The Cebollita Valley and its ruins: Kowina Ruin
name: label: Creator
content: Nusbaum, Jesse L. (Jesse Logan)
creator: label: Creator
content: Nusbaum, Jesse L. (Jesse Logan)
culture: label: Culture
content: Acoma Pueblo
setName: label: See more items in
content: Bureau of American Ethnology negatives
label: See more items in
content: Bureau of American Ethnology negatives / Glass Negatives / Nusbaum, Jesse L. (Jesse Logan)
physdesc: label: Extent
content: 1 Glass negative (5x7 in)
unitdate: label: Date
content: 1911 or 1913
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: National Anthropological Archives
identifier: label: Identifier
content: NAA.PhotoLot.176, Item Negative 2469 T 2
objectType: label: Type
content: Archival materials
label: Type
content: Glass negatives
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: This area, and consequently these pictures have been confused with the Cebolleta area, New Mexico. These pictures relate to a ruin or ruins known as Kowina in Cebollita canyon or valley which may have been occupied by the prehistoric Acoma. At Cebolleta in northeast Valencia County was a Navaho settlement and mission, 1746-49. Some maps spell both areas Cebolleta; Rupe and Dittert spell the Canyon with an i and the Mesa with an e--both Canyon and Mesa and in the Acoma area. See Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 30: Cebolleta; Bureau of American Ethnology Annual Report 35, Pt. 1 Kowina, pages 10-14. (Field notes by Hodge). ; Arthur Bibo to M W Stirling. March 8, 1954. Box 25, Albuquerque, New Mexico. "On checking some photographs while in Washington, March 2, 1954, at your Bureau, I found some errors made with regard to proper description of locations. These were the photos taken by Vroman in 1900 in the Cebollita Canon in Valencia Co. New Mexico, and some taken by Jesse Nusbaum in the same area 10 to 12 years later. The ruins mentioned as "Old Spanish Mission" erected for the Navahos about 1746 is in-correct. This ruin is in the SE 1/4 of Section 8 of Twp. 7 North, Range 9 West N.M.P.M. at the head of the Cebollita Canon. The tribe: is not Navaho but Acoma. The Acomas call this ruin and the area immediately adjacent thereto as "Kowina". The other ruin in the pictures you have which mention the square walls, is on what we term Garcia Mesa in the Cebollita Canon also, in Section 24 of Twp. 8 North, Range 10 West. ; "Both these ruins are on property I own at present. These two fortified sites, erected about 1150 A.D. or a little earlier according to Dr Reginald Rey Ruppe Jr and Alfred Dittert Jr who did extensive field work in this area and to whom I can refer you, were photographed by Nels Nelson also in 1916. Unfortunately the region is being confused with the town of Cebollita on the Southeast slope of Mt Taylor where a mission church was established by Father Menchero about 1746 tho never built. Dr Ruth Underhill used this mistaken identity in her book "Here Come the Navaho" published by the Dept of the Interior last year." ; Arthur Bibo, Los Pilares Ranch, Cubero, N.M. on whose property this ruin is located gives the location as T 7 N, R 9 W. It is known as the Kowina Ruin. Mr Bibo here 3/2/54.