Chaco Culture National Historical Park. Pueblo Bonito is the largest ruin in the park. New Mexico. USA
Chaco Canyon lies within the San Juan Basin, atop the vast Colorado Plateau, surrounded by the Chuska Mountains in the west, the San Juan Mountains to the north, and the San Pedro Mountains in the east. Ancient Chacoans drew upon dense forests of oak, piñon, ponderosa pine, and juniper to obtain timber and other resources. The canyon itself, located within lowlands circumscribed by dune fields, ridges, and mountains, is aligned along a roughly northwest-to-southeast axis and is rimmed by flat massifs known as mesas. Large gaps between the southwestern cliff faces—side canyons known as rincons—were critical in funneling rain-bearing storms into the canyon and boosting local precipitation levels. The principal Chacoan complexes, such as Pueblo Bonito, Nuevo Alto, and Kin Kletso, have elevations of 6,200 to 6,440 feet (1,890 to 1,960 m). Pueblo Bonito, the largest and best known Great House in Chaco Culture National Historical Park, northern New Mexico, was built by ancestral Pueblo people and occupied between AD 828 and 1126. In January, 1941, a section of the canyon wall known as Threatening Rock, or tse biyaa anii'ahi (leaning rock gap) in Navajo, collapsed as a result of a rock fall, destroying some of the structure's rear wall and a number of rooms. The builders of Pueblo Bonito appear to have been well aware of this threat. However, they chose to build beneath the fractured stone, which stood 97 feet (30 m) high and weighed approximately 30,000 tons, and compensated by building a structural reinforcement for the slab. Pueblo Bonito was one of the most famous Chaco Sites and was a huge D-shaped building that housed many. In 2009, it was reported that traces of cacao from, at the nearest, 1,200 miles (1,900 km) away in Mexico, were detected in pottery sherds at Pueblo Bonito. This was the first demonstration that cacao, important in rituals, had been brought into the area that became the United States at any time before the Spanish arrived around.
Size: 5500px × 1667px
Location: Farmington, New Mexico. USA
Photo credit: © Morey Milbradt / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: arizona, bonito, bricks, brown, chaco, chacoans, culture, historical, indians, milbradt, morey, national, park, pueblo, rock, rocks, ruin, ruins, sky, stone, sunrise, sunset
