| NATIVE AMERICAN DWELLINGS Native Americans dwellings comprised a variety of different styles based upon their environment and lifestyle. Styles included tepees (or tipis), hogans, adobe houses, long houses, wigwams (or wikkiups), earth lodges, brush shelters and lean-tos. Most of these appear to be rather simplistic in design. However, It should be noted that some of the ancient civilizations, the dwellings of the Anasazis, for example, were quite intricate in structure and accommodations. The Pueblo Bonito community in Chaco Canyon, New Mexico housed about 1,000 people at its peak. It thrived for about 400 years after its construction in 920 A.D. The residents lived in a huge semicircular masonry structure that covered over three acres and was built around a central plaza. Although it lies in ruins today, it is believed to have contained at least 660 rooms built on a series of graduated terraces that served as streets. The entire complex rose four or five stories high in the outermost ring and was contained in the front by a wall. Another major Anasazi find for archeologists was the ruins of Mesa Verde, a 20 mile long stretch of land perched on cliffsides 1,000 to 2,000 feet above Colorado countryside. it is cut into numerous fingershape plateaus by rugged canyons. This village was prominent for 700 years up until the late 13th century. Here, as many as 7,000 men, women and children may have lived in 200 distinct rooms. The series of houses were broken into other nearby communities: Long House with 150 rooms, Spruce Tree House with 120 rooms and scores of other smaller groups. | |
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