PREHISTORIC RUINS IN SOUTHERN COLORADO. 669 



ness of its walls, and the care displayed in dressing and laying the 

 stone ; also by the presence of a circular room, which, as will be seen 

 hereafter, is their temple and council-house. On the La Plata there 

 is a large agricultural settlement, very much dilapidated, which con- 

 sists mainly of houses of this kind. The largest of these is one hun- 

 dred by one hundred and fifty feet. These dwelling-houses seem to 

 have been very similar to those in the pueblos of the present day. A 

 high wall was built, inclosing a rectangular space. The house was 

 built all around the interior of this wall, which thus became the back 

 wall of the house. In the interior was a rectangular court, on which 

 the house opened. There were no openings for egress or ingress 

 through the wall ; the only way to obtain admission being to climb 

 over the wall, by a ladder, and descend in the same manner to the 

 court. The house was divided into many rooms, and, except in a few 

 cases, they did not connect with one another directly. 



None of the ruins of these houses thus far examined are in such a 

 condition as to enable one to determine whether they had more than 

 one story. In the pueblos of the present day they are found of three 

 and even four stories in height. 



In the towns built in time of war, for defensive purposes, these 

 dwellings are usually much smaller than in the former case, and could 

 have accommodated comparatively few persons : but this is due to the 

 circumstances of building-site solely ; for everything in their history 

 shows them to have been a gregarious people. These towns were evi- 

 dently built later, and in many cases are so situated as to be much 

 better sheltered from the elements, and naturally are found in a much 

 better state of preservation than the former. 



In every village, whose site would admit of it, these people have 

 built one or more cylindrical towers, which seem to have been used as 

 council-houses or temples, or both. The walls are generally double, a 

 tower within a tower, and, in one or two cases observed, there is a 

 third tower. The space between them, several feet in width, is divided 

 by radial partitions into rooms. Within the inner tower, the ground 

 is excavated, forming an hemispherical depression. Here it has been 

 supposed that the eternal fire was kept ; and it has been suggested 

 that the circular section of the building was intended to symbolize the 

 sun, the object of their worship. These buildings are, in all cases, 

 the most thoroughly constructed ; their walls are thicker and of larger 

 and better-dressed stones than in any other buildings. Structures 

 quite similar to these are found in the pueblos of the present day, and 

 are used for the purposes above mentioned. They are always found 

 in agricultural towns, and in fortified towns on the summits of mesas, 

 but in most collections of the cliff-houses and in the cave-dwellings 

 they are of necessity absent. 



Well-preserved specimens of these structures have been found on 

 the edge of the mesa above the San Juan, a few miles from the mouth 



