others, with sources in the northeast, have contributed designs from an opposite direction. The predominating directions of ceramic culture migration in this valley have been from south to north and from west to east.[72]
The relation of Cliff Palace pottery designs to the symbolism or decorative motives characteristic of the Gila valley ruins is remote. Several geometrical patterns are common to all areas of the Southwest, but specialized features characterize each of these areas. The pottery from Cliff Palace finds its nearest relation throughout the upper San Juan region; the most distant to that of ruins in northern Arizona near Colorado Grande.[73]
The symbols on the Cliff Palace pottery are reducible to rectangular geometrical figures; life forms, with the rare exceptions noted above, are not represented, and the exceptional examples are crude. Contrast this condition with the pottery from Sikyatki, where three-fourths of the decorations are life designs, as figures of men or animals, many of which are highly symbolic. The "sky band" with hanging bird design, peculiar to old Hopi ware, was unknown to Cliff Palace potters. Encircling lines are unbroken, no specimen being found with the break so common to the pottery from the Hopi, Little Colorado, Gila, and Jemez subareas. The designs on food bowls are often accompanied with marginal dots. No example of the conventionalized "breath-feather" so common in Sikyatki pottery decoration occurs. Spattering with color was not practiced.
An analysis of the pottery decorations shows that the dominant forms may be reduced to a few types, of which the terrace, the spiral, the triangle, and the cross in its various forms are the most common.
Various forms and sizes of triangles, singly or in combination, constitute one of the most constant devices used by the cliff-dwellers of the Mesa Verde in the decoration of their pottery. It is common to find two series of triangles arranged on parallel lines. When the component triangles are right-angled they sometimes alternate with each other, forming a zigzag which may be sinistral or dextral. This design may be called an alternate right-angular figure.
If instead of two parallel series of right-angle triangles there are isosceles triangles, they may be known as alternate isosceles triangles. These triangles, when opposite, form a series of hour-glass figures or squares. This form is commonly accompanied by a row of dots, affixed to top and base, known as the dotted square or hour-glass figure. Hour-glass designs are commonly represented upright, but the angles of the triangles may be so placed that the series is horizontal, forming a continuous chain. Often the bases of these serially arrayed hour-glass figures are separated by rows of dots or by blank spaces.
A row of triangles, each so placed that the angles touch the middles of the sides of others in the same series, form an arc called linear triangles. The St. Andrews cross, which occurs sparingly on Mesa Verde pottery, is formed by joining the vertical angles of four isosceles triangles.
The cross and the various forms of the familiar swastika also occur on Cliff Palace pottery. The star symbol, made up of four squares so arranged as to leave a space in the middle, is yet to be found in Mesa Verde. Parallel curved lines, crooked at the end or combined with triangles and squares, occur commonly in the pottery decorationof Cliff Palace.S-shaped figures are known. Rectangles or triangles with dots, or even a line of dots alone, are not rare in the decoration. No designs representing leaves or flowers occur on pottery from Cliff Palace, nor has the spider-web pattern been found. The most common geometrical decorations are the stepped or terraced figures, generally called rain-clouds.
Among the objects found in the refuse heaps of Cliff Palace are rings, about 6 inches in diameter, woven of corn husks or cedar bark bound together with fiber of yucca or other plants. These rings (pl. 28) were evidently used as supports for earthenware vases, the bases of which are generally rounded, so that otherwise they would not stand upright. Similar rings may have been used by the women in carrying jars of water on their heads,[74]as among the Zuñi of to-day. Some of these rings may have been used in what is called the "ring and dart" game, which is often ceremonial in nature. The best made of all these objects, found by Mr. Fuller on his visit to a neighboring canyon, is shown in the accompanying illustration (pl. 28,b). The specimen is made of tightly woven corn husks, around which the fiber is gathered so as to form an equatorial ridge rarely present in these objects.
A few instructive specimens of basketry or wicker ware were exhumed at Cliff Palace. One of the most interesting of these is the unfinished plaque shown in the accompanyingfigure 2.
One specimen of basketry (pl. 29) has the form of a hopper; its whole central part was purposely omitted, but the basket is finished on the inner and outer margins. It recalls a basket used by the Ute and other Shoshonean Indians, but it is different in form from any figured in Nordenskiöld's work, and, so far as the author is acquainted with other specimens of basketry from Mesa Verde ruins, is unique. It is supposed that when used this hopper was placed on a flat or rounded stone and that corn or other seeds to be pounded were placed in it, the stone thus forming the surface upon which the seeds were treated, and the sides of the basket serving to retain the meal.
The sandals found at Cliff Palace (pls. 30-32) are practically the same in form, material, and weave as those recorded from Spruce-tree House. The shape of these, however, is particularly instructive, as it appears to shed light on the meaning of certain flat stones, rare in cliff-dwellings, called "sandal lasts." These stones, one of which is figured in the report on Spruce-tree House, are rectangular, flat, thin, smooth, with rounded corners, and sometimes have a notch in the rim at one end. The exceptionally formed sandal from Cliff Palace (pl. 32) is similar in shape and has a notch identical with that of the problematical stone objects, supporting the theory that the latter were used as sandal lasts, as interpreted by several authors.
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGYBULLETIN 51PLATE 33PLATE 33PLATE 33PLATE 33aBilletbObjects used in gamecBilletWOODEN OBJECTS
Fig. 2.—Coil of basket plaque.Fig. 2.—Coil of basket plaque.
Fig. 2.—Coil of basket plaque.
The sandals are ordinarily made of plaited yucca leaves, their upper side being sometimes covered with corn leaves for protection of the feet. The thongs that passed between the toes are made either of yucca or other vegetable fiber, or of hide.
There are several objects made of wood in the collection from Cliff Palace, some of the least problematical of which are long, pointed rods (fig. 3) with which the ancients probably made the holes in which they planted corn, in much the same way as the Hopi plant at the present day. These implements are commonly pointed at the end, but one or two are broadened and flattened. No example of the spatular variety of dibble found by others, and none showing the point of attachment of a flat stone blade, occurs in the collection. One or two short broken sticks, having a knob cut on the unbroken end, are interpreted as handles of weapons—a use that is not definitely proven. There are several sticks that evidently were used for barring windows or for holding stone door-closes in place.
Among problematical wooden objects may be mentioned billets (pl. 33), flattened on one side and rounded at each end. Two of these were found, with calcined human bones, in the inclosure used for cremation of the dead, situated at the northern end of the large refuse heap. These, like the bowls with which they were associated, were coated with a white salt-like deposit. None of the many wooden objects figured by Nordenskiöld are exactly the same as those above mentioned, although the one shown in his platexliii, figure 17, is very close in form and size.
Several bent twigs or loops of flexible wood from the refuse heaps were found; these are supposed to have been inserted in the masonry, one on each side of door and window openings, to hold in place the stick which served as a bolt for fastening the door or window stone in position.
Fig. 3.—Planting sticks.Fig. 3.—Planting sticks.
Fig. 3.—Planting sticks.
Bent sticks, of dumb-bell shape, having a knob at each end (pl. 33,b), are believed to have been used in games. A similar object from the Mancos region is figured by Mr. Stewart Culin in his account of the games of the cliff-dwellers.[75]The ancient people of the semi-deserts of Atacama, in South America, employed a similar but larger stick, to which cords were attached for strapping bundles on their beasts of burden.
A small pointed stone attached with fiber to the end of a stick, similar to those found by Nordenskiöld in ruin 9 and at Long House, was found.
The Cliff Palace people kindled fire by means of the fire-drill and fire-stick (hearth), a specimen of which, similar to one collected at Spruce-tree House, is contained in the collection. Both of these fire-making implements were broken when found, apparently thrown away on that account either by the original people or by subsequent visitors.
Many bone implements (pl. 34,35) were found during the excavation of Cliff Palace. They are of the bones of birds and small mammals, or, now and then, of those of antelope or bear, the latter furnishing the best material for large scrapers. These implements were evidently sharpened by rubbing on the stones of walls or on the face of the cliff, as grooves, apparently made in this way, are there visible in several places. Scratches made in shaping or sharpening bones, repeatedly found on the masonry of Cliff Palace, are not peculiar, resembling those referred to in the report on Spruce-tree House. A small tube with a hole midway of its length doubtless served as a whistle, similar instruments being still often used in Hopi ceremonies to imitate the calls of birds.
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGYBULLETIN 51PLATE 34PLATE 34BONE IMPLEMENTS
Sections of bones were found tied in pairs, and while it is not clear that these were threaded on a cord and worn as necklaces or armlets, as Nordenskiöld suggests, they may have been tied side by side, forming a kind of breastplate not unlike that used by the Plains tribes. In a room of Spruce-tree House, according to Nordenskiöld, eight similar pieces of bone were found strung on a fine thong of tide.
Among other bone objects there is one, of unknown use, about an inch long and one-fourth of an inch in diameter, nearly cylindrical in shape. A bone with a hole in one end, similar to those figured by Nordenskiöld, forms part of the collection.