NO. 3 ARCHEOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS AT PARAGONAH JUDD 7 



habitation, the old walls were pulled down upon themselves, the mass 

 brought to a uniform level, and erection of the substitute structure 

 begun. 



In a previous paper, 1 the present writer has briefly described the 

 occurrence of superposed dwellings in mounds excavated at Beaver 

 City, Utah. They, like the ones now under discussion, did not always 

 possess the same floor area as the buildings they replaced. In some 

 instances, one or more walls of the upper house coincided with those 

 of the lower ; in others, the long axis of the later dwelling lay at right 

 angles to that of the earlier. The mere position of the new habitation 

 seemingly did not influence its builders so much as the fact that 

 necessity compelled its erection and that preference or social custom 

 influenced its construction on the site of the one destroyed. 



The occasional superposition of dwellings adds greatly to the 

 interest of such structures as those disclosed by the 1917 excavations. 

 A few of them, briefly described, may serve not only to indicate the 

 general problems involved, but they may also contribute, in a greater 

 or less degree, to an understanding of their primitive builders. 

 Rooms 16-19, for example, occur in three distinct levels. Numbers 

 16 and 17 originally comprised a single room, but this was subse 

 quently divided by a partition only half as thick as the main walls. 

 Still later, both houses appear to have been abandoned, although 

 Room 17 may have been temporarily occupied after construction of 

 the neighboring house, number 18. A continuation of the floor level 

 of this latter dwelling extended out over the razed walls of Room 16, 

 2 feet 9 inches above their inner base. 



The length of the upper structure was nearly as great as that of 

 Rooms 1 6 and 17 combined ; the condition of its floor suggests occu 

 pancy during a considerable period. For some unknown reason, 

 however, the walls of number 18 were later demolished and Room 

 19, a building only half as long, was erected above them. Seventeen 

 inches of closely packed building material separated the two floors ; 

 the width of the structures was approximately the same, although 

 the walls of the one did not rest directly upon those of the other. 



The neighboring houses, numbers 8 to 12, furnish a similar 

 example of superposition. Rooms 9 and 1 1 were built above the par 

 tially razed walls of Rooms 8, 10, and 12. Number 8 was constructed 

 subsequently to Room 10, its floor being approximately 10 inches 



1 Proceedings of the Nineteenth International Congress of Americanists, pp. 

 119-124. Washington, D. C., 1917. 



