| OCR Text |
Show 86 BASIS OP AMERICAN HISTORY theories have been advanced. The idea of a distinct cliff- dwelling race, which has since entirely disappeared, has been generally discarded, and it is now generally believed that part of the buildings at least were constructed and used by the ancestors of some of the present Pueblo Indians; perhaps some of them were built by the ancestors of the present Navajos. 1 . That some of these structures were occupied dur-ingv historic times* is made probable by the traditions of some of the neighboring tribes. Certain of the Hopi clans claim to have lived at Canon de Chelly;* others on the upper Rio Grande, in the Gila Valley. 4 The possible accuracy of such legends is illustrated by the discussion which arose recently over the claim of the Acoma Indians to have once lived on the " Enchanted Mesa," in which their tradition was fully supported* by investigation. On the other hand, there is historical evidence that some of the pueblos were deserted and in ruins at the time of Coronado's expedition in 1540.6 1 Hodge, " The Early Navajo and Apache/' in American Anthropologist, VIII., 239. 1 Mindeleff, " CHff Ruins of Canon de Chelly, Arizona" ( Bureau of Ethnology, Sixteenth Annual Report), 162, 163. 9 Ibid., 191. 4 Fewkes, " Tusayan Migration Legends" ( Bureau of American Ethnology, Nineteenth Annual Report, pt. ii., 573- 634). • Hodge," The Enchanted Mesa," in National Geographic Magazine, VIII., 273- 284). • Report of Hernando de Alvarado, in Winship, " The Cor-onado Expedition" ( Bureau of Ethnology, Fourteenth Annual Report, pt. i., 594). |
