fewkes] PREHISTORIC VILLAGES, CASTLES, AKl> TOWERS 25 



"Those ruins form the most imposing pile of masonry yet [1875] 

 found in Colorado. The whole group covers an area about 480,000 

 square feet, and has an average depth of from 3 to 4 feet. This 

 would give in the vicinity of 1,500,000 solid feet of stonework. The 

 stone used is chiefly of the fossiliferous limestone that outcrop 

 along the base of the Mesa Verde a mile or more away, and its trans- 

 portation to this place has doubtless been a great work for a people 

 so totally without facilities. . 



"The upper house is rectangular, measuring 80 feet by 100 feet, 

 and is built with the cardinal points to within a few degrees. The 

 pile is from 12 to 15 feet in height, and its massiveness suggests an 

 original height at least twice as great. The plan is somewhat < lifficult 

 to make out on account of the very great quantity of debris. 



"The walls seem to have been double, with a space 7 feet be- 

 tween; a number of cross walls at regular intervals indicate that this 

 space has been divided into apartments, as seen in the plan. 



"The walls are 26 inches thick, and are built of roughly dressed 

 stones, which were probably laid in mortar, as in other cases. 



"The enclosed space, which is somewhat depressed, has two lines 

 of debris, probably the remains of partition-walls, separating it into 

 three apartments, a, b, c [note]. Enclosing' this great house is a 

 network of fallen walls, so completely reduced that none of the 

 stones seem to remain in place; and I am at a loss to determine 

 whether they mark the site of a cluster of irregular apartments, 

 having low, loosely built walls, or whether they are the remains of 

 some imposing adobe structure built after the manner of the ruined 

 pueblos of the Rio Chaco. 



"Two well-defined circular enclosures or estufas [kivas] are situated 

 in the midst of the southern wing of the ruin. The upper one, A, 

 is on the opposite side of the spring from the great house, is 60 feet 

 in diameter, and is surrounded by a low stone wall. West of the house 

 is a small open court, which seems to have had a gateway opening 

 out to the west, through the surrounding walls. 



"The lower house is 200 feet in length by ISO in width, and its 

 walls vary 15 degrees from the cardinal points. The northern wall, 

 a, is double and contains a row of eight apartments about 7 feet in 

 width by 24 in length. The walls of the other sides are low, and 

 seem to have served simply to enclose the great court, near the 

 center of which is a large walled depression (estufa B)." 



The number of buildings that composed the Aztec Spring village 

 (fig. 1) when it was inhabited can not be exactly estimated, but as 

 indicated by the largest mound, the most important block of rooms 

 exceeds in size any at Mitchell Spring Ruin. While this village also 

 covered more ground than that at Mud Spring, it shows no evidence 

 of added towers, a prominent feature of the. largest mound of the 



