AmericaQuest is an interactive expedition developed by Classroom Connect. For four weeks a team of scientists and explorers will work to unravel the mysteries surrounding an ancient Pueblo indian tribe. Follow along here for daily reports on the Quest.

AmericaQuest: Clues under cliffs

Keet Seel is nestled into the surrounding cliffs.

March 7, 2000
Web posted at: 2:00 p.m. EST (1900 GMT)

By John Fox

Imagine scaling a 40-foot cliff to the most spectacular ancient site in North America, only to see a 700-year-old gate which seems to say: KEEP OUT.

This morning, after a day of slogging through streams and a night out in the cold, we climbed to Keet Seel. James Charles, the Navajo park superintendent, led us. He assembled the ladder leading up to Keet Seel and one by one we climbed to the top. There, a massive white pine log blocked the way. It's as if the Anasazi put it there when they left in the 1290s to tell people to stay out.

Beyond this gate is a town that appears frozen in time. Dwellings and storage rooms are nestled into the bedrock of the cave and stacked like toy blocks. Outside, grinding stones remain where women once ground corn into corn meal while they perhaps shared tales and gossip. Ancient corncobs and black-on-white pottery sherds litter the ground under our feet. It's hard to believe that this site was abandoned 710 years ago.

Archaeologists working here used a drill to remove long tubes of wood, or cores, from the roof beams of houses. They then use a scientific method called dendrochronology to date building episodes from the sequence of tree rings found. These cores tell them that the present site of Keet Seel was occupied from the 1240s up to 1290 or so. After 1286 nobody built or repaired anything -- they just left. The 155 rooms, and their arrangements, tell archaeologists how many people lived here (around 150) and how they were related to each other socially (clans).

Corncobs, the designs on the pottery, and the figures painted on the cliff face above the houses offer more evidence. Archaeologists found some of the best evidence by picking through the garbage the Anasazi dumped off the edge!

At one time Keet Seel must have been a true paradise. A fresh spring bubbled below, deer and other animals grazed near the stream, fields of corn were planted at the base of the canyon. The town itself is built with care and artistic skill. Six kivas, circular ritual structures, served the community. A 180-foot retaining wall runs the entire length of the alcove, supporting the street above.

I sat down on a bench in the darkness of one of Keet Seel's kivas and thought about why the Anasazi abandoned this place. Why would people leave a place like this forever after making a life for themselves and their children?

The floor of Keet Seel is covered with pottery shards and corncobs

I think the answer lies among the pottery shards and scraps of evidence left behind by the ancients. As team archaeologist I'll be searching for this evidence among the ruins, talking with archaeologists who have excavated these ruins -- seeking clues among the wreckage.

Jonathan Haas, one of our online experts, has worked with his wife, Winifred Creamer, in the canyons that surround Keet Seel for years. They believe Keet Seel was built in a remote and inaccessible location for one reason: to defend against invaders. Haas presents it as a dare: "just think about getting in to this place if they didn't want you to come in." He's dead right. Without an invitation you'd be out of luck. A few well-aimed rocks while you were scaling the 60 degree slope would do the job!

We leave Keet Seel as the late afternoon shadow fills its doorways and windows. They close the site at dusk, James Charles tell us, out of reverence for the dead and out of respect for the beliefs of the Hopi people, who claim descent from the people of Keet Seel. As I look back over my shoulder, Keet Seel disappears into the darkness. I know clues are to be found among those ancient stones. That's where I'll be looking.

Diggin' it,

John

AmericaQuest
Classroom Connect