Pueblo Bonito - Description

Description

Pueblo Bonito is divided into two sections by a precisely aligned wall, running north to south, through the central plaza. A Great Kiva is placed on either side of the wall, creating a symmetrical pattern common to many of the Great Houses. In addition to the great kivas, over thirty other kivas or ceremonial structures have been found, many also associated with the large central courtyard. Interior living spaces were quite large by the standards of the Ancient Pueblo.

The site covers almost two acres (8,000 m²) and incorporates at least 650 rooms, with some estimates rising to 800. In parts of the village, the tiered structure was four and five stories high. During later construction, some lower level rooms were filled with debris to better support the weight of the upper levels. The builder's use of core and veneer architecture and multi-story construction produced massive masonry walls as much as three feet (1 m) thick.

Archaeologists' population estimates for the village have varied. During the early 20th century, the structures were viewed as small cities, with people residing in every room. From this perspective, Pueblo Bonito could have accommodated several thousand inhabitants at the village's peak. More recent analysis has lowered the resident total to less than 800, primarily due to the small number of usable hearths in the ruins. Another analysis, based on architecture, estimates the resident population to be even smaller, with only 12 households or about 70 people at its peak. These tend to be located on the ground floor, near the central plaza, and are associated with entrances to a series of rooms going deeper into the structure. Rooms were connected by a series of interior doorways, some of them in a T-shape. A family may have inhabited 3 to 4 rooms, with many small interior spaces being used for storage. There was generally no outside access to the room blocks other than from the central courtyard.

It is possible that Pueblo Bonito is actually neither a village nor city. While its size has the capacity for a significant population, the environment may not have been ideal for sustaining a large population. Excavations at the site have not revealed significant trash middens indicating residential areas. A common suggestion is that Pueblo Bonito was a ritual center. This is not only evident in the existence of the kivas (which are more often than not attributed to ritual function) but also in the construction of the site and its relation to other Chaco Canyon sites. Although there were many occupants, only 50-60 burials were found here. (Snow, 131)

The site allows us to begin to comprehend the degree to which the Anasazi/ Ancient Pueblo understood the solar and lunar cycles. The solar and Lunar cycles are marked in the petroglyphs of the surrounding cliff area as well as in the architecture of Pueblo Bonito itself.

Examination of pack rat middens revealed that, at the time that Pueblo Bonito was built Chaco Canyon and the surrounding areas were wooded by trees such as ponderosa pines. Evidence of such trees can be seen within the structure of Pueblo Bonito, such as the first floor support beams. Scientists hypothesised that during the time that the pueblo was inhabited the valley was cleared of almost all of the trees, to provide timber for construction and fuel. This, combined with a period of drought, led to the water table in the valley to drop severely, making the land infertile. This explains why Pueblo Bonito was only inhabited for about 300 years and is a good example of the effect that deforestation can have on the local environment. The Anasazi, no longer able to grow crops to sustain their population, had to move on.

Since 2004, the University of New Mexico has begun a campaign to reopen excavations of the great house in order to obtain new data. Major excavations of Chaco Canyon occurred during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; for this reason, the nature of the incredible social transformation that developed in Chaco Canyon and its underlying causes remains poorly understood.

A multi-year field study, centered in Pueblo Bonito, has been launched in order to obtain new information on the economic conditions of the Bonito phase. The ultimate goal of this recent fieldwork is to obtain data that will enable researchers to examine the development of great house communities in respect to relationships between demographic change and economic productivity.

Thus far, the team from the University of New Mexico has recovered and inventoried thousands of artifacts, including ceramics, animal bones, and stone fragments. As a result, the researchers have received a separate grant from the National Science Foundation to analyze more than 300,000 artifacts: the largest single-site artifact assemblage ever collected from Chaco.