University of Virginia Library

ORNAMENTS

Free from the influences that so often determine our own choice of
objects for personal adornment, primitive man finds beauty in relatively
simple things—brightly colored rocks, feathers, and flowers.
His preference will generally settle upon some product of the locality
he calls home, but it may go winging off to distant lands. Thus the
Pueblo Indians, to whom New Mexico turquoise is extraordinarily
precious, have, during many generations, sent periodically to the
Pacific for certain kinds of seashells.

In 1910 an old resident of San Ildefonso told me he had as a young
man twice ridden horseback from his Rio Grande village to the west
coast to obtain shells. Bandelier (1892, p. 4) states that the Pueblos

secured most of their shells from the Gulf of California; that until
1859 they "made annual trading expeditions into Sonora, exchanging
blankets, buffalo robes, turquoises, etc., for shells, coral, and parrots'
feathers." Feathers were wanted for use in rituals; shells, chiefly for
beads and pendants. Pendants and beads of various types, and of
diverse materials, have been popular Pueblo ornaments since earliest
times.

However much the average Pueblo Indian may prize jewels made
from Pacific shells, he holds those fashioned from turquoise in still
higher esteem. For turquoise, he thinks, is a gift from the gods, symbolizing
the west; it reflects the blue of both Pacific waters and
New Mexico's summer skies.

Wherever turquoise outcrops in the Southwest one sees evidence
of aboriginal mining operations. Fray Gerónimo de Zárate Salmerón.
reporting upon his observations in New Mexico between 1618 and
1626, refers to turquoise mines "which the Indians work in their
paganism, since to them it is as diamonds and precious stones"
(Hodge, in Ayer, 1916, p. 217).

Most extensive of all are the old diggings in the Cerrillos district,
about 25 miles southwest of Santa Fe. Here, in 1911, the main pit
measured fully 200 feet across and 130 feet deep; waste from this
single aboriginal mine covered more than two acres, and in it stone
hammers and other primitive quarrying tools were frequently found.
Pogue (1915, p. 52), from whose monograph the foregoing figures
are taken, believed most of the excavation was made before advent
of the Spaniards and that this and other Cerrillos mines supplied a
large portion of the turquoise distributed throughout the southwestern
United States and Mexico prior to 1540. This belief has been greatly
strengthened within the past 10 years by archeological investigations
at Chichen Itzá, Yucatán (Morris, 1931, p. 218), Monte Albán,
Oaxaca (Caso, 1932, pp. 509-510), and other prehistoric cities in
Mexico.

Although none has yet been found, Dr. Caso believes turquoise
mines exist in Oaxaca and Guerrero and were worked in pre-Conquest
times. He bases his conviction on two facts: Indian towns in those
states are credited in the Aztec tribute books with payments in turquoise;
the quantity of turquoise recovered at Monte Albán is such
that one cannot believe all of it originated in far New Mexico.[2]

Some of the gifts sent by Montezuma to Cortés in 1520 were ornamented

with turquoise mosaic. Until nearer, adequate sources have
been discovered, it must be assumed that the Aztecs, Zapotecs, and
Mayas obtained much, if not all, of their turquoise indirectly through
trade from New Mexico and Arizona. In contrast, the southerners
found in the northern country no market for the native Mexican jades
which they themselves valued above all other minerals. At least jade
never has been reported, so far as I am aware, from one of our Southwestern
ruins.

Turquoise is prized by desert peoples the world over but by none
more than the Zuñi. Both men and women take vast pride in their
wealth of personal ornaments and let pass no fitting occasion for its
display. Summarizing their mythology, Pogue (1915, p. 123) notes
that the Zuñi believe "perfect blue turquoise is male; the off-color,
female. Their upper world is symbolized by the sun, eagle, and turquoise.
. . . The west, also, is known as the blue world, `not only
because of the blue or gray twilight at evening, but also because
westward from Zuñiland lies the blue Pacific.' " Turquoise Man, who
lives in a sacred mountain southwest of Zuñi salt lake, came from
Santo Domingo (Stevenson, 1904, p. 58).

From earliest times the Zuñi obtained most of their turquoise from
the mines at Los Cerrillos by trade, first with the now extinct Tano
and, later, with the Keres of San Felipe and Santo Domingo (Hodge,
1921, pp. 5-6). What they did not keep for themselves they passed
on, through exchange, west and south to other tribes. It was the tale
told by a Mexican Indian, be it remembered, who as a youth had gone
with his father to the Zuñi villages to barter parrot feathers for turquoise,
that in 1529 initiated Spanish search for the mysterious Seven
Cities. Eleven years later Coronado's army advanced along the same
path these traders had followed.

With all this in mind, and with knowledge of the extent to which
aboriginal mining operations were carried on both before and after
the Conquest, it is rather surprising that turquoise is so seldom found
in Southwestern ruins. Of the many explored and reported upon by
archeologists, Pueblo Bonito alone has yielded turquoise ornaments
in quantity.

Describing the remarkable series of artifacts he recovered from
Room 33, Pepper (1909, pp. 222-225) lists nearly 15,000 turquoise
beads and pendants among the objects accompanying burials 13 and
14. The stones from which these were made, he states categorically,
came from Los Cerrillos. Now this certainly is the most logical source
both because of its proximity—but little more than 125 miles by trail
from Pueblo Bonito—and because the old Tano mines have long been

famous for the rich color of their mineral. Many Bonitian ornaments
seem quite as blue as the best turquoise produced at Los Cerrillos.

Appearance is not enough, however. Both good and worthless
turquoise may come from the same mine, even the same vein. One
piece holds its color while another fades. Most of the turquoise mined
is discarded because of its unfavorable color. Sky-blue tones have
everywhere been preferred, but the ancient Pueblos were not averse
to those of lesser merit. The Bonitians, for example, often used pale
blue or greenish stones for mosaics and beads; less frequently, for
pendants. And, with native canniness, when called upon to make
personal offerings they sacrificed their off-color ornaments first. We
noted relatively few prize stones in ceremonial offerings.

Pepper's conviction that Los Cerrillos was the principal source of
Pueblo Bonito turquoise seemed reasonable but unproved. So we
selected from our series those few ornaments to which matrix still
adhered and submitted them for mineralogical examination. In each
case the feldspars had been so altered through use that satisfactory
comparison with mineralogical samples could not be made. Spectrochemical
analyses likewise failed to identify our specimens with known
sources. While the better beads and pendants agree in color most
closely with ores from Los Cerrillos and the Jicarilla Mountains in
New Mexico and the Mineral Park and Kingman fields in Arizona,
color alone is an inadequate diagnostic. Thus we do not yet know
whether the Bonitians looked east or west for the turquoise with which
they were so prodigal.

One of our Chaco Canyon neighbors, Old Wello, in 1925 expressed
his conviction that the Bonitians mined their own turquoise in Rincon
del Camino, a mile below the pueblo, and indicated a shallow cave near
Dan Cly's house where great blocks of sandstone had been undercut
by seepage. However, friend Padilla countered, and quite correctly,
that New Mexico turquoise never occurs in sandstone.

In their day the Bonitians were known far and wide for the quality
and quantity of their turquoise ornaments. But they used other minerals
also, both local and foreign, the seeds of certain trees and shrubs,
and a variety of Pacific shells. From these diverse materials their
lapidaries fashioned rings, pendants, beads, and bracelets.

Beads.—Excepting the olivellas, most beads in our collection are
discoidal. They are made of shell, slaty or tufaceous stone, and turquoise;
they vary in diameter from 2.0 to 13.0 mm. The smallest are
turquoise, the largest, shell. Approximate averages are: Turquoise,
4; shell, 5; and stone, 6 mm., respectively.

In one lot of 800 miscellaneous turquoise beads (U.S.N.M. No.

335730) diameter varies from 2.0 to 10.3 mm.; thickness, from less
than 1 to 6.8 mm. All are flat-sided except three, and two of these are
planoconvex in cross section while the third has both edges rounded
(fig. 12). Perhaps a half dozen similar specimens were noted among
oblations from kiva pilasters; also, a few cylindrical turquoise beads,
the largest of which measures 12.0 mm. in diameter and, with both
ends broken, 15 mm. long (U.S.N.M. No. 335973).

Our most treasured turquoise ornament was found quite by chance.
Baskets, earthenware vessels, and disarticulated skeletons had been
encountered deep in Room 320, and I had joined the two Zuñi men
working there. The floor was half cleared, and we were preparing to
remove a couple of baskets from below the east door when I had a
sudden impulse to turn once more to the north end. The second stroke
of my trowel on a floor already swept with hand brooms brought
several beads to light. A few moments more with awl and brush and

there lay a carefully coiled turquoise necklace, accompanied by two
pairs of marvelously blue eardrops (pl. 9, A).

I cannot adequately describe the thrill of that discovery. It was so
unexpected, so unforeseen. A casual scrape of a trowel across the
ash-strewn floor, a stroke as mechanical as a thousand other strokes
made every day, exposed the long-hidden treasure. Room 320 had
been paved with flagstones, and it is my impression that a hollow
between two flags had been deliberately chosen as a hiding place; that
the necklace had been coiled and laid within and the whole concealed
by a handful of sandy mud that was spread out, and packed down, and
then disguised with ashes until the patch was indistinguishable in the
room's darkness.

The speed with which news of the find reached other workmen distributed
about the ruin was remarkable. In a matter of minutes every
Zuñi, every Navaho, and every one of my white assistants was draped
over the wall above and looking down upon our spectacular find. No
word, no signal, so far as I know, ever left the room. We were down
about 12 feet, the two Zuñis and I, and completely absorbed with the
task of brushing and blowing the sand away from the beads and pendants.
And then I was suddenly aware of our audience. In response

Plate 18.—The worn sole of a cloth sandal reveals the technique of its weaver.

Plate 19.—The Expedition's famous turquoise necklace and ear bobs, as displayed at the
National Geographic Society. (Photograph by Volkmar Wentzel.)

to native intuition or mental telepathy, every Indian on the job had
dropped his shovel and quietly gathered to watch the clearing of the
specimens and their removal.

Since our masculine camp lacked a needle fine enough to pass
through the smallest beads, we borrowed the lesser strings from
Havens's tenor banjo and thus were able to remove the disks in their
graduated sequence. From the faint trace that remained it was impossible
to identify the material on which they had been threaded, but they
were clearly arranged in four strings and these had been tied together.
Restored as nearly as may be to its former condition this unique ornament,
together with the two pairs of ear pendants, is now preserved
in the Hall of the Explorers at the National Geographic Society's
administration building in Washington (pl. 19). The necklace is 14
inches long as restrung; the four pendants vary in length from 1⅝ to
1[fraction 11 by 16] inches and in width from 1[fraction 1 by 16] to 1¼ inches.

If another complete turquoise necklace has ever been discovered in
a Pueblo ruin I fail to find published record of it. Ours is therefore
treasured for its rarity as well as its own inherent beauty.

How did it happen to be where we found it, neatly coiled in a
shallow depression between two flagstones? If its last owner did not
hide it there for safekeeping under a film of sandy adobe, was it
surreptitiously withheld by a covetous relative while preparing that
last owner for hurried interment? Or was it among the loot, set aside
but overlooked in the haste of flight, of one who pillaged this improvised
burial chamber? These latter possibilities seem very remote, for
a prehistoric thief would never have let go such a prize once he had it
in hand, and Pueblo Indians are always at pains to see a loved one best
attired for his journey to the next world.

A storeroom connecting with 326, Room 320 stands at the extreme
southwestern corner of the older section of Pueblo Bonito (fig. 2).
With others hereabout it had come, perhaps late in the history of the
village, to be used as a sepulcher. Of the 10 bodies buried in it, 8 had
been disturbed in ancient times; their skulls had been kicked to one
side while the remainder of the skeletons were dragged about and
overturned (pl. 91).

Now it is my belief that marauding enemy bands on one or more
occasions attacked the surviving remnant of Pueblo Bonito's once considerable
population and that such disturbance as we noted in Room
320 is evidence of their pillage.

In addition, we listed from this room the following turquoise ornaments:
Six rectangular, planoconvex beads drilled transversely (fig.
12, e, f), 126 discoidal beads, and 7 miscellaneous pendants; also, a

handful of shell and stone beads. Since the total is obviously small
for 10 Pueblo Bonito burials, we may conclude that other, more conspicuous
jewels were carried away by the plunderers.

Pueblo beadmaking is essentially an exercise in patience. Each little
disk is made separately—ground thin, roughly shaped, and drilled
preparatory to stringing for final rounding. These successive stages
are all clearly illustrated by unfinished turquoise beads in our
collection.

After a piece of the mineral had been abraded to the desired thinness,
and sometimes before, its edges were broken away to leave a
discoidal blank, ready for the drill. In one lot of 66 such blanks
(U.S.N.M. No. 335731), 27 percent have rubbed edges, thus partially

anticipating that concluding operation in which the roughly shaped,
drilled, and tightly strung pieces were reduced to satisfactory diameter.
The sandstone abrader reproduced in figure 13 illustrates one type
used in beadmaking. It is grooved on the narrowest rather than on the
broadest surface; the opposite edge and both sides are worn by the
fingers of the artisan. Traces of red paint remain on both faces. With
such a tool many weeks were required to shape the 2,500-odd beads in
our famous necklace.

Examination of finished beads and fragments of others broken
during the manufacturing process indicates that many were bored with
stone-tipped drills and that drilling progressed from one side until the
opposite was barely pierced, after which the disk was reversed and the
incipient hole reamed out. A biconcave hole is the mark of a stone
drill, smallest at the bit. In addition, the Bonitians had other, now
unknown, instruments capable of drilling through stone perfectly cylindrical
holes no larger than the smallest needle.

The tiniest turquoise bead noted in our collection measures 1.8 mm.

in diameter, just a trifle over one-sixteenth of an inch; its hole is
about 0.75 mm. and absolutely symmetrical so far as eye and microscope
can detect. Slate beads even smaller than this were made in
large numbers by prehistoric peoples who dwelt in the Kayenta region
and in the Gila-Salt drainage of Arizona.

Speculating on the identity of the implement with which such minute
disks were pierced, archeologists have suggested a dry tubular
grass stem, or a cactus spine, with fine sand as the cutting medium.
I do not know whether the former has been tried, but Haury, experimenting
with a simple shaft drill tipped with a thorn of the barrel
cactus and rotated between his palms, employing damp sand as an
abrasive, in approximately 15 minutes drilled a hole 0.94 mm. in diameter
through fine-grained pelitic rock 1.47 mm. thick (Haury, 1931,
pp. 86-87). An Indian more expert in beadmaking, using rock fresh
from the quarry instead of a fragment culled from the sun-baked surface
of a Gila Valley ruin, doubtless could have accomplished the same
end in less time. But Haury has demonstrated that cactus needles
make practical drill points. There are no barrel cactuses in the Chaco
country, but other species native to the region bear stubborn spines.

The objects shown in figure 34 are two of six fragmentary implements,
each made of fine-grained sandstone, found in Room 26,
Pueblo del Arroyo. They were uncovered by a Zuñi, a skilled worker
in turquoise, who immediately identified them as "files" and who proceeded
to demonstrate on his own turquoise eardrops.

One cannot put much pressure on a sandstone file one-tenth inch
thick. But my friend may have been right; on the other hand, he may
have been influenced in his identification by the outward resemblance
between these ancient implements and those which he himself employs
along with pinchers, chisels, and other steel tools in these days
when the spirit of mass production has penetrated even unto Zuñi.
This same man uses a block of wood with a very shallow depression
on the under side to hold a piece of shell, or turquoise, while reducing
it to bead thickness on a sandstone tablet (pl. 20, left).

Shell beads are more numerous than turquoise at any Pueblo ruin.
Despite greater distance to the source of supply and the not inconsiderable
problems of transportation, large quantities of Pacific shells
were imported into the Pueblo country. Being softer, shell is easier
to cut and carve. One digs through rock even for the poorer varieties
of turquoise! These several factors doubtless fixed the value of the
two materials in prehistoric times as they do today.

From Spanish records of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries it
is manifest that well-traveled trails led to the Pueblo villages from

the south and southwest. Over these paths, across deserts and rugged
mountains, came traders on foot to barter the products of their industry.
If Pueblo Indians ventured south for like purposes before they
acquired Spanish horses and burros I find no suggestion of it in narratives
of the Conquest period. Later, however, the Pueblos did go south
to trade, very likely because the long-continuing conflict between the
Spaniards and the tribes of northern Mexico checked the normal
supply of materials that had become essential in Pueblo secular and
ceremonial life.

In 1539, as he trudged northward on an old Indian trail seeking
word of the mysterious Seven Cities, Fray Marcos de Niza came
finally to a fertile, well-irrigated valley inhabited by Sobaipuri Pimas.
The location is thought to have been the upper Rio San Pedro, in
southeastern Arizona just north of the Mexican border. Here information
previously gathered among the Opatas concerning the Zuñi
villages was confirmed and augmented. The Sobaipuris were so richly
supplied with Zuñi turquoise—necklaces of from one to four strands,
eardrops, and nose pendants—that frequent contact between the two
peoples seems evident. "Cibola was as well known here," Fray Marcos
notes in his journal, "as Mexico is in New Spain, or Cuzco in Peru;
and they described fully the shape of the houses, the arrangement of
the villages, the streets and squares, like people who had been there
often" (Bandelier, 1890, p. 142).

The Franciscan's own record of what he learned along the way
convinced Bandelier (1892, p. 3) that in 1539, and before, trade
between Zuñi and the Sonoran tribes had originated among the latter.
It was flowing in the opposite direction, from north to south, 300
years later. Just when the tide of commerce turned, and why, remain
uncertain. But the turn is an established fact and Bandelier reports
that "until 1859 the New Mexican Pueblos made annual trading
expeditions to Guaymas and into the heart of Sonora, bartering buffalo
robes, piñon, meat, and other products for iridescent conch-shells and
the bright plumes of the parrot" (Bandelier, 1890, p. 177).

When Bourke visited the Hopi in 1881 he observed many of them
wearing pendants of abalone. "This, they told me, they obtained from
the seashore, to which they had been in the habit, at least until recently,
of making pilgrimages every four or five years" (Bourke, 1884,
p. 242).

That the Gulf of California was the principal source of seashells
reaching the Pueblo country in earlier, as in later, times has been
proved by archeological researches at diverse, widely separated sites.

It was the source of most shells we unearthed at Pueblo Bonito and
which include the following genera and species:[3]

• Glycymeris giganteus Reeve

• Glycymeris maculatus Broderip

• Glycymeris sp.

• Nodipecten subnodosus Sowerby

• Quodrula sp.

• Proptera coloradoensis Lea (?)

• Anodonta sp.

• Laevicardium elatum Sowerby

• Spondylus princeps Broderip (?)

• Chama echinata Broderip (?)

• Chama sp.

• Haliotis sp.

• Cerithidea sp.

• Turritella leucostoma Valenciennes (?)

• Strombus gracilior Sowerby

• Phyllonotus nitidus Broderip

• Columbella fuscata Sowerby

• Columbella mercatoria Linnaeus

• Nassarius ioaedes Dall

• Oliva (Agaronia) testacea Lamarck

• Olivella dama Mawe

• Olivella sp.

• Conus interruptus Broderip

• Conus sp.

Olivellas are easily converted into beads. It is necessary only to
grind off the spire until a thread can be run through and out the mouth
(fig. 14, a). The smaller examples, however, often had both ends cut
away (b) or were halved. In kivas and dwellings erected by the Late
Bonitians we found both sectioned and unsectioned olivella beads but,
in houses of first-type construction, only those from which the spire
alone had been removed.

Among the decayed ceiling poles of Kiva R we encountered seven
bead deposits, perhaps sacrificial. Largest of these (U.S.N.M. No.
336010) lay about 2½ feet above the bench in the southeast quarter
and included 399 olivellas from which the apex only had been cut, 119
olivella halves or thirds, 79 oblong and figure-8 beads, 3 discoidal shell
beads, 11 bracelet fragments, 1 hook-shaped shell pendant, 1 Conus sp.
pendant; 30½ discoidal turquoise beads, 8 turquoise pendant fragments,
and 6 tesserae. We have no means of knowing whether this
particular deposit represents the offering of one priest or several, and
this is unimportant. But it does seem significant that here, as elsewhere
about the newer sections of the pueblo, we found both types of
olivella beads while one type only was recovered in the older, but
contemporaneously occupied, section.

Of "saucer-shaped" beads, cut from the wall of the olivella (fig.
14, f), we unearthed relatively few; none in dwellings of the Old
Bonitians.

Among ancient Pueblo ornaments discoidal shell beads are most
abundant (fig. 14, c). A half dozen on a string made an eardrop; a

couple of hundred, or more, went into an ordinary, single-strand
necklace. Although produced in the same manner as those of turquoise,
the shell beads in our collection are, on the average, somewhat
larger. With living Pueblo and Navaho Indians shell beads increase
in value as they decrease in size.

Although discoidal shell beads were commonly included with pilaster
offerings and other oblations and although many were lost about the
village, most of those we recovered came from a single room, 298.
Of first-type masonry, this three-story structure had been destroyed
by fire and the contents of the living quarters above fell, with collapse
of the floors, into the storage chamber below. It was here, among and
beneath fragments of charred timbers and adobe flooring, that we
found the beads. They were gathered at the time into eight arbitrary
lots; only those composing the shortest string (pl. 21, c) were actually
together.

Least burned of all, these latter had been threaded, together with
nine red claystone beads, on what appeared to be a cotton cord.
Whether the strand was originally longer I do not know; neither do
I know whether the beads comprising the other seven lots formed one
or more necklaces at the time of the conflagration. They were found,
as has been said, scattered throughout the room, and pack rats that
once occupied the interstices between the burned ceiling timbers doubtless
contributed to the distribution.

In addition to the ornaments just mentioned, we collected from
Room 298 a number of figure-8 shell beads, four olivellas, a pendant
fashioned from part of a shell bracelet (fig. 15, q), two burned fragments
of jet pendants, three lots of stone beads, and, by way of
variety, a walnut-shell pendant and 16 beads (U.S.N.M. No. 335759)
made from seeds of the Rocky Mountain hackberry (Celtis reticulata).
This tough desert plant ranges westward from Texas and Coahuila to
Lower California and, in restricted areas, as far north as Colorado.

The stone beads (pl. 21, figs. e-g) present a puzzle to mystify the
mineralogists. If the microscope be an exacting one, different materials
are identifiable—lignite, oil shale, and a clay in various shades
of gray. The second string includes the largest beads, some of which
"resemble altered phonolitic tuffs." The first string (fig. e) is composed
almost wholly of earthy-brown, mud-colored disks identified as
of "rhyolitic tuff which has been mixed with some clay and baked."[4]
Many are sintered or slightly fused on the outside, but this may be
as much the result of the fire that destroyed 298 as evidence of kiln

baking. On the other hand, the microscope testifies to internal proof
of the folding and molding of plastic materials.

If our mineralogists be correct, these manufactured beads are
unique, so far as I know, in the Pueblo area. Externally nothing but
an unusual color sets them apart. All are discoidal; sides retain
striations of the abrading tablet; peripheries were shaped by the
customary finishing process. Their borings vary in diameter, some
being perfectly cylindrical, while others are more or less asymmetrical
and biconcave—marks of a stone drillhead.[5]

In the middle of the third necklace (fig. g) are 32 more or less cylindrical
beads, dark brown in color and of undetermined material.
Discoidal beads of lignite and various shales complete the string.

Fig. 14.—Types of shell beads. (Drawn by Irvin E. Alleman.)

Besides these three lots and those next to be considered, we collected
only 117 stone beads in the course of seven seasons at Pueblo Bonito.
A few were surface finds; a few came from Kiva B, of third-period
construction. The remainder, perhaps 100 in all, were collected from
six Old Bonito dwellings and during the digging of our West Court
trench.

Shell beads were combined with shale to form a necklace for one
of the persons buried in Room 330. Since the beads were found all
about the skull it seems likely the ornament had been laid upon the
head at the time of interment. Rethreaded (the original arrangement
is unknown), they constitute a string 22 feet 8 inches long—enough
to make up a necklace of 7 or 8 strands. Approximately three-fourths
of the total are shale beads averaging 3.5 mm. in diameter and 26 to
the inch; the remainder are shell disks of comparable size, interspersed
with 62 univalves from the Gulf of California (Nassarius ioaedes

Dall, spires ground off, outer lip perforated for stringing) and some
50-odd figure-8 beads from 2.8 to 4.0 mm. long.

If this assortment made up a single necklace it is noteworthy for
several reasons: It is the only one in our collection composed of both
stone and shell; it includes the only examples of Nassarius found
during the course of our Chaco Canyon explorations; it contains our
smallest figure-8 beads and, considered as a whole, our smallest stone
beads. These latter remind one of the diminutive stone beads for
which the Hohokam of southern Arizona were so justly famous and,
indeed, a Gila Valley Indian may well have made those we unearthed
in Room 330.

The figure-8 beads are miniature examples of a type much favored
at Pueblo Bonito. A variant of the oblong bead (fig. 14, d), the
figure-8 (e) when arranged as a necklace would simulate a double
string of discoidal beads. The side notch, which gave the type its
peculiar form, was the final task in the shaping process and followed
after the oblong pieces had been otherwise finished and tightly strung.
Because their greater length would naturally induce end-spreading
when worn about the neck, beads in this category, both notched and
unnotched, are frequently wedge-shaped—thinner at the drilled end.
Fancy occasionally urged further elaboration—two of the figure-8
beads in the pilaster 3 offering, Kiva N, have the lower lobe squared
at the end and marked, respectively, by single and crossed saw cuts
(U.S.N.M. No. 335995).

Normal figure-8 beads from Pueblo Bonito vary in length from 3.6
to 10.7 mm.; in thickness, from 2.0 to 7.2 mm. The averages are about
8 and 3 mm., respectively. Most of those we recovered were offerings
deposited in kiva pilasters or in house walls at time of construction.
Relatively few were found in dwellings of the Old Bonitians; over
90 percent came from kivas showing third-type masonry.

Scattered among the wreckage in Room 329 were parts of a figure-8
necklace so decayed that its shell beads stuck together in groups of 3
to 10. Examining these sections led me to believe that the larger, more
boldly notched beads had been assembled to hang upon the owner's
chest while those less prominently marked, including oblong beads,
encircled his neck (U.S.N.M. No. 335684).

Casual search of the literature at hand suggests that the figure-8
bead is an ornament peculiar to the Pueblo III period. Where the type
originated and how widely it was distributed throughout the Southwest,
are yet to be determined. It has been reported from at least two
ruins in Arizona, from Chaco Canyon and the Mimbres area, in New
Mexico. It has been variously designated and its material identified

as stone, bone, and shell.[6] Although many of our figure-8 beads
resemble either bone or stone those actually tested proved to be shell.

About the chest and shoulders of a male skeleton (No. 23) in Room
330 we found a pair of shell eardrops, one of which is shown in
figure 15, o, and a necklace composed of discoidal and cylindrical
shell beads, pendant beads of Chama, and apex-cut olivellas (pl. 21, b).
Many of the latter have one or more tiny quartz pellets forced under
the lip to keep the strung shells properly aligned. This appears to have
been a common local practice. Occasionally bits of shell or turquoise
or even small discoidal beads replaced the pellets.

The cylindrical beads on the necklace just described vary in diameter
from 4.0 to 5.3 mm.; in length, from 5.8 to 10.7 mm. All others in
our collection were included with pilaster offerings; rarely does one
exceed the dimensions just given.

The "pendant beads" mentioned are irregular in shape and size and
vary in color from creamy white to pink. All are provisionally identified
as of Chama echinata Broderip, from the Gulf of California.
Previous drillings show several to be reworked fragments of larger
ornaments. A partially bored hole in the lower pendant is set with tiny
turquoise beads, and it is reasonable to believe that some of the older
cord holes had also been plugged.

Many of the cylindrical and irregularly discoidal beads on this same
necklace appear likewise to be made from Chama. No other ornaments
fashioned from this particular species of shell were found in the old
part of Pueblo Bonito, but beads, pendants, and unworked fragments
were fairly common in the newer sections, especially as sacrifices in
kiva pilasters. Toothlike pendant beads occur most frequently; next,
discoidal beads, including the largest in our collection (fig. 16). One
such, from a pilaster in Kiva P, measures 12.7 mm. in diameter by 7.9
mm. (U.S.N.M. No. 336000).

Pendants.—One may not readily distinguish between ear pendants
and those designed to be worn alone upon a neck cord or threaded at

Fig. 15.—Variations in shell pendants.

intervals on a string of shell beads. Some examples were paired when
found and thus, presumably, are eardrops; others, like the pendant
beads previously described, were no doubt attached to necklaces. There
is no reason, of course, why the average pendant could not have served
both purposes, according to the whim of its owner.

A number of characteristic shell pendants from the Pueblo Bonito
collection are illustrated in figure 15. Figure 15, o, is one of a pair
found, with the necklace described above (pl. 21, b), in Room 330
above the shoulders of Skeleton 23, a male. The second shows a cut
across one lobe where a piece had been inset transversely to cover a

break. Figure k, also from Room 330, is one of two (Haliotis sp.)
picked up among the scattered bones of several children. A third pair
from the same burial chamber is represented by figure j while figure
s portrays one of two fine abalone disks from Room 323.

The two abalone pendants illustrated as figure 15, l, m, our only
specimens having more than three lobes, were found among fallen
masonry just outside the northeast wall of Room 186 and are part of
an offering formerly embedded, it is believed, over one of the firststory
ventilators. On that at the right, the two extra notches plainly
result from an effort at balance following breakage of the major lobes.

Another pair of abalone eardrops (U.S.N.M. No. 336000), sacrificed
to the gods, was sealed in one of the two pilasters we exposed
in Kiva P.

A few additional examples are: Figure 15, p, depicts a fine abalone
pendant, one lobe of which had been broken and repaired with an

inset of the same material; the old cord hole, near the upper edge, was
plugged with a rounded bit of turquoise and replaced by a larger
one. In the companion pendant (U.S.N.M. No. 335709), the original
suspension-cord hole was likewise closed with turquoise and a new one
drilled at the middle of the lentoid bar. That shown in figure n, of
like form, is cut from a pinkish shell (believed to be Spondylus princeps
Brod.), whose range is from the Gulf of California to Panama.
Worn and polished by long use, the specimen (Strombus gracilior
Sowerby) figured in u is the heaviest (1.4 ounces) of our shell ornaments.
Our lone shell effigy (fig. h) may represent almost any 4legged
creature, from a lizard to a mountain lion.

Of unidentifiable shell, the fragment shown in figure 15, g, illustrates
a type of ornament which, despite its obvious fragility, appears
to have been quite popular. We found comparable fragments, generally
included with offerings in kiva pilasters, carved from turquoise,
jet, and claystone. Some of these, however, have ground ends that
clearly identify them as peripheral segments of discoidal or ringlike
mosaics.

Small Glycymeris shells were converted into pendants simply by
drilling a hole through the hinge. One, from Room 241, is illustrated
in figure 15, b; another of like size came from Room 227-I. Four
larger examples (U.S.N.M. No. 336031; average width 2.4 cm.) were
picked up among the jumble of human bones and burial furniture in
Room 329. None of the six is ornamented in any way.

From the foregoing list and descriptions it is clear that most of the
shell ornaments in our Pueblo Bonito collection were made from
Pacific coast species obtained, quite likely, from the Gulf of California.
Of those identified, I am informed only four species could have come
from east of the Rocky Mountains; of these, three are fresh-water
clams well known in Texas and Arkansas, but one of the three, Anodonta
sp., is said to occur also in northern California. No fragments
of clamshells were recovered from dwellings of the Old Bonitians.
Columbella mercatoria Linné, whose range is from North Carolina to
the Gulf of Mexico, is represented by a single, unworked specimen
(U.S.N.M. No. 335691), found during the digging of our West Court
exploratory trench.

Turquoise pendants and eardrops, unlike those of shell, exhibit but
little variety of form. With few exceptions those we collected are
more or less keystone-shaped and drilled at the narrower end for
suspension. Length ranges from [fraction 3 by 16] to 2¾ inches; width, from ⅛ to
2⅝; thickness, from less than [fraction 1 by 16] to ¼ inch. In each case the maximum
dimensions here given are those of a once-magnificent ornament,

found burned and broken in Room 41, Pueblo del Arroyo. More
typical examples, all from Room 326, Pueblo Bonito, are shown in
plate 22. (See table of size and provenience, Appendix A, for explanation
of letters referred to on plates 22, 24, 36, 52, 79, and 83.)

Of these Room 326 pendants, the first were found on the skeletons
of women. Figures f and h lay at the neck of burials 8 and 9, respectively;
g lay on the left chest of Skeleton 12. The other six were
picked up individually about the room, but
they are so evenly matched, both in size and
color, that I have not hesitated to pair them.

Averaging a trifle under 6 in the scale of
hardness (Pogue, 1915, p. 24), or just a
little harder than glass, turquoise, nevertheless,
is readily worked by primitive peoples
and with the crudest of implements. The
Pueblos had no metal tools until after the
advent of the Spaniards; sand and sandstone

Fig. 17.—Turquoise partly
cut from its matrix.

Fig. 18.—Abrader tablet for shell and turquoise ornaments.

were their substitutes for steel. With thin sandstone saws they separated
a piece of turquoise from its matrix (fig. 17); by patient rubbing
on a fine-grained sandstone tablet (fig. 18), the selected piece
was reduced to the size and shape desired. The cord hole was bored
with a simple shaft drill or, possibly, with a pump drill such as Pueblo
lapidaries employ today. The velvet smoothness that followed years
of contact with the human skin only added to the soft beauty of a
perfect turquoise ornament.

Although frequently worn in pairs as eardrops, the smaller pendants
were sometimes interspersed in a necklace of discoidal beads. One
such necklace, including eight pendants from three-sixteenths to threeeights

of an inch long, formed a bracelet of three coils on the left
wrist of an elderly female (No. 12) buried in Room 326 (pl. 22, e).[7]
Perhaps it was this type of bracelet that Indians of northwestern
Mexico had in mind when, describing the Pueblo country and its
inhabitants to Melchior Diaz early in 1540, they said the women "wear
their hair on each side done up in a sort of twist, which leaves the
ears outside, in which they hang many turquoises, as well as on their
necks and on the wrists of their arms" (Winship, 1896, p. 549). The
fabulously rich Burial 14, Room 33, apparently was bedecked with a
necklace wrapped around each wrist, that on the left including 2,384
discoidal turquoise beads and 194 pendants (Pepper, 1909, p. 224).

Fig. 19.—An
unusual turquoise
ornament.
(Drawn
by Irvin E.
Alleman.)

As has been said, turquoise pendants are usually
thin and keystone-shaped. From this generalization
two interesting exceptions may be noted: A little, paleblue
ornament (fig. 19), drilled lengthwise through
the barrel and transversely through the surmounting
lobe, part of which was found in pilaster 1 and the
remainder in pilaster 6, Kiva I; and a teardrop pendant
of greenish shale, three-eighths of an inch in maximum
diameter by thirteen-sixteenths of an inch long,
from Room 323 (U.S.N.M. No. 335741). A fragment of a large polished
object, of the same green shale and half an inch thick (U.S.N.M.
No. 335733), was recovered from the nearby dwelling, Room 326;
also, beads and thin pieces squared for mosaics were occasionally
noted elsewhere. It is quite possible that this dark, oily-green stone
passed for turquoise since our Bonitians did not entirely scorn the
off-color varieties. Or perhaps a visiting trader turned a shady deal!

That turquoise-conscious Indians are sometimes as gullible as Whites
is evident from a transaction I surreptitiously watched during working
hours at Pueblo Bonito. One of our Zuñi workers whom everyone
regarded as mentally subnormal finally persuaded a dubious Navaho
to buy as genuine turquoise a slender pendant made from a tooth I had
seen broken from part of a woman's blue celluloid comb, retrieved
from the trash pile behind the old Wetherill home.

The bird figured on page 296 (fig. 92) is carved from pale greenish
turquoise. Although found with the disturbed burials in Room 329,
it may be regarded not as a personal ornament but as an object associated
with some unknown ritual. The drilling through the breast is

at such an angle that, suspended from a cord, the bird hangs back
down and almost horizontally—a most unlikely position for a heavy
pendant worn on the chest. It is more reasonable to believe the drilling
a means for binding the figure to a staff or other support. Pepper
(1905b, p. 194) includes five comparable examples with the wealth of
ceremonial objects he unearthed in Room 38. From the illustration
given, his birds differ from ours chiefly in their smaller size and in
their head position which, in each instance, is high with beak thrust
forward.

Our second turquoise effigy, in this case of rich blue stone, is a
"tadpole," oval in shape, 11.6 mm. long, drilled laterally, with two
knobs for eyes. It may once have been an amulet or an ornament for
necklace or wristlet, but we found it in the pilaster 5 offering, Kiva R.

With scraps from the lapidary's workbench, beads and small turquoise
pendants were usually included in the propitiatory offerings
built into secular and ceremonial structures. Many were lost about the
village and still others in kivas and living quarters, whence sooner or
later they were removed with floor sweepings to the nearest rubbish
pile. However, with few exceptions, the finest examples we recovered
came from those rooms in the older section utilized for burial purposes.
We may be certain they either belonged to the deceased or were
funeral gifts from sorrowing relatives. It seems equally obvious that,
from the conditions under which they were found, these choice turquoise
ornaments are those overlooked by prehistoric grave robbers.

Lignite is considered by Zuñi Indians as precious as turquoise and
is even referred to as "black turquoise" (Hodge, 1921, p. 21). Lignite
occurs in Chaco Canyon's bituminous coal beds as laminate masses
varying in color from brown to gray to jet black. Unworked lignite
fragments look dull and unpromising but those that are jet black,
carved and polished to mirror smoothness, become jewels very pleasing
to look upon.

Among the jet ornaments we recovered, pendants are most numerous.
Not all are of tabular form (fig. 20). Perhaps lignite, being
relatively soft and easy to carve, tempted the Bonitians to experiment
with new ideas. Only two of those illustrated could conceivably be
classed as beads (figs. a, g). Figures k-m show three unfinished pendants,
one with incipient drilling.

Cord holes in jet ornaments, instead of being straight through, are
often paired and drilled at an angle to meet below the surface, at the
back or on one edge.

In the 2-foot fill (principally debris of reconstruction) separating
the original floor of Room 348 from the last, a lignite pendant or

Fig. 20.—Ornaments carved from jet.

Plate 20

Zuñi man drilling turquoise with pump drill. (Photograph by O. C.
Havens, 1924.)

A young Zuñi matron wearing a Navaho silver necklace that includes
12 half dollars. (Photograph by Charles Martin, 1920.)

Plate 21.—Shell, stone, and clay beads, restrung.

eardrop (fig. 20, b) came to light. In its countersunk border turquoise
pieces had once been fitted. If these were also present in the fill some
were missed and of those recovered several fit less snugly than our
artist has represented. Nevertheless, the drawing gives the general
idea, and the reader's imagination will readily picture the pleasing
contrast between jet black and turquoise blue.

Two jet effigies (figs. n, o) may also be accepted as ornaments. The
smaller was unearthed during the digging of our West Court trench;
the larger, in the south recess of a partially razed subfloor kiva within
Room 336. From the place of finding, it might logically be assumed
that this second figure had some connection with rituals once performed
in the abandoned chamber. But ceremonial objects are rarely
left lying about; the kiva wall had been razed to within nine inches of
its floor; there were no other artifacts among the debris. Could this
fragile carving, with its paired holes through the breast for suspension,
have been a personal, priestly sacrifice when the kiva was replaced by
another?

Thin squared and rectangular bits of polished jet were often used
in mosaic work. It so happens, however, that our only detached pieces,
28 by actual count, were among a quantity of shell, turquoise, and red
claystone tesserae scattered about the floor of Kiva Q. Neither jet
ornaments nor unworked fragments of lignite were recognized in any
pilaster or other sacrificial deposit.

Claystone, or red shale, is often called "clinker" by unromantic
geologists just because it is a clay turned red through burning of
underlying coal beds. It varies considerably in texture, but the finer
grades take on a smooth, velvety finish. Claystone of this latter quality
was utilized by the Bonitians not only in mosaics but also for pendants
and pendant beads; less frequently, for discoidal beads and finger
rings. As variations from the more common rectangular and ovoid
forms, we figure one claystone pendant with lobate ends, like the
favorite form of shell pendant, and a central depression in which a
jet or turquoise disk may have been fitted; also, three lesser ornaments
probably worn on necklaces (fig. 21).

Calcite and selenite were but little used as material for ornaments.
Or perhaps we should say the Bonitians tried these two minerals and
found them wanting. Both lack those qualities of color or luster prized
by primitive peoples. Rarity alone is no measure of desirability. Of
the many fragments of selenite retrieved during the course of our
explorations only 11 had been shaped in any degree, and of these 5
only had been drilled for suspension. Three are shown in figure 22

Mica, as a medium for personal embellishment, awakened even less
interest than selenite. Of the half dozen fragments recovered, two
only have been shaped and drilled for possible use as ornaments. The
nearest known source of mica is in Rio Arriba County, 120 miles to
the east, and this may be the source also of the unworked cubes of
galena (U.S.N.M. No. 335566) that we found in several rooms.

There may be nothing significant in it, but the result of our inquiry

Fig. 22.—Pendants carved from selenite.

into the distribution of these several minerals between the older and
later sections of Pueblo Bonito is here recorded: Of 7 cataloged lots
(one or more pieces) of galena, 3 were from rooms of first-type construction;
of 7 lots of mica, all came from third- and fourth-type
rooms; of 35 lots of selenite and calcite, both worked and unworked,
5 lots only were recovered from first-type dwellings; of 41 lots of red
claystone artifacts, worked and unworked fragments, 10 are listed
from rooms of first-type construction; of 31 lots of azurite and malachite
pellets, mostly unworked, 13 came from first-type structures; of
9 hematite artifacts and fragments, 4 are cataloged from dwellings of
the Old Bonitians.

Several other ornaments, fashioned from minerals foreign to Chaco

Canyon, may be noted: A sphere of fluorite (fig. 23, c) practically
duplicating in shape and size the jet ball represented in figure 20, c;
the blunt tip of a slender fluorite ornament 7.2 mm. in diameter
(U.S.N.M. No. 335756); a hematite effigy of some canyon insect,
found on the surface within the walls of Room 35 (fig. 23, b); the
likeness of an acorn produced, after a few moments' work with
abrader and drill, from an azurite pellet whose natural shape gave its
finder the idea (fig. 23, a). Azurite and malachite pellets were found
throughout the ruin but very few had been modified in any way. A
rather sizable garnet (U.S.N.M. No. 336036), unworked, came from
Room 330.

Half a walnut (Juglans sp.), converted into a pendant merely by
drilling two holes to meet below the convex surface near the apex
(fig. 23, d, d′), was picked up in Room 298 along with the hackberry

seed, shell, and stone beads already described. Another walnut shell,
rubbed smooth on the outside and the base ground off, yet not identifiable
as an ornament, was recovered in the passageway (Room 250)
connecting Rooms 251 and 256 (U.S.N.M. No. 335378). Unworked
fragments of walnut shells (Juglans major or J. rupestris) were collected
also in Rooms 246, 296, and 323. Three of these five chambers
were built and occupied by the Old Bonitians.

Because the shells have been more or less mutilated from the botanical
point of view, identification as to species is not always practical.
Two native walnuts are recognized in the Southwest, neither being
found in Chaco Canyon today. One is a shrub (J. rupestris) growing
along streams in western Texas and southeastern New Mexico; the
other is a tree (J. major) whose range is given by Wooton and
Standley (1915, p. 162) as the mountainous section of southwestern
New Mexico, southeastern Arizona, and southward. But Rehder
(1927, p. 128) extends the range into Colorado.

During his excavations in Pueblo Bonito, Pepper likewise found a
number of walnut shells, both worked and unworked. One of these

had been "covered with gum and inlaid with turquoise" (Pepper,
1920, p. 205). Morris unearthed several at Aztec Ruin and thought
them more likely to have been worn as charms than as mere ornaments
(Morris, 1919a, p. 98). The five walnut shells on a string found in an
infant's grave in Canyon del Muerto, (Morris, 1925, p. 298) may have
hung from the baby's cradle to ward off evil spirits or just to entertain
him with their rattling. Some years ago in the Colorado State
Museum, Denver, I saw single walnut shells suspended from paired
bone beads 2 or 3 inches long, forming an attractive ornament.

Two pendants fashioned from black-on-red potsherds, one of which
is only partially drilled (fig. 24), may have been designed to satisfy
the imitative instinct of children. The square one comes from refuse

in Kiva H; the discoidal, from Room 282—both third-period structures
on the east side of the village. I rather suspect certain Bonitian
mothers, in devising trinkets for their offspring, experienced fully as
much secret amusement as did the wife of one of our Navaho workmen
who; from day to day, bedecked her small son with a varying
assortment of spools, pearl buttons, huge wooden beads, etc., and
pretended not to notice the surprise his visits always created in our
camp (pl. 59, left).

Mosaics.—The numbers of tesserae found in kivas, dwellings, and
rubbish piles suggest that mosaic work was much in vogue at Pueblo
Bonito. We unearthed no complete example, however, and the only
base for inlay actually recovered is the jet pendant from Room 348,
subfloor. In Kiva R we noted decomposed shell, cut in the form of
a human lower leg, as a backing for fitted pieces of turquoise; of
these, only six were present, including one notched to represent toes
(U.S.N.M. No. 335752). Among the artifacts from Room 330 is a
thin rectangle of sky-blue turquoise still adhering to a square of

abalone shell which may, in itself, be a peripheral segment of a large
mosaic gorget.

From Room 33 Pepper (1909, pp. 227-230) reports two foot-shaped
turquoise ornaments accompanying Skeleton 14 and two shell pendants
of like form near a cylindrical basket incrusted with turquoise
and shell. Since this latter surely was never intended for daily household
use, it is manifest the Bonitians employed mosaic not only for
the embellishment of objects of personal adornment but of ceremonial
paraphernalia as well.

For their inlays the lapidaries of Pueblo Bonito utilized shell, jet,
red claystone, and turquoise. Of these, turquoise ranked first according
to our observations; claystone, second. While the vast majority
of prepared pieces are quadrangular, thin, and flat-sided, some were
shaped to fit a convex surface. We know, for example, that shell
gorgets, jet finger rings, and bone scrapers occasionally were inlaid.

Among the tesserae before me several are planoconvex in cross
section including some curved laterally as though to border a disk
2 inches or more in diameter. The longest is a jet piece 4 mm. wide
by 2.8 cm. from end to end; it is a segment from a circle 7.1 cm, in
diameter—a trifle over 2¾ inches. One claystone piece measures 6 by
20.3 mm.; another is 15.5 mm. square. Three planoconvex circle
segments measure, respectively, 3 by 20, 3.5 by 20.2, and 6 by 17.5 mm.
A claystone rectangle 7.5 by 17 mm. and only 1 mm. thick is concavoconvex
as though ground to meet the curve, say, of an abalone disk.
There are squares and rectangles also of glossy mussel shell, the
largest measuring 8.5 by 20 mm. From these figures it is clear that
some Bonitian mosaics were large enough to attract attention in any
gathering.

Mosaic ornaments have long been prized by Indians of the Southwest.
A number, with wood or shell backplates, were unearthed by
Fewkes (1904, pp. 85-87) during excavation of Chevlon and Chaves
Pass ruins, near Winslow, Ariz. At the somewhat older Aztec Ruin,
northwestern New Mexico, Morris (1919a, p. 102) observed some
20 mosaic-incrusted shell disks on the chest of a single skeleton. From
pre-Spanish graves at Hawikuh, Hodge (1921) recovered part of a
shell gorget and several wooden combs and ear tablets, each decorated
with mosaic work.

Data gathered during the course of his investigations led Hodge to
conclude that wood, as a backing for mosaic, was introduced at
Hawikuh in late prehistoric time. This supports the observations of
other students, namely, that wood gradually replaced shell. Although
their men continued to wear mosaic-covered shell gorgets, the favorite

ear ornaments of Hopi and Zuñi women in the sixteenth century and,
indeed, until a generation ago, were wooden tablets to which bits of
turquoise had been attached with pinyon gum.[8]

Rings and bracelets.—No ornaments in our collection prove the
esthetic sense of the Bonitians more convicingly than the jet finger
rings illustrated in figure 25. (See also pl. 22.) When one recalls how
fragile jet really is and how crude the tools available for carving it,
and then notes the uniform thinness and symmetry of these four rings,
one's admiration for the skill of Pueblo Bonito artisans is measurably
increased. The four vary in thickness from 2.0 to 2.7 mm.; in width,
from 10.5 to 18.0 mm.; in inner diameter, from 14.6 to 16.7 mm. Thus
the rings provide a passing index to the stature of those who wore
them. For example, the widest of the four has the smallest diameter,

and this is just one-sixteenth inch less than that of a ring worn by my
secretary who stands 5 feet 3 inches and weighs 135 pounds.

The first three rings were found among the disarticulated skeletons
in Room 330; the fourth, in Kiva 2-D. This latter specimen had been
broken and later repaired by binding a splint (now missing) to a
purposely thinned zone bordering the fracture. But the ring that
naturally attracts most attention is the first, with its silhouetted little
bird whose inset wings are sky-blue turquoise. A daintier, more exquisite
jewel was never made by Pueblo Indians! The fragment of
another jet ring with turquoise inlay was found in Room 348.

Our Bonitians also carved finger rings from bone (fig. 26), shell,
limestone, red shale, and onyx. When broken, as many of them
eventually were, the prehistoric technique of pottery repair was
brought into play; that is, holes for sinew or fiber lashings were

drilled on both sides of the break. Narrowest of all in our collection
are fragments of two shell rings: 4.0 and 5.0 mm., respectively.

The bracelet shown in figure 15, t, was cut from a Gulf of California
shell, Glycymeris giganteus Reeve. As always, the hinge is
drilled for suspension, thus evidencing occasional use as a pendant.
Similar ornaments are especially characteristic of those prehistoric
cultures that once flourished in the Little Colorado and Salt River
Valleys, Arizona.

Apparently no effort was made to mend
a broken bracelet, but the fragments had
ritualistic value, being included in most
pilaster and other offerings. Three superb
Glycymeris bracelets, as white as when
first carved, and part of a fourth were
among the sacrifices placed in one valve of
a cockleshell (Laevicardium elatum Sowerby)
and sealed in a subfloor repository
in Kiva D (U.S.N.M. No. 335955). Fig-

Fig. 26.—Bone rings

ure 15, i, illustrates a simple gorget made from the ventral margin
of, presumably, another cockle.

Bone "beads."—Besides the rings our only bone artifacts that conceivably
may be regarded as ornaments are 53 tubular "beads" varying
in length from three-eighths of an inch to 3¾ inches. None is ornamented.
All, apparently, are made from radii, ulnae, and femora of
birds, including the turkey.

The series in figure 27 illustrates the method of manufacture and
the finished product. Freed from its articulations, the hollow shaft
was used in whole or in part; the cut ends were ground smooth and,
in time, the sides became more or less polished. First of the five, the
ulna of a golden eagle, is scarred by stone knife marks as though it
had served as a cutting block after a bead had been detached; the last
has been partially sectioned into three.

Of the 53, 10 represent casual finds during trenching operations
while 19 came from kivas and 24 from dwelling rooms of which 11
were built during the third period of constructional activity. Only
one bone bead was found in a fourth-period room; only six in houses
of the Old Bonitians. All occurred in rubbish and, with two exceptions,
singly.

Both exceptions are from Kiva X, a smallish chamber on the middle
west side of the West Court. Here, lying close together in the fill,
were three bone beads averaging 7.0 mm. in diameter by 16 mm. long.
The second lot, presumably of turkey bone, numbers five. Their

diameter varies from 12.2 to 15.1 mm.; length, from 9.2 to 14.0 mm.
In neither case was the original arrangement evident. A section of
reed, tightly fitted into a bone tube 4.2 cm. long, came from Room 296
(U.S.N.M. No. 335197).

Sections of bone such as these, irrespective of length, have generally
been classified as beads because of their polished ends and sides.
No one of our Pueblo Bonito examples was found under circumstances
suggesting its original use. But quite comparable specimens,
strung end to end to form necklaces, accompanied burials at Aztec
Ruin and at Hawikuh; others lay at the wrists of skeletons as though

once bound to a leather or fiber bowguard (Morris, 1919a, p. 42;
Hodge, 1920, pp. 126, 134). That like sections of bird bone played a
further, as yet undetermined, function in Pueblo life is evidenced by
the fact that lots of 10 to 200 or more occurred both in rooms and
with interments at Aztec and at Pecos (Morris, 1924, p. 153; Kidder,
1932, p. 260).

Three pairs of cut bird bones in the Colorado State Museum,
Denver, probably were designed as ornaments. The pairs vary in
length from 2 to 3 inches; each pair hangs side by side, but not snugly,
on a yucca cord with a walnut-shell pendant below. (Colo. State Mus.
Nos. 0815-0817.)

While supplementing my original notes on these three, I was informed
that the Colorado collection includes four other specimens,
presumably necklaces, composed of bone beads strung end to end and
alternating with walnut shells (Nos. 0811-0814). Some of the latter

are missing, but one specimen (No. 0811), apparently complete, is
made up of eight bone beads and eight walnuts. As a variation from
the usual practice, the walnut shells of No. 0812 were each threaded
independently and suspended from the necklace cord between bone
beads. All seven specimens were collected in unidentified cave ruins
of the Mesa Verde district in the winter of 1888-89 by a party composed
of Charles McLoyd, L. C. Patrick, J. H. Graham, and Alfred
Wetherill.[9]

Copper bells.—We found 21 copper bells and bell fragments in
Pueblo Bonito, 6 in Pueblo del Arroyo, and of the total only half a
dozen came from kivas. We have no reason to suppose ownership

was restricted to the priesthood; no reason to believe the bells were
in any way connected with rituals.

Of our Pueblo Bonito specimens one was a surface find, one came
from the West Court trench, two from dwellings of the Old Bonitians
(Rooms 6a, 329). Four bells, including three unearthed during removal
of debris previously thrown out of Rooms 55 and 57, are
attributed to fourth-period houses; the remaining 13 to third-period
rooms and kivas. Since 81 percent were recovered from newer sections
of the village, it is quite possible these copper bells did not reach
Pueblo Bonito until sometime after A.D. 1050, the approximate date
when the Late Bonitians began their first intensive rebuilding program.

Our six best-preserved examples are illustrated in figure 28. Each
was made of thin copper (0.39 to 0.50 mm.). In each the slit in the
resonator was cut as the final operation in the manufacturing process;

cracks at the ends of the slits prove the cutting was done when the
metal was cold. In the three larger examples (d-f), strips of metal
one-eighth inch wide were actually removed and the resulting gaps
lessened by pinching the lips together. These three, and two of the
smaller, have pebbles for clappers; one specimen only (b) contains a
copper pellet. Examining the series as a whole, we find that five are
pear-shaped, as a and b, with the apex more or less flat and ringed
about; a majority are globular.

The outer surfaces, while not perfectly smooth and regular, exhibit
no hammer marks and no mold seams. In every instance the suspension
ring appears to have been made separately and then brazed or
fused to the body.

Two fragments, one of which has been somewhat flattened by
hammering (g) are from larger, thicker bells with wire coiling simulated
between ring and raised shoulder band. Bells in this technique
have been recovered from various sites in Mexico, Yucatan, Honduras,
and Panama.

Spanish explorers and missionaries to the Southwest sometimes
distributed metal bells, presumably made in Spain. At Cochití, notes
Luxán (Hammond and Rey, 1929, p. 82), the Espejo expedition of
1582-83 traded sleigh bells and small iron articles for buffalo hides.
Fray Estevan de Perea, reporting upon a visit to the Hopi pueblos in
1629, remarks that the priests gave the Indians "some trinkets which
they had brought—such as hawks' bells, beads, hatchets and knives"
(Bloom, 1933, p. 232). But the copper bells we found in Pueblo
Bonito exhibit individual variations that identify them as of native
manufacture; they antedate coming of the Spaniards by at least four
centuries.

Echoing the thoughts of our teachers we first assumed these bells
had reached Chaco Canyon through intertribal trade, along with parrot
feathers, seashells, and other products of the southlands. However,
as the present study was getting under way, eight of our specimens
were analyzed for Peabody Museum by Prof. W. C. Root, who concluded
they were cast in New Mexico, Arizona, or Chihuahua and
from local ores.[10]

During the years that followed, the present writer puzzled repeatedly
over Professor Root's conclusions and remained unconvinced.
Southwestern copper deposits were well known but none gave evidence,
so far as could be learned, of having been worked in preSpanish
times. Copper artifacts other than bells had rarely, if ever,
been reported from southwestern ruins; there was no proof that
metalworking was practiced by any southwestern tribe before 1540.
Finally, as these paragraphs were being revised in the summer of
1938, the Chaco Canyon specimens forwarded to Harvard 10 years
earlier, with 12 others of like form and 7 ore samples, were transmitted
to the National Bureau of Standards for spectrochemical
analysis.[11]

The specimens considered, identified by their U. S. National Museum
catalog numbers, are as follows:[12]

                                                     

No.	Specimen	Locality	U.S.N.M. No.
1	Bell	Bay Islands, Honduras	373236
2	Bell	Bay Islands, Honduras	373237
3	Bell	Tenango, Mexico	99044
4	Bell	Orizaba, Veracruz	97782
5	Bell	Casa Grande, Ariz	254495
6	Bell	Upper San Francisco River, N. Mex	98211
7	Bell	Tulerosa Canyon, N. Mex	170547
8	Bell	Tonto Basin, Ariz	173068
9	Bell	4-Mile Ruin, Ariz	177804
10	Bell	Pueblo Bonito, N. Mex	335581
11	Bell	Pueblo Bonito, N. Mex	335583
12	Bell	Pueblo Bonito, N. Mex	335587
13	Bell	Pueblo Bonito, N. Mex	335582
14	Bell	Pueblo Bonito, N. Mex	335586
15	Bell	Pueblo del Arroyo, N. Mex	334764
16	Bell	Pueblo del Arroyo, N. Mex	334766
17	Bell	Pueblo del Arroyo, N. Mex	334767
18	Bell	State of Guerrero, Mexico	99043
19	Bell	State of Guerrero, Mexico	99042
20	Ore	Fort Bayard, N. Mex	10183
21	Ore	Santa Rita, N. Mex	33371
22	Ore	Bisbee, Ariz.	86510
23	Ore	Cananea, Sonora	88198
24	Ore	Inguaran, Michoacán	19550
25	Ore	Jalacingo, Veracruz	57277
26	Ore	Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas	90770

The nature and extent of the analyses are described in these words:

Subsequently Dr. Meggers interpreted the results and drew certain
conclusions from them, in a letter addressed to the writer:

Dr. Meggers's tabulation is given on page 114.[13]

Silver is present in all the bells and all the ores examined. Zinc is
present in three of the Mexican ores but in none of the bells, including
four from Mexico. Tin, occurring in two Mexican ores and three
Mexican bells, is lacking in our specimens from southwestern mines
and ruins. Antimony appears in most of the bells but in none of the
ores; lead is present in most bells and in five of the seven ores. Indium
is found in only one southwestern bell, that from Tonto Basin; gallium,
present in all 19 bells, occurs in the single Arizona ore sample

and in three of those from Mexico. Arsenic appears in two-thirds of
the bells but, like antimony and bismuth, is lacking in all seven ores.
Our data, therefore, fail to show any connection between copper bells
from divers sites and ore samples from the nearest mines represented
in the mineralogical collections of the U. S. National Museum. If
artifacts from Arizona and New Mexico ruins were made of local
copper one might logically expect a closer similarity between the
spectrograms of, say, bells 98211 and 170547 and ores 10183 and
33371. And the Bisbee ore might show at least a trace of the arsenic
noted in the bell from Casa Grande. Obviously, as Dr. Meggers points
out in his letter, we need to know more about copper ores and whether
the elements in them may vary quantitatively in samples from the
same deposit. Until such information is available for comparative
study the origin of the copper bells found in our southwestern ruins
cannot positively be determined. So far as we are aware, the prehistoric
Indians of New Mexico and Arizona had no knowledge of
metallurgy.

The clay bells with clay pellets unearthed by Fewkes at Awatobi
and by Hough at nearby Kawaiokuh may be pre-Spanish, as Fewkes
believed, or local imitations of those introduced by Perea in 1629
(Fewkes, 1898, p. 629; Hough, 1903, p. 342).

Paints.—However lavish Bonitian men and women may have been
in their use of jewelry, there came times when necklaces, bracelets,
and rings were supplemented, or even replaced, by mineral paints.
Especially on ceremonial occasions paints were utilized for drawing
symbolic designs both on participants and on their paraphernalia.
Oxides of iron provided red, yellow, and brown; carbonate of copper,
the green and blue; gypsum, the white. Since their chief use was
ritualistic, pigments have been considered at greater length in our
chapter on objects of religious connotation. But red paint was also
an essential feature of the daily toilet and therefore a requisite in
primitive dress. Modestly applied to cheek and forehead, it heightened
flesh tints and thus braced the ego; used extravagantly, it afforded
protection from sunburn.

Time and again on Arizona trails I have passed Navaho men and
women with faces as brilliant as the Vermilion Cliffs at sunset. Occasionally
such a one stopped briefly to watch our Chaco Canyon excavations.
But our Navaho workmen seemed less covetous than the
Zuñi of the fragments they unearthed. The Zuñi begged every scrap
of red paint exposed but were generally satisfied with pieces not
desired for our collections. Invariably they would interrupt work long

enough to rub the fragment on a potsherd or bit of sandstone, wet the
rubbings with spittle, and daub the mixture on forehead, nose, and
cheeks. I was given to understand that when they are home they
usually mix face paints with a little grease or the oil of melon and
squash seeds. Generous use of rouge, practiced by desert peoples the
world over, doubtless was an established custom at Pueblo Bonito no
less than at Zuñi and other present-day pueblos in Arizona and New
Mexico.

I realize that our data do scant justice to the dress and objects
of personal adornment worn by the inhabitants of Pueblo Bonito.
Because time had destroyed most perishable materials, the material
evidence we sought was mostly lacking. Nevertheless, if we keep
before us the fragments of cloth, blankets, and sandals actually recovered
and bear in mind what contemporary Pueblos in cliff dwellings
were wearing; if we recall the degree to which cliffdweller garments
duplicated Pueblo dress at the time of the Conquest and later, we
cannot go far astray in picturing the articles of clothing worn by our
Bonitians—rectangular pieces of cotton goods tied together and worn
as knee-length shirts or dresses, cotton blankets, rabbit-skin or turkeyfeather
robes, dressed skins, sandals of braided yucca leaves or woven
Apocynum fibers. And with their wealth in jewels, with trails bringing
trade from far valleys, it is certain they lacked nothing the eleventhcentury
Southwest offered in the way of body covering.