194 TWO summers' work in pueblo ruins [eth. ANN. 22 



community of life no doubt explains in part the pueblo-like character 

 of the Mormon settlements, but mutual defense was au important 

 factor in the determination of the form of their villages. 



The pueblo, therefore, as we find it today, is a survival of con- 

 solidated cliff houses, cavate villages, or rectangular and circular 

 towns of the plain, which have assumed their form for the sake of 

 defense. But these forms are secondary; in localities and at times 

 when defense was not necessary the aboriginal farmers erected more 

 or less isolated dwellings or ranches, each with few rooms and with 

 accommodations for one clan. 



In very ancient times the inhabitants of the Gila were scattered 

 over the land, or their homes were clustered together, but were not 

 united in a compact form with adjoining walls. Even then, however, 

 they had certain common houses for defense or religious purposes, of 

 which Casa Grande is a good example. 



As the clans moved into exposed regions in which they were raided 

 by hostiles they naturally built their houses in pueblos or forms best 

 calculated for defense. 



It is interesting to note that when this pi-essure of necessity for 

 defense was removed the former distribution of small farmhouses 

 over the land returned. When the clan was no longer forced to 

 huddle under the same I'oof with its neighbor, it returned to the 

 isolated rancheria. In this way large pueblos have disintegrated, 

 first into summer farming villages, later into individual farmhouses. 

 Thus, a law of the struggle for existence and survival of the fittest 

 can be educed to account for pueblo architecture in the Southwest. 

 There is nothing in an arid environment to lead agriculturists to hud- 

 dle into pueblos, and it was not until nomadic robbers forced them to 

 do so that they adopted this form of life. 



The semi-deserts of the Southwest are not valuable lands for agri- 

 culture, and yet the aboriginal jjeople of this region were preemi- 

 nently farmers. This is explained by the fact that it was impossible 

 for hunters to remain in that culture stage, for there was no game; 

 it was alike impossible to be fishermen, because there were no fishes. 

 The people were forced by pressure of climatic conditions either to 

 become farmers or to perish. In more fertile lands, where game was 

 eibundant, there roamed nomadic hunters with whom they were unable 

 to successfuUj' contend. Thus in an arid desert land the individual 

 farmer became secure in his poverty from his warlike fellow-man. 

 When, by his industry, he gathered property beyond his immediate 

 needs, the nomads sought him out to despoil him of his possessions. 

 To meet these attacks he joined his neighbors, building his houses in 

 (;lusters, which, for additional protection, were finally consolidated 

 into a pueblo form. As the enemies grew stronger the size of pueblos 

 increased by consolidation. The form which the builders adopted 

 was that best fitted fo'- mutual protection. It has always been so 



