MiNDELEFFl DESIDERATA IN SITE SELECTION. 215 



ancient builders have seldom made even that slight addition to the 

 natural advantages of the site they occupied. 



The tirst desideratum in the minds of the old pueblo builders in 

 choosing the location of their habitations was nearness to some area of 

 tillable land. This land was generally adjacent to the site of the vil- 

 lage, and was almost invariably overlooked by it. In fact this require- 

 mentwas considered of far more importance than adajjtability todefense, 

 for the latter was often sacrificed to the former. A good example in 

 which both requirements have been fully met is the ruin under discus- 

 sion. This, however, is the result of an exceptionally favorable envi- 

 ronment; as a rule the two requirements conflict with each other, and 

 it is always the latter requirement, — adaptability to defense — which 

 sutlers. These statements are true even of the so-called fortresses, of 

 the cavate lodges, of the cliff ruins, and of many of the large village 

 ruins scattered over the southwestern portion of the United States. 

 In the case of the large village ruins, however, there is another feature 

 of pueblo life which sometimes produces a different result, viz, the use 

 of outlying single houses or small clusters separated from the main vil- 

 lage and used for temporary abode during the farming season only. 

 This feature is well developed in some of the modern pueblos, particu- 

 larly in Zufii and Acoma. 



The principle illustrated by this ruin is an important one. Among 

 the ancient pueblo builders there was no military art, or rather the 

 military art was in its infancy; purely defensive structures, such as fort- 

 resses, were unknown, and the idea of defense never reached any greater 

 development than the selection of an easily defended site for a village, 

 and seldom extended to the artifical improvement of the site. There is 

 another result of this lack of military knowledge not heretofore alluded 

 to, which will be discussed at length on some other occasion and can 

 only be mentioned here: this is the aggregation of a number of small 

 villages or clusters into the large many-storied pueblo building, such 

 as the modern Zuni or Taos. 



About 1-i miles north of the mouth of Fossil creek, on the eastern 

 side of the river, there is another ruin somewhat resembling the last 

 described. A large red rock rises at the intersection of two washes, 

 about a mile back from the river, and on a bench near the summit are 

 the remains of walls. These are illustrated in plate xxiii. In general 

 appearance and in character of site this ruin strongly resembles a type 

 found in the San .Tuan region. There seem to have been only a few 

 rooms on the top of the rock, and the prominent wall seen in the illus- 

 tration was probably a retaining or tilling wall in a cleft of the rock. 

 Such walls are now used among the Pueblos for the sides of trails, etc. 

 It is probable that at one time there were a considerable number of 

 rooms on the rock ; the debris on the ground at the base of the rock 

 on the western side, shown in the illustration, is rather scanty; on the 

 opposite or eastern side there is more, and it is not improbable there 



