474 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1923 



the ruin, but the form and arrangement of walls at that junction 

 are not evident. The walls of one of the kivas show evidences of 

 mural pilasters and banquettes like those of cliff dwellings. 



The fourth group of ruins in the Hovenweep Monument is situ- 

 ated at the head of a small canyon on the Cajon Mesa a few miles 

 west of those already described. To the largest ruin of this group, 

 the author has given the name Cool Spring House (pi. 5, fig. 2), on 

 account of the fine drinking water in the canyon below it. This ruin 

 would well repay extensive study and contains features not yet 

 described in other ruins. 4 



POTTERY AND OTHER OBJECTS 



Through the kindness of Mr. Williamson, cashier of the national 

 bank at Dolores, the author is able to give a brief chapter on pot- 

 tery and other objects from the neighborhood of Hovenweep Na- 

 tional Monument, In a general way the architecture of the build- 

 ings in the Hovenweep National Monument is identical with that 

 of the buildings on top of the Mesa Verde and likewise the build- 

 ings in the intervening areas separating the two. The large mounds 

 in the Montezuma Valley west of the Mesa Verde have such 

 a close likeness to those in the Mummy Lake group and elsewhere 

 on the surface of the Mesa Verde Park that we may suppose their 

 former buildings identical in culture. Wherever we find true cliff 

 dwellings in this vast area we have evidence of cultural similarities. 

 In other words the architectural types of the Mesa are practically 

 duplications of those in the neighboring valleys, and the conclu- 

 sion is evident that all this neighborhood was formerly inhabited by 

 a widespread people in a similar stage of development. The extent 

 of the distribution of these similarities, north, west, south, and east, 

 is a most interesting problem for the archeologist to solve, for it 

 indicates the horizontal spread of a characteristic culture. 



But similarity in architectural features is only one means by 

 which the archeologist recognizes the extension of culture; another 

 is the similarity in form, colors, and designs of pottery. An exam- 

 ination of ceramic objects reveals the fact that there is no radical 

 difference in pottery throughout this area and we find by comparison 

 that pottery from the Hovenweep National Monument is so similar 

 to that from the Mesa Verde that one may say it is identical, and 

 is the product of people in the same cultural stage. The ceramic 

 evidence thus supports the architectural that the former inhabitants 

 of the Hovenweep National Monument were the same as those of 

 the Mesa Verde. But it must be borne in mind that we are handi- 

 capped by the paucity of specimens from the two regions for com- 



* For further details of Bull. 70, Bur. Amer. Ethn., and Sniithsouian Misc. Coll., Vol. 

 68, No. 1, 1917. 



