Mesa Verde cliff dwellings

Mesa Verde cliff dwellings. Montezuma County, Colorado. Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi). 450–1300 C.E. Sandstone

  • Beginning after 1000-1100 CE, they built more than 600 structures into the cliff faces of the Four Corners region of the United States: the southwestern corner of Colorado, northwestern corner of New Mexico, northeastern corner of Arizona, and southeastern corner of Utah. These structures were mostly residential but some were used for storage and ritual.
  • The most famous residential sites date to the twelfth and thirteenth centuries; the Ancestral Puebloans accessed these dwellings with retractable ladders. 
  • We often see traces of the people who constructed these buildings, such as handprints or fingerprints in many of the mortar and plaster walls. 
  • The cliff dwellings are certainly among the best preserved buildings from this time. To build these structures, people used stone and mud mortar, along with wooden beams adapted to the natural clefts in the cliff face. 
  • The builders of these structures plastered and painted murals, although what remains today is fairly fragmentary. Some murals display geometric designs, while other murals represent animals and plants.
  • The creators of the murals used paint produced from clay, organic materials, and minerals. For instance, the red color came from hematite, a red ocher. Blue pigment could be turquoise or azurite, while black was often derived from charcoal. Along with the complex architecture and mural painting, the Ancestral Puebloan peoples produced black-on-white ceramics and turquoise and shell jewellery. 
  • Goods were imported from afar including shell and other types of pottery; many of these high-quality objects and their materials demonstrate the close relationship people had to the landscape. 
  • Unknown purpose: Why away from water and crops? Did the cliffs provide protection from invaders? Were they defensive? Did the rock ledges have a ceremonial or spiritual significance? They certainly provide shade and protection from snow. 
  • The cliff dwellings at Mesa Verde were abandoned around 1300, possibly due to droughts. 
  • BUILDINGS MADE OF MUD, STONE, ORGANIC MATERIALS; PUEBLO PEOPLE KNOWN FOR POTTERY; LACK OF WATER ACCESS; POOR FOUNDATIONS; STRUCTURES CRACKING/FALLING APART; CERAMICS LOOTED
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