October 10, 2010

Sunday 10~~~We drove to Aztec, New Mexico this morning about 35 miles from Durango, Colorado where we are staying. We went to Mass and went out for lunch before touring the Aztec Ruins National Monument. This was the first houses of stone we have seen and been able to go through, so we were pretty excited to go through these ruins. Numerous and varied structures of the Ancestral Pueblo people are preserved at this Intriguing World Heritage Site. Recent evidence suggests that the settlement was planned sometime in the late 1000's and the community's design remained intact until the group moved away two centuries later. The enormous West Ruin, a pueblo of 400 rooms is open to the public through an 800-yard self guided trail. There is a reconstructed Kiva that is one of the walks high lights. The Kiva's are large round buildings used for community meeting places and for religious rituals. They are built deep in the ground and they have a rounded roof on them built with very large posts, smaller trees and then muddied over with clay. You enter the Kiva's through the roof and down into the Kiva by a tall ladder. These are HUGE!!!! One of them we went through, was so big, it would hold 500 or more people. ( picture of Kent in a large room) (the picture before it is the upper level of the Kiva with its altar) you use ladders to climb down to the main Kiva Some villages had 6 to 20 Kiva's each holding about 75 people. The homes are built with the same construction of the Kiva's, many rooms connected to each other with a door one one wall and across from it a door leading to the next room. It goes on forever, there wasn't a lot of privacy for anyone with the path going rite through your home. (picture) The doors are quite short and they are built across for ventilation, as are the small openings up high for smoke and fresh air. The roof is like the Kiva's built with small branches and large beams. (picture) They are very warm in cold weather and cool in the summer. I think they are made all connected for protection from enemies. They had areas for the dried corn and beans that were main staples for their cooking. They had several years of dried foods on hand at all times. The first picture on this blog is a Kiva without its roof, the four brick supports around the circle is where the large beams are laid around the wall going higher and higher until a roof is made and finished with clay and straw. They enter the kiva from the top with ladders and a ladder inside to climb down. Probably more protection. Note the pretty pottery they make.