Uncovering the history of Ancestral Puebloans at Mesa Verde
A group of cliff dwellings in Mesa Verde National Park, Colorado
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
-
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.Ellis Island and a photo montage of immigrants to the United States.
-
Contunico © ZDF Studios GmbH, MainzOverview of Copenhagen.
-
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.The Nile River has been important to the development of North Africa.
-
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.Learn about a controversial 2017 study that used thorium/uranium dating of broken mastodon bones to argue that a prehistoric human species, such as Neanderthals, lived in North America some 130,000 years ago.
-
Courtesy of Northwestern University (A Britannica Publishing Partner)How the billion-year-old Midcontinent Rift helped form Lake Superior.
-
Created and produced by QA International. © QA International, 2010. All rights reserved. www.qa-international.comThe distribution of the seven continents.
-
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.From The Second World War: Triumph of the Axis (1963).
Transcript
NARRATOR: Two Colorado ranchers searching for missing cattle in 1888 stumbled upon a massive rock structure underneath a cliff alcove. This dwelling—later called Cliff Palace—consisted of four stories and 150 rooms tucked tightly within the alcove. It had been built by the Ancestral Puebloans, or Anasazi, between 1150 and 1200.
Cliff Palace is one of the over 4,000 known archaeological sites located within Mesa Verde National Park. The Ancestral Puebloans lived in this area for more than 700 years. They originally lived on the mesa tops, but around the mid-1100s they began constructing dwellings within the cliff alcoves. Most of the area's alcoves were large enough to house only a few rooms. With 150 rooms, Cliff Palace is the largest of Mesa Verde's 600 existing cliff dwellings.
The Ancestral Puebloans constructed these structures from hand-cut stone blocks and adobe mortar. Each cliff dwelling had two or more kivas—underground circular rooms used mainly for ceremonial purposes.
The Ancestral Puebloans continued building and rebuilding within Mesa Verde's cliff alcoves until they left the region at the end of the 13th century.
Cliff Palace is one of the over 4,000 known archaeological sites located within Mesa Verde National Park. The Ancestral Puebloans lived in this area for more than 700 years. They originally lived on the mesa tops, but around the mid-1100s they began constructing dwellings within the cliff alcoves. Most of the area's alcoves were large enough to house only a few rooms. With 150 rooms, Cliff Palace is the largest of Mesa Verde's 600 existing cliff dwellings.
The Ancestral Puebloans constructed these structures from hand-cut stone blocks and adobe mortar. Each cliff dwelling had two or more kivas—underground circular rooms used mainly for ceremonial purposes.
The Ancestral Puebloans continued building and rebuilding within Mesa Verde's cliff alcoves until they left the region at the end of the 13th century.