NO. 2 SMITHSONIAN EXPLORATIONS, I924 85 



Indian laborers. The explorations of 1924 mark the fourth season 

 of the five-year Pueblo Bonito project, inaugurated in 1921 after a 

 thorough reconnoissance of the entire Chaco Canyon region. 



During the years 1921-1923 the Expedition completed the excava- 

 tion of the eastern and northern portions of Pueblo Bonito. It is in 

 the former section of the ruin that those dwellings last constructed are 

 to be found ; in the northern section are slightly earlier houses erected 

 above the razed walls of part of that original settlement which pre- 

 ceded and formed a nucleus for the great communal structure now 

 known as Pueblo Bonito. In 1924 the Expedition confined its principal 

 activities to the western half of the ruin where rooms of both early 

 and late construction exist. From these much new data were obtained. 



As one result of the past season's explorations, it is now reasonably 

 certain that no more than two major periods of occupancy are present 

 in the ruins of Pueblo Bonito. These were contemporaneous through- 

 out many successive generations and yet one was pioneer to the other. 

 During the second period, three separate types of masonry were 

 evolved. The culture of the original Bonitians appears to have been 

 quite distinct ; the masonry of their dwellings, the form and furniture 

 of their ceremonial rooms and perhaps even their daily life differed 

 from that of their later associates. 



In that portion of the pueblo recently excavated are to be seen 

 rectangular dwellings whose walls were constructed both with hard, 

 laminate sandstone and dressed blocks of similar but more friable 

 material. These rooms adjoin and even encompass earlier habitations 

 in which broad, thin slabs of sandstone were utilized with abundant 

 quantities of adobe mud as the characteristic building material. The 

 earlier dwellings were built on a much lower level of occupancy ; the 

 later structures are especially noteworthy for the perfection and 

 symmetry of their masonry, the trueness of their corners and the 

 uniform regularity of their dimensions. Kivas associated with these 

 latter dwellings are, for the most part, of smaller diameter than those 

 observed elsewhere in the ancient village. 



Among the older habitations excavated last season were four rooms 

 which had been utilized as burial chambers. A majority of the 71 

 bodies interred here had been placed upon burial mats and were 

 accompanied by mortuary ofiferings, including basketry and earthen- 

 ware vessels. Such personal ornaments as were worn by the deceased 

 at the moment of death were not removed. Whether the burials 

 represent the first or second period of occupancy is a question still 

 undetermined. But a curious fact in connection with these interments 



