MINDELEEFF. ] ROOF OPENINGS. 207 
leled in the excavated lodges of the San Francisco Mountains, where a 
single opening served this double purpose. A slight recess or excava- 
tion in the side of the entrance shaft evidently served for the exit of 
smoke. 
At the village of Acoma the kiva trapdoors differ somewhat from the 
Zuni form. The survey of this village was somewhat hasty, and no 
opportunity was afforded of ascertaining from the Indians the special 
purpose of the mode of construction adopted. The roof hole is divided, 
as in Zuni, but the portion against which the ladder leans, instead of 
being made into a smoke vent, is provided with a small roof. These 
roof holes to the ceremonial chamber are entered directly from the open 
air, while in the dwelling rooms it seems customary (much more cus- 
tomary than at Zuni) to enter the lower stories through trapdoors 
within upper rooms. In many instances second-story rooms have no 
exterior rooms but are entered from rooms above, contrary to the usual 
arrangement in both Tusayan and Cibola. All six of the kivas in this 
village are provided with this peculiarly constructed opening. 
In Zuni close crowding of the cells has led to an exceptionally fre- 
quent use of roof-lights and trapdoors. The ingenuity of the builders 
was greatly taxed to admit sufficient light to the inner rooms. The 
roof hole, which was originally used only to furnish the means of access 
and light for the first terrace, as is still the case in Tusayan, is here 
used in all stories indiscriminately, and principally for light and air. 
In large clusters there are necessarily many dark rooms, which has led 
to the employment of great numbers of roof holes, more or less directly 
modeled after the ordinary trapdoor. Their occurrence is particularly 
frequent in the larger clusters of the village, as in house No.1. The 
exceptional size of this pile, and of the adjoining house No. 4, with the 
consequent large proportion of dark rooms, have taxed the ingenuity of 
the Zuni to the utmost, and as a result we see roof openings here 
assuming a degree of importance not found elsewhere. 
In addition to roof openings of the type described, the dense clus- 
tering of the Zuni houses has led to the invention of a curious device 
for lighting inner rooms not reached by ordinary external openings. 
This consists of an opening, usually of oval or subrectangular form 
in elevation, placed at the junction of the roof with a vertical wall. 
This opening is carried down obliquely between the roofing beams, as 
shown in the sections, Fig. 100, so that the light is admitted within 
the room just at the junction of the ceiling and the inner face of the 
wall. With the meager facilities and rude methods of the Zuni, this 
peculiar arrangement often involved weak construction, and the open- 
ings, placed so low in the wall, were in danger of admitting water from 
the roof. The difficulty of obtaining the desired light by this device was 
much lessened where the outer roof was somewhat lower than the ceil- 
ing within. 
