Fajada Butte after the Great Snow of 1986, or was it 1987? Photo by M. Severson

I am an archaeologist who has lived in the desert for almost 50 years so let me start off by clearing the air: I hate snow!

Yes, I know it looks pretty on the mountains, like the powdered sugar you sprinkle on your French toast. And, yes, it is magical to stand out amid the whispering of light flakes spiraling gently from the gray blanketed sky.

After that delightful experience is over, I want it gone!

I doubt there is an archaeologist worth his trowel that likes the idea of snow covering the ground but part of my ‘curmudgeon-y’ attitude comes from my years as a tour guide.

And one of my first trips to Chaco Canyon came the day after a major snowstorm.

If you live in or have visited in the southwestern United States and are interested in Indian culture, or ruins, or rock art, or hiking and you haven’t been to Chaco; shame on you! First reported to the United States government in the mid-1800s, Chaco is the heartbeat of prehistoric archaeology in the southwest. The small sampling of photos that I have included here barely begin to convey the vast array of fascinating places to see in this World Heritage site.

Fajada Butte, sans snow, is the site of the solstice marking Sun Dagger it is seen here from the ruins of Una Vida. The park headquarters is to center left. Photo by M. Severson

The park was first established back in the early 1900s and originally included only the massive 800-room Pueblo Bonito. Gradually more of the current park was added until it included all the major ruins and dozens of outlying prehistoric communities and resources. 1)

Originally access to the canyon was only by two primitive roads. However, today you can drive nearly any vehicle into the park by way of the “Pueblo Pintado” road coming either from Bloomfield or Cuba, New Mexico. 2)

Photograph of fine chaco style masonry technique from Pueblo Pintado. Amazingly enough after creating these painstakingly beautiful stoneworks they coated it all with plaster so it was never seen. Photo by M. Severson

Ah, you say but what was that I said about about snow?

Okay, I better fess-up. Back in the day, and I’m talking mid-80s here, I decided to begin offering tours of archaeological sites and Indian reservations as part of the Community Outreach program at Pima Community College in Tucson. I am also trained as an educator and it just seemed a natural outgrowth of my various careers to visit the places I liked to go and take others with me. It became the perfect second job.

In scheduling my first tour into Chaco however, I made the mistake of setting it in February.

I live and work mostly in Tucson, Arizona in the great Sonoran desert. It is hot. We received a dusting of snow this winter and also last year but that is an infrequent occurrence at best.

Chaco Canyon though is 40 miles from anywhere in northwestern New Mexico. True it is located in a desert but it is the Great Basin; a high, cold desert.

In February they get SNOW! The day we were scheduled to leave Tucson a massive storm had settled over the Four Corners area.

Choosing discretion for once, we waited a day longer before leaving to head north. When I got there I saw that it had been quite a storm. Snow blanketed everything. Realizing that the south road into Chaco was definitely the worse of the two main routes available to me, I chose to enter the canyon from the north. In those days, from the north you could select either the road at the Blanco Trading Post or the one at the Nageezi Trading Post as both eventually hooked up to the Park Service road and the canyon. In good weather I always chose Blanco to go in and Nageezi to return so that we would get a different look coming and going.

Blanco it was.

Corner doorways are an interesting feature in Chacoan towns. This one is at Pueblo Bonito. Photo by M. Severson

Turning off NM 44 I was surprised to see that no one had as yet driven on the gravel road once it passed the trading post buildings. The snow covered it uniformly though I could vaguely see the outlines of the ruts. I was not too concerned, I had driven the road many times, I was in a high clearance vehicle and it was only 25 miles to the park. The proverbial piece of cake — ice cream cake!

In very short order I realized the road beneath the snow was frozen solid, if I drove over 10 miles an hour the van would begin to fish-tale and slide off the road into the ditches on either side. Two and a half hours and several badly bitten fingernails later, we arrived at the park entrance where I faced my next crisis.

The old park service road into the canyon was cut down through the sandstone talus and was about one and one third lanes wide. If someone was leaving by way of this road, which was still frozen; and we happened to meet . . . well, I didn’t really want to think on it further, I had come this far — down I went.

I, of course, shared very little of this with the people in my charge, though I had casually mentioned earlier that usually it took only about forty-five minutes to reach the Visitor’s Center once we left the highway; they couldn’t help but notice the time discrepancy.

My luck held, we arrived at the Visitor’s Center in one piece and amazingly enough we were the only sightseers at that hour and for much of that day. Who would’ve thought?

Everyone loved the canyon’s picturesque sandstone walls topped all in white. The sun came out, the trails drained and it was a chilly but wonderful day.

Yes that is a person emerging from the rocks! One highlight of any trip to Chaco canyon should be hiking up the cliff walls to the overlooks. The views are magnificent. Photo by M. Severson

Later as we were leaving the Visitor Center to return to our motel in Farmington, I happened to mention how bad the Blanco road had been. The Park Service ranger behind the desk laughed and replied, “Oh Blanco, nobody uses ‘that’ road in the winter!”

Here is a view of Pueblo Bonito from the overlook. Photo by M. Severson

OK then, in leaving I would use Nageezi. In retrospect I guess it was the right decision, the Nageezi road was not frozen . . . it was mud! Two and a half hours later I was thrilled to see pavement!

Today you will probably have no such adventures arriving safely at Chaco but if I were you, my trips would be confined to spring and summer.

1) http://www.nps.gov/chcu/index.htm

2) from the Park Service Guide: The preferred and recommended access route to the park is from the north, via US 550 (formerly NM 44) and County Road (CR) 7900, and CR 7950.

At Penasco Blanco, there are several great kivas, one specifically, is separated from the main ruin and actually lies across the park service fence in what is likely Navajo Reservation or BLM land. (What? Yes, of course I jumped the fence, shhhh don’t tell the Park Service or they may not rehire me.) In a future post I will spend more time on Penasco Blanco and all the wonders there but the clear relationship of a disassociated great kiva intended to serve as a gathering place for outlying smaller communities cannot be ignored. Casa Rinconada, the largest great kiva in Chaco Canyon would be another similar example of an isolated great kiva that comes to mind.

View inside the excavated great kiva of Casa Rinconada on the south side of Chaco Canyon. Pueblo Bonito lies across the wash in the distance at far left and Chettro Ketl in the center right distance, east of Bonito. View to the NE. Photo by M. Severson

This perspective is from the northern overhang, the lower of the two pictograph panels, showing a perspective of the size of the masks and their location. Notice the desert varnish coating the rocks that indicates that there has been water running down the rocks. This contributes to the general greater wear on the pictographs of the lower panel. The view is generally to the southwest. Photo by M. Severson

Finding the array of petroglyphs covering the naturally varnished panels above the site gave life to the ruin, showing much of the thought and dreams of the people who had dwelt there nearly a thousand years before. We walked along that high trail, scouring every flat surface for more rock art. Finally as I worked my way east, it seemed that the finding of the panels was at an end. But the trail went on around the corner and continued around to the east facing bluff. Could there be more glyphs? I had to know.

As I clambered through a notch formed by sandstone boulders that had tumbled down from above I looked up and stopped. I am sure my breathing literally stopped for a moment as I saw things I could not have imagined would be waiting there.

This is the upper panel, the first one you see as you come around the corner and climb between the rocks. There is little or no varnish on these rocks indicating this one is better protected from the elements. Photo by M. Severson

Spread out before me, larger than life and in vivid natural colors were masks, kok’ko masks. Animals, human representations and imaginary creatures surrounded me, wrapped around a slightly concave panel protected by a overhanging roof of stone. Beyond lay another array of masks that were slightly more exposed and so somewhat more weathered and yet nonetheless impressive in their stoic display.

My personal favorite, an ogre that I imagine is asking children if they are listening to their parents. Photo by M. Severson

Shalakos, ogres, animals masks, Comanches and other masks vied with each other for my attention as I sat down on a handy rock and at my leisure simply surveyed the amazing tableau. After perusing the pictographs for a time I began to notice evidence of other drawings that appeared more weathered and older than these. It set me to wondering if there were older paintings that had been replaced and also how long these panels may have been used. Thinking back to Penasco Blanco, anyone who has hiked that trail and seen the numerous petroglyphs that adorn the sandstone walls along the way can only begin to wonder at the lost art — the pictographs that once were left by the ancestral puebloan people in celebration of their lives and religious beliefs.

Various masks from the northern panel show more wear than those on the higher, more protected southern panel. Photo by M. Severson

From the southern panel a Shalako mask to the left. Photo by M. Severson

Notice the figure that stands to the right of this scary creature. To me, with its overall shape and posture, it appears to be a faint representation of another Shalako. This could indicate that these paintings are not a single work of one artist but a compendium of many over a longer period of time. Photo by M. Severson

When my girls were younger they loved going to places like Sea World and Disneyland.  For me it was Chaco Canyon. Chaco Canyon is the place where archaeologists go to vacation. But Chaco is not just one place, it had an enormous effect on the world of the Ancestral Pueblo people. Prehistoric roads stretch out from the canyon enfolding a huge expanse of the region within its grasp.  The towns of Chaco spawned many smaller sites, called outliers by archaeologists.

Lower Nutria Lake on the Zuni Indian Reservation back in the late 80s. The site is to the left out of the picture.

For years I had heard tell of an amazing Chaco outlier site on the Zuni Reservation, excavated by Frank H.H. Roberts, a legend of early southwestern archaeology, in the 1930s. It was called The Village of the Great Kivas because there were two of the huge subterranean rooms at  what was otherwise a relatively minor site. The implications for archaeologists were that it served as a regional center for all the local Chacoan villages, a materials redistribution point and political symbol of Chaco Canyon’s long reach. I wanted to go there.

I knew from my readings that it was near lower Nutria Lake in the northeast corner of reservation lands. From the time I started doing Chacoan tours in the 80s I marked a spot with bright red in my personal itinerary that said, “locate the Village of the Great Kivas.”

As often is the case with me, I chose to look upon it as a quest and a personal challenge rather than a research project. There were certainly people I could have asked for specific instructions and without much doubt they would have probably just told me how to get there but where is the fun in that?

A friend points to the drawings found on some of the lower rocks on level with the ruins. While most of the glyphs are found on the higher trail, there are a few tucked in amongst the boulders to the east of the ruin.

I did mention to one of my Zuni friends, Charles that I was going to look for the site and smiling he responded that he used to like to go out there to fish off the dam, back when he had time. Unfortunately he was just too busy to go fishing now.

Charles had introduced me to Hawikuh, the site where Esteban the Moor had met his end and Father de Niza reported cities of gold. But Hawikuh, a Zuni historic place, had been very close to is family’s traditional farm at Ojo Caliente, so he felt that he had a right to take people there. Nutria was also an area of summer farming communities for Zuni families but Charles’ family was not one of them. He had intimated I was on my own.

I could have asked the Zuni Tribal Office of Tourism about the site. Because security has been greatly augmented over the years, they are the ones you have to see if you want to go there today. They would have helped me, but this was back in the day and I was Illinois Smith (think about it). I’d just do it myself.

Looking up at the site from approximately where the the van was in the previous photo. In the foreground you can see a person standing beside the village, which was excavated by Roberts in the 30s. The petroglyph trail is just below the center row of sandstone blocks above the site.

It wasn’t the first time or the last that I would follow my guiding principle in life: “It’s easier to offer a heartfelt apology than to gain a requested permission.”

My first sally was when I was going from Zuni to Gallup. I took the Nutria turnoff saying, somewhat enigmatically, to the group with me that I wanted to ‘take a look at something’. They being mostly vets of previous trips with me were not the least surprised at the serendipitous event.  I had driven in a couple of clicks toward Nutria lake on a good gravel road when I hit a muddy road that caused my van to fishtail and spin out. Looking ahead I saw no improvement. Never having been one to avoid bad roads when I knew where I was headed, I decided that at this time I would bow to discretion being the better part of valor, I turned around and at the time none but me were the wiser.

I would have to try to find the site again, another time.

View from the petroglyph trail back toward the village with a good perspective of the two great kivas. The smaller, also excavated by Roberts is in the lower center of the photo. The larger lies up and to the right with the large round juniper growing from its walls.

The next try came about a year later, in better weather the road was dry and easy driving.

We got to the lake and I kept watching for signs that I was there. It had to be off to the left somewhere, towards the sandstone talus slopes of the Zuni Mountains.

All the turnoffs looked like they lead to small farms comprised of several dressed sandstone buildings with corrals and clear fence lines. All except one; that one lead back to a rail fence but I saw no buildings. That might be the place but to me it seemed to be too close to the lake.

A few more miles I realized I was gaining altitude, heading for Upper Nutria and I decided. At the first pullout I turned around, went back to the one road near the lake and turned toward the pale stone cliffs. Reaching what I had thought to be a rail fence it revealed itself to be road blocks, meant to prevent vehicles from continuing. Just up ahead I saw the telltale indication that the search was over — stacked sandstone blocks in the classic Chacoan style. We were there.

There are many different types of figures seen on the various panels.

I knew from others that had been there that one of the best features of the site was the rock art. We spent a considerable time wandering around the ruins but the trail beckoned so we trudged up the side of the hill to where the petroglyphs were.

A large panel of petroglyphs that includes one that echoes the pictogragh at Penasco Blanco in Chaco Canyon thought to represent the ‘nova’ phenomenon.

Various figures including a ‘kokopelli’ or hump-backed flute player in the upper right.

It was a stiff climb and the old trail up was largely gone now so it was more of a scramble but we got there and were amply rewarded. Nearly all the panels that were exposed on the sandstone boulders above were covered with graphic expressions of the prehistoric world. Humans, animals and creatures of indeterminate etiology vied with symbols and lines and unusual figures.

The climb was more than worth it when we found all that the artists had previously left for us to see. Most exciting for me was the star and moon pairing which seemed to echo a famous pictograph at Penasco Blanco in Chaco Canyon. The meaning of the pictograph is generally agreed upon by archaeologists to represent the Crab Nebula supernova event of 1054 AD.

(Wow! You mean there is actually something that is generally agreed upon by archaeologists? Who knew?)

After a slow leisurely viewing of the Ancestral Puebloan artistic expressions I thought it couldn’t get any better than this. But I was wrong; the best that this incredible archaeological site had to offer the to diligent and persistent traveller was yet to come . . .

In the lower left is a possible kok’ko (Zuni for katsina) mask.

(To be continued.)

I laid my well-worn hat down on the trail as scale to illustrate the scope of some of the glyphs. You may notice the resemblance of some of the figures to the familiar southwestern icon  ’kokopelli’

I will be taking you to some of the lesser known places in Chaco Canyon in some later posts but for now I am stopping at an outlier about 50 miles south of Chaco and it is one that is integrally related to the prehistoric cities of the canyon.

Outliers in the professional archaeologist parlance are habitation sites that are somehow connected to a larger sphere of influence but located somewhere outside it’s core.

Driving from Gallup, exit at Thoreau (pronounced ‘threw’; it’s named for a former railroad man) as if to take the short cut to Farmington, New Mexico. Traveling by this back road toward the Bistii Wilderness, and eventually Farmington, as I am sure you have done many times, you may have noticed in passing an interesting rock formation east of the highway near Crownpoint. It looks much like a natural spire of sandstone when seen from the road traveling 70 plus miles an hour. Closer inspection though, discloses that while it is a stone spire, it is of man-made origin.

The Navajo (Dine′) have named it Kin Ya’a — the Tall House.

The Tall House, notice how the shadow makes it look like a natural formation. Looking east. Photo by M. Severson

It represents the remains of what must have been an imposing structure in its day. Archaeologists refer to it as a ‘tower kiva’ because there appears to be a ceremonial significance to the interior room at the top of the tower. Modern kivas are ceremonial rooms in pueblo towns and by the referential process of archaeological interpretation, archaeologists have identified these rooms as being ceremonial in ancient pueblos also. Tree ring dates place the building of Kin Ya’a around 1100 AD.

Generally kivas make up a small percentage of the overall rooms in a village. Tower kivas are a unique structure even among these less common specialized rooms because rather than being subterranean as  are most prehistoric kivas, they rise several stories into the air.

One theory is that building a kiva so high up gives it a stronger connection to the realm of the sky and therefore increases the viability of any prayers for rain that originate there. Since it appears that some tower kivas may be several of the structures stacked one atop the other, they may also replicate the four worlds of pueblo myths.

Tower kivas are not exclusive to sites that are linked to Chaco Canyon but they are most commonly found in Chacoan towns. The one at Chettro Ketl, the second largest town in the canyon, has some interesting stone projections that appear to allow for entry by those adventurous souls brave enough to ascend the exterior of the tower in that manner. A more likely function is to illustrate to the people when it was time to re-plaster the exterior walls. When the rock projections start to show it’s time to start mixing more plaster.

The Chettro Ketl tower kiva has been excavated to illustrate the amount of work that went into the foundations of the structure. Not surprisingly it sits upon an impressive stone base excavated more than twenty feet into the Chaco soil. West of Pueblo Bonito, the compact town of Kin Kletso has two structures that appear to be tower kivas. If you are interested in learning more about Chaco you can go to the NPS site. 1)

Here in a close-up of remains of the tower kiva interior wall where you can see the reddish coloring of oxidation on the sandstone bricks indicating that the structure probably burned. Looking north. Photo by M. Severson

Most archaeologists agree that the tower kiva at Kin Ya’a has a very specific reason for its placement at this particular Chacoan town. But because they are archaeologists they don’t all agree on what that reason is. It all depends on who you talk to.

This site is unexcavated, which means all the information is still there waiting for future improvements in archaeological techniques. Looking northeast. Photo by M. Severson

The purpose of the structure may have long been open to debate but I like the signal tower aspect that has been presented in many discussions. The idea is that fires built atop the kiva could be used to signal other sites far away, especially at night. Kin Ya’a lies along the Great South Road out of Chaco, in fact the road bisects the pueblo diagonally.

To read more information on Kin Ya’a and a nice interpretive reconstruction painting go to the NPS brochure 2).

If you want to go to Kin Ya’a I better tell you my story.

Anyone traveling to Chaco today normally enters by the Pueblo Pintado road between Bloomfield and Cuba, NM;  built a decade or so ago to facilitate visitation to the remote site. Back in the day, a generation or more in the distant past, this adventurous explorer used to enter the canyon by the south road at the old trading post (TP) turnoff and return the next day by the Blanco TP or Nageezi TP road. I have always been a lover of bad roads.

Exploring the site, Chaco road is in foreground. Exploring the site, people are standing on the ruins of multistory rooms. A portion of a Chaco road is in the foreground, the tower kiva to the right of picture. Looking west. Photo by M. Severson

Of course, while on tour, I also wanted to stop and see Kin Ya’a since I drove right by it. Not bothering to get directions, (Don’t say it!) I felt I could find my way to the site. After all, I am a trained archaeologist. I’ve surveyed hundreds of miles of desert without getting lost. I can surely find my way to a stone spire that anyone can plainly see.

Yep.

On my first attempt I wound up in a local front yard somewhere south of Kin Ya’a. Sitting there slightly embarrassed but unashamed I watched as a Navajo granny in long skirts came out her front door. She looked at the huge white van loaded with bil-ganas (the term Navajos use for ‘white people’) that was being driven by some big guy with a nervous smile on his hairy face. She slowly shook her head, turned around and walked back in the house shutting the door behind her

As you can tell by my photos, I did finally find my way to Kin Ya’a but I still owe that granny an apology.

The carefully constructed Chacoan walls usually had a visual pattern to the layers of sandstone. Then they were covered by plaster and never seen by the people who lived there. Looking northwest. Photo by M. Severson

1) http://www.chaco.com/park/brochure.html

2) http://www.nps.gov/chcu/planyourvisit/upload/

KIN%20YA’%20A%20-%202005.pdf