KIDDER-GUERNSEY] ARCHEOLOGICAL EXPLORATIONS IN ARIZONA 43 
The bottoms of the walls are made of large, flat sandstone slabs set 
on edge in the earth, and the building was carried up by means of 
adobe “turtlebacks,” masses of clay averaging 15 inches long, 5 
inches wide, and 34 inches thick, which were put on wet and pushed 
and patted down over the series below (fig. 17). An occasional 
stone. was introduced. among the adobes; after the structure had 
dried and settled together the irregularities and cracks were filled 
and smo®thed over with more clay, making a firm, enduring, good- 
looking wall. These rooms were entirely filled with earth, ashes, 
and other refuse, the lower levels of which produced pottery of 
the non-Kayenta type. 
The second group of three rooms is built against the back of the 
cave, a slight ledge of which was evened up with stones and clay to 
make a low bench at the back of each chamber. In shape they are 
more nearly rectangular than those in front, but in construction the 
two assemblages are identical, as the rear rooms are now, and always 
were, semisubterranean. Large slabs set on edge form the founda- 
tions, and the upper parts are of adobe “ turtlebacks.” No clue could 
be obtained as to the method of roofing in either group. “ 
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Fie. 17.—Adobe ‘“ turtlebacks ” in Ruin 5. 
The seventh room (fig. 18) stands by itself, both in position and in 
structure. It is nearly circular,’ and except for its front part, where, 
because of the downward slope of the cave floor, the wall probably 
protruded slightly above ground, was entirely subterranean. It had 
been dug from the compact hardpan and completed by simply coat- 
ing the sides of the excavation with plaster. An occasional stone 
was introduced to fill a chink. The front or south side, where the 
earth had apparently not been firm enough to serve as a wall, was 
built up of large stone slabs; presumably its upper portion had been 
made, as in the rooms just described, of adobe. From the floor the 
walls rose to a height of 3 feet 6 inches,*where they were set 
back 8 inches, and then rose again for 14 feet to what was eyi- 
dently the floor level of the cave at the time of occupancy. The 
8-inch offset seemed to have been designed to receive the ends of the 
roof beams, but:as it was less than 4 feet above the floor we were 
somewhat puzzled as to the method of roofing until we made a more 
careful examination of the offset and discovered the charred butts 
of 2 to 3 inch poles driven slantingly into the hardpan at such an angle 
1PDimensions: East and west, 11 feet 7 inches; north and south, 10 feet 9 inches. 
