356 PAPAGUERIA 



pushed further into the valleys than the historical population. 

 The prehistoric relics comprise ruined houses and villages, 

 weathered to inconspicuous mounds, but known from occasional 

 foundation remnants to have been constructed, at least in part, 

 of a mixture of adobe and coarse pebbles ; abundant fragments 

 of potteiy, finer in texture and decoration than that now made 

 by the Papago; extensive acequias and other irrigation works; 

 small corrals or stock yards containing reservoirs; dominating 

 structures in each considerable village, in the ruins of which the 

 finest pottery is found ; and well shaped and polished stone axes, 

 pestles, mortars, etc. Comparison of these vestiges with the 

 works of the modern Indians indicates that the prehistoric pop- 

 ulation was the more advanced in industries and much the larger 

 in numbers. The ancient agriculture, particularly, occupied a 

 higher plane than that of the present ; for the prehistoric farmers 

 constrained and restrained the running waters to the needs of 

 their kind, while the modern Indians chase and seek the waters 

 just as they chase game and seek wild fruits. By reason of the 

 control of the waters the fruitful ness of the valleys was undoubt- 

 edly multiplied, and large tracts of the desert must have blos- 

 somed and borne fruit at the behest and for the benefit of the 

 primitive husbandmen. The ancient acequias were much larger 

 than the modern ditches — e. g., in Arivaca valley, in southern 

 Arizona, the main prehistoric acequia was raised so as to flood the 

 entire bottomland, was lined almost continuously with houses, 

 and was 150 feet wide, while its modern representative, intro- 

 duced by Caucasian skill, is a simple ditch excavated below the 

 surface and 8 or 10 feet wide. The ancient villages are much 

 more numerous and extensive than the modern Indian, Mex- 

 ican, and American villages combined. The great number of 

 habitations might be ascribed to successive occupation and aban- 

 donment were it not for the testimony of the irrigation works ; 

 for the old ditches were not only more extensive, but were car- 

 ried further up the sides of the valleys in such manner as to 

 permit the synchronous cultivation of larger areas than are now 

 cultivated, and in a manner, moreover, which would have been 

 extravagant and useless unless a large population in each valley 

 was dependent thereon. The dominant structures in each vil- 

 lage suggest a cult and social organization somewhat different 

 from that of the modern Pitnan tribes, whose villages are with- 

 out council-houses or temples, the ancient structures correspond- 

 ing in some measure with the " casas grandes " found in Arizona, 



