These Anasazi ruins in Aztec, New Mexico are favorites of mine, partly because of their easy accessibility.
The guide book says ” Imagine living here at that time. Smell the aroma of corn and venison stew simmering in the clay pots over a fire of cedar and pinyon wood.”
I stood with my hands pressed against the cool walls in the near darkness of the inner rooms and in the silence you can almost hear the whisper of voices from a long ago time.
Much of the living was done outside on the roofs or in the common areas. The only light, inside, would have been the coming in small ventilation windows or smoke holes in the ceiling
The pottery that the women did is amazing. They obviously valued beauty as well as function.
Outside we noticed there were several bands of ‘green stone’ used in among the building blocks. You only see it in a couple of places. I wonder if someone put it there just because he liked the ‘look’ of it. But we will never know…like so many mysteries of that time and place.
One thing we do know is ‘This Place by the Flowing Waters’, as it is called, was a ‘Mother Pueblo’ because of it’s special spirit. And you do feel it.
An indication of the size of these people shows up in the doorways. I’m only five foot tall and ‘ I ‘ had to duck to get through them!
They may have been small in ‘stature’ but this was not an easy life…They were ‘big’ in the ways that counted…