FEWKES: UNIT TYPE OF PUEBLO ARCHITECTUEE 543 



ANTHROPOLOGY.— r/ie origin of the unit type of Pueblo 



K 



architecture.^ J. Walter Fewkes, Bureau of American 

 Ethnology. 



An important step in the study of the origin of the pueblos 

 of our Southwest was the recognition, by Dr. T. Mitchell Prudden, 

 of the ''unit type," from which more complex architectural 

 forms may have been evolved. This ''unit type, " so well defined 

 by him,- consists of a row of rooms with consolidated walls and 

 extensions at right angles from each end, directly in front of which 

 is a circular subterranean ceremonial chamber, or kiva, and near 

 by a cemeter}^ with other features. Another important advance 

 in the study of pueblos was the recognition of the existence of an 

 architectural type known as the pre-puebloan, preceding the 

 "unit type." The object of the present paper is to consider a 

 cause that may have developed the "unit type" of habitation 

 from the pre-puebloan. 



The accepted classification of our Southwestern sedentary 

 Indians inhabiting terraced houses is based on differences in 

 their languages, and includes the following stocks: Tanoan 

 (Tewa, Tigua, Piros), Keresan, Zufii, and Hopi, to which list 

 may be added others now extinct. 



It is evident that in ancient times each of these linguistic 

 stocks inhabited a much larger area than its descendants, or 

 those speaking the above-mentioned languages, now occupy. 

 We know of a diminution in the number of villages, not only 

 from legendary accounts, supplemented by archaeological data, 

 but also from historical evidences. The number of inhabited 

 villages in the Rio Grande region recorded in 1540 was larger 

 than that existing at the present day. The rate of decrease of 

 certain Pueblo stocks in historical times may even be determined, 

 and the probability is that the number of inhabited pueblos in 

 prehistoric times was considerably larger than when they were 

 first visited by white men, although many were in ruins even at 

 that time. We are hardly justified in supposing that the people 



'■ Published by permission of the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. 

 2 American Anthropologist, n. s., 5: 224. 1903; ibid., 16: 33. 1914. 



