Evening star., 1925-05-31

WHICH NeH NJ. Judd curator OF Amer
lean archaeology in the United States
rational Museum, has set himself this
summer, in continuing explorations
Tor the National Geographic Society.
With a carefully chosen party of 10
technlcIans as assistants, DIR. Judd is
leaving Washington next week to con-
tlnue, for another five months, what
ne believes to be the most important
and eliminating exploration work in
Pueblo Bonito, the beautiful village"
In Chaco Canyon. New MeXico-the
ruins of gigantic apartment house
OF some 500 rooms, sheltering at least
1,5OO persons about 500 years before
Columbus discovered America.
The intensive study of American
archaeology is only about 20 years old.
and the most notable contributions TO
this subject have been made during
the last 20 years In the last II wears
DIR. Judd has been doing conspicuous
work in this line. for Il years with
the National Museum. and directing
work of the National Geographic So
ciety.
He has organized and directed II
archaeological expeditions, and has pur-
sued his studies all over the South
west and into Central America.
Summarizing some of the more i'm
portant purposes he hopes to achieve
in this, the fifth year of his explora-
lions under the National Geographic
Society auspices in Pueblo Bonito
and Chaco Canyon. DR.. Judd says:
~ We should reach quite definite
conclusions as to how long ago these
ruins of a great apartment house were
abandoned, or built. which will prob
ably be some 500 yenrs before Column
bus landed on American soil We are
endeavoring to establish the date by
an interesting comparison of tree
rings.
t2l I'VE ought 10 establish the differ
ences between the two distinct peoples
who lived in that single apartment
house, Judging from their cultural OBJ
jccts. chiefly pottery, basfetry and
jewelry.
(5) We are trying to ascertain the
approximate length of time Chaco
Canyon was occupied by prehistoric
peoples-eXIending back probably sew
eral centurtes before Christ.
CD We are trying To ind the
reasons why Americas first big
apartment house was abandoned. We
know there were persistent attacks by
hostile nomadic people, and serious
agricultural problems. SO one phase
of our work this Summer Will be a
close study of prehistoric agriculture.
(5) I'VE will endeavor to find the
upper end of an old arroyo. or water
channel which discovery would be
exceedingly important in our Solu-
tion of the BonitianS' problems and
their abandonment of the most beau
tiful aboriginal village i'm the whole
United States.
IF we can solve these i've prob
lens explained DR.. Judd. "or even
approach their solution. | am con-
fident that the National Geo-ra pIlic
Society will have made one of the
most important, outstanding contri-
buttons to American archaeology
= = ~
SURROUNDED by prehistoric In
dian art, delicately wrought
trinkets. closely woven baskets,
beautiful pottery, and other trophies
of his delving into the lives of the
Bonitians, which have been buried for
centuries, DR.. Judd visualized his eX-
cavations. But he emphasized that
while the attention of the world has
been arrested by his penctrati ton of
the Pueblo Bonito ruins. with inter
est augmented by the sending of u
National Geographic Society eXpedi-
ton to uncover the great mound of
Cuicuilco in the Valley of Mexico,
which may be 5000 years old. there
absolutely is no chance of tracing
any relationship between our prehis-
toric southwestern tribes and those of
the Old World.
There is a bare possibility that
some cultural connection will be
found between the former inhab-
itants of Pueblo Bonito and the
Mayas, ancient temple builders of
Yucatan and Guatemala" he con-
Cedes in his rigid conservatism.
"Tut-ankh Amen. and his fellow
Egyptians represent a high state of
cultural development along the desert
borders of the Nile. while the ancient
BonitianS surpassed all their cotem-
porarieS in the desert regions of the
Southwest but the prehistoric peo-
pies of America and Egypt had moth
ing in common"
Giving present-day and local com
PARSONS that made his description
more real. DIR. Judd described Pueblo
Bonito as IAN aboriginal apartment
house of 500 to 800 rooms. four
stories high. The ruins cover a little
over three and one-haIf acres of
ground. Viewed from the towering
north cliff, the ancient village is
semi-clrcuiar. with the greater portion
of it's dwellings,, or suites, grouped
along the curved side.
"a long row of one-story houses
connects the extreme wings of the
semicircle. From the middle of the
straight row a cluster of ceremonial
chambers extended TO meet the curved
section, thus dividing the village into
Pueblo Bonito, West, and Pueblo Bo-
nito, East and providing each side
with an open court. In these courts
sacred dances and religious ceremonies
were performed.
This first great American apart
ment house was 10 times as large as
the White House, and had more than
$50 rooms on the ground floor The
distance between the extreme ends of
the curved wall is $40 feet, and the
distance rom the long row of 'moni-
tor or one-story dwellings,, to the cen
ter of the curved wall. occupied by the
ceremonial chambers. is 80 feet. Por-
tions of the wall still stand to a height
of 40 feet, showing the fourth story
construction.
THE rooms of the Pueblo Bonito are
grouped in suites, as in modern apart
ment houses. If they were all occu-
pied at the same time the resident
population of this aboriginal family
hotel must have been between 1900
and l 800 persons.
4 :: i
THE old people who lived there
centuries before Columbus discov-
cred America were agriculturiSts. |
have been unable to find among the
Indians of that region any tradition
that leads us to believe that the Span
iardS ever knew about the ruins. Like
wise, in Spanish chronicles and rec
ords of the conquest in the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries there is no
reference that would identify this par
ticular group of ruins. So, they are
unquestionably so old that, when the
Standards came TO New Mexico in 1910