Ancestral Pueblo Cliff Dwellings
Mesa Verde National Park
“Sometime during the late 1190s, after primarily living on the mesa tops for 600 years, many Ancestral Pueblo people began moving into pueblos they built into natural cliff alcoves. The structures ranged in size from one-room granaries to villages of more than 150 rooms. While still farming the mesa tops, they lived in cliff dwellings…for nearly a century. In the mid-1200s, the population began migrating to the south, into present-day New Mexico and Arizona. By the end of the 1200s, most everyone had migrated away.” - Mesa Verde National Park Website.
We visited Mesa Verde National Park on 8 November 2023
The Spruce Treehouse is visible from the Chapin Mesa Archeological Museum - three images stitched together
Spruce Treehouse, Mesa Verde National Park
Spruce Treehouse Detail. The Spruce Treehouse was previously open for self-guided tours but was closed in 2015 due to the danger of rock fall
The Cliff Palace. "Cliff Palace contained 150 rooms and 23 kivas (small, round underground rooms) and housed a population of approximately 100 people. Out of over 600 cliff dwellings within the boundaries of the park, 75% contain only 1-5 rooms each, and many are single room storage units." (NPS website)
Cliff Palace
The Cliff Palace can be seen from several pullouts on Mesa Top Loop Road
One of several cliff dwellings visible from the Mesa Top loop road. This was built into two cliff alcoves
Slightly more zoomed in on the top layer of this two-cliff-alcove dwelling
Slightly zoomed in to the lower level of this cliff dwelling
Doorways into rooms at Far View House. The Far View village dates from about 800 CE and is at least 300 years older than the adjacent cliff dwellings
Petroglyph etched into a brick in a building at the Far View Site
Same brick, slightly different view.
Doorways and rooms
A list of the 26 tribes with sacred connections to the area
View of the Spruce Tree House from the Mesa Verde Museum