480 KANSAS CITY REVIEW OF SCIENCE. 



ARCHEOLOGY. 



DEAD CITIES OF NEW MEXICO. 



COLUMBUS MOlSE, LAS VEGAS, N. M. 



To the east of the range known as the Manzano, which Has about the centre 

 of the Territory, and runs parallel with the Rio Grande from north to south, is a 

 region rich with relics and full of monuments for the antiquary and historian. 

 Here even tradition is silent, and the ruins which still exist are the only witness- 

 es. I speak of the remnants of the old cities of Abo, Cuerro, and Gran Quivira. 

 When they were founded, who their inhabitants, or how long their existence, 

 is all matter for conjecture. The remains show their size, and the nature of their 

 people, but further than this, through lack of thorough scientific investigation, we 

 are left to wild guess-work or to nothing. Tradition speaks of seven great cities 

 existing in times long past somewhere within the limits of New Mexico, known 

 as the seven cities of the Cibola, but where they were is more than debatable. 



Conjecture seems, too, to have been the only move toward a solution of a 

 question which would doubtless prove interesting as instructive. The old site of 

 what is known as the Pecos church, an oft described and venerable ruin is 

 thought to have been one of these cities, but I think it rather unfounded because 

 the timbers of this church, known to be over 200 years old, are still in perfect 

 preservation, while those of the stone churches of Abo, Cuerro, Gran Quivira 

 and Belen, of which I shall speak, are, with the one exception of Abo, entirely 

 gone, the vacant niches where they once rested, alone remaining in testimony. 



The ruin of the church at Abo, has one little alcove about four feet square 

 which yet retains the roof traces — four brown and rotten logs half dropped to 

 pieces from decay. To me it seems that in these four ruins are found four of 

 these storied cities, and I draw my conjecture from the similarity of architecture 

 in these church ruins, of stone, still extant, as well as from the similarity of the 

 subterranean dwellings about them. All four of these ruins show a knowledge of 

 architecture and an evident acquaintance with the plumb and level, for the 

 walls and lines are as correct as these instruments could make them. First, in 

 order of importance, both in extent and mystery, is the site of the city of El 

 Gran Quivira which lies, as I have said, beyond the ranges of the Manzano and 

 Oscuros and in the valley between the latter range and that of the Gallinas. The 

 proper dimensions of the main ruin, the church, I cannot give, for I did not take 

 any measurements, but I should judge the extreme length to be about one hundred 

 and fifty feet with an extreme width of probably fifty feet. The walls now stand- 

 ing would possibly measure forty-five feet in height, and vary in thickness from 



