El Paso daily herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1881-1901, 1897-10-25
VOL. XVII, No. 254
The Enchanted Mesa.

The subject of the enchanted mesa,
which Professor Libbey believed that
he had disenchanted, proves not to be
one that can be dismissed in para
graph, or even in several paragraphs
A fortnight ago it was suggested in the
Weekly that Mr.. F. w. Hodges dis
coveries of stone axes and other relics,
which Professor Libbey had not MOTTO
ed,' did indeed demonstrate that the
mesa had been visited, but did not
necessarily prove that it had ever
been inhabited. That suggestion has
prompted Mr.. Hogde to write the
Weekly as follows:
The mere fact that there were found
on the Su mmit two fragme ntary stone
axes, portion of shell bracelet. sev-
eral greatly worn potsherds of ex-
tremely ancie ware, and projectile
point would not in itself abe regard ed
as conclusive evidence that the mesa
had actually been Occ, pied as village
site; but when we know that the sum-
NIT is, and evidently long has been,
absolutely Inaccessible to the Indians;
that 1t has been washed by rains and
swept by winds for centuries, until
scarcely any soil is left on the crest;
that thousands of tons of soft sandstone
have so recently fallen from the cliff
that their edges have not had time to
become rounded by erosion; that the
topography of the summit is such that
not a cupful of water now remains on
the surface, save in a few eroded ''pot-
holes" in the sandstone, but that it
rushes over the precipice on every
side in hundred cataracts; that the
rude stone monument (which Professor
Libbey believed might be due to
erosion) in a spot well protected from
surface wash is artificial beyond
peradventnre, as any one may Judge
from my photograph; that well-defned
traces of an ancient ladder trail may
at the very cleft through which the
traditional pathway passed: and, above
all, the large mum bers of very ancient
pottery fragments and other artefacts
in the earthly ta'us around the base of
the mesa, whica must have been wash
ed from the summit, for they could
have occurred there in no other way
we have incontrovertible evidence that
the summit of KatzimO, or enchanted
mesa, was inhabited prior to 154O, when
the present Acoma was discovered by
Francisco VaZquez de Coronado, and
that the last vestige of the village has
long been washed or blown over the
cliff.
After having examined hundreds of
ruins and engaged in excavating dozens
of others in the southwest, I am fully
logic evidence OF the former occupancy
o. enchanted mesa by the Acoma In
dians and that their tradition to that
effect is substantially true; and this
opinion is entertained by every compe-
tent authority to whose attention these
facts have been drawn.
An authority we'll known to the
Weekly's readers, who agrees with
Mr.. Hodges conclusions, is Mr.. Charles
F. Lummis. 1t was he, if the Weekly
is correctly informed, who learned
from the Acoma Indians the legend of
the former occupation of the mesa, and
first made it familiar to American
resders. To him it seems to be due
that enough interest was felt in the
mesa to induce any one to go to the top
of it. To Professor Libbey belongs at
least the credit of demonstrating that
the rock can be scaled and of being the
first to scale it.-Harper' ,Weekly.