Native American Shelters

Southwest

The Native Americans of the Southwest such as the Anasazi and the Pueblo, lived in structures made out of semicircular masonry. The shelter masonry is related to the same masonry used in the creation of southwestern pottery. These shelters were primary built on cliffs with large shallow caves. The cave top was then used as the roof for the shelters. These shelters had many doorways which lead to the neighboring person or family. Not only did these shelters have doors on the sides, but also in the ceilings, which connected the person or family living above them. The bottom of the shelter had many openings which lead to ceremonial chambers. Wooden or bone ladders were used to reach the next level or terrace of rooms.

The villages of the Southwest are known for their great attention to detail and to the landscape of the region. Circular subterranean chambers known as "kivas" were used as primary sources of rituals and were located strategically along a pattern which represented either the cosmos, or the primary landscape figures near by. Houses, as well as other structures, were made of stone and reinforced by huge pine timbers which were hauled in from up to sixty miles away. Buildings were positioned and spaced in such a way as to coincide with certain cosmological features during certain phases, representing the cycles of birth, life, and death. A complex network of individual houses and buildings made up an almost urban-like village. Long walls, intricate stairways, level gardens, and complex road systems linked these structures together in a particular pattern.

Whether it be the cliff houses of Northern Arizona, or the enormous kivas of the Pueblo Bonito, each structure in the village had a religious motive behind its construction, and together they represented the one-ness with the earth.