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- Wukoki
Location: Wukoki Pueblo, Wupatki National Monument. Description: Wukoki on a hot summer day. - Summer Monsoon, Wukoki
Location: Wukoki Pueblo, Wupatki National Monument. Description: The landscape surrounding Wukoki during summer monsoons. - Door at Crack-in-Rock Pueblo
Location: Crack-in-Rock Pueblo, Wupatki National Monument. - Wukoki Pueblo
Location: Wukoki, Wupatki National Monument. The pueblo was built and occupied between A.D. 1120 and A.D. 1210. - Summer Monsoon, Citadel Ruin
Location: Citadel, Wupatki National Monument. Description: Isolated summer monsoon just north of the San Francisco Peaks, as viewed from Citadel Ruin. - Midden (Trash)
Along this side of the pueblo, people repeatedly dumped their trash, forming a midden. Refuse tells us much of what we know about past life. Each layer of food debris yields facts about diet, nutrition, and changing reliance on resources throughout the history of the village. Broken pottery and worn out tools reveal relative dates of occupation and technological changes through time. When Wupatki was excavated, artifacts and food remains were collected and stored but not studied for years. Today, rather than excavating new material, we study old collections to learn how people altered or managed plant and animal populations to their advantage. This midden has not been excavated. Walking off trail here, or through any midden, mixes the upper layer of trash with lower levels, destroying the context that is so important to understanding past lifeways. - The Blowhole Interpretative Panel
This blowhole – a crevice in the earth’s crust that appears to breathe – is one of several found in the Wupatki area. It connects to an underground passage – size, depth, and complexity unknown – called an earthcrack. Earthcracks resulted from earthquake activity in the Kaibab Limestone bedrock and have enlarged over time. Archaeologists have yet to uncover any evidence of prehistoric structures or uses at the blowhole. Its connection to the Wupatki Pueblo remains a mystery. Today, the Hopi descendants of these early people, refer to the blowhole as the breath of “Yaapontsa,” the wind spirit. They and other American Indians attach a spiritual significance to these features. - Overlook Interpretative Panel
For today's Hopi people, the villages of Wupatki remain among the most important "footprints" of the ancestral clans. It was on this landscape, in the shadow of the San Francisco Peaks, that a number of migrating clans met and merged. Significant events, and new traditions and ceremonies resulted. The Zuni and other Puebloan groups (Acoma, Laguna, and Rio Grande) share Wupatki's history as they share a belief in a common origin that begins with their ancestors. Stories of Wupatki also exist among non-Puebloan groups (Havasupai, Yavapai, Hualapai, Southern Paiute, and Navajo) whose ancestors interacted with Puebloan ancestors. The dates for these interactions are unknown. - View from the Inside
View from the inside of the "ready-made" room. - Plaza
The open plaza area may have been the hub of village life and work. Ethnographic evidence suggests most activities were gender specific, and everyone contributed. Children learned by watching, listening, then doing. Surely there were no idle hands. Women worked clay into necessary utensils. They mortared the pueblo, knowing clay as they did. As the herbalists, gatherers, and protectors of stored crops and seeds, women were vital to the community. Men hunted and farmed. The entire growing season may have been spent away from home tending fields. Winter brought with it time to weave. Fine cotton textiles and abundant tools suggest weaving was an important, highly developed skill at Wupatki. "...the man cultivates the field, but he renders its harvests into the woman's keeping." -A Hopi view of the community, 1894 "No woman ever sat at the Hopi looms. The men were expert weavers; they wove diligently all winter long in the various kivas. Hopi woven items were known far and wide, and people of other tribes came to barter for them." -Helen Sekaquaptewa, from "Me and Mine" - Overlook Interpretative Panel
The name Wupatki derives from Hopi words that translate literally into "it was cut long," and recalls an event in the histories of the Hopi clans. It is said that people prospered here. In time men began gambling and ignored their crops and prayers for rain. Concerned, their leader severed a ritual object and then went into exile. When he returned the people awoke from their decadence. - Community Room
The reconstructed circular structure below you resembles a great kiva, a special room used for rituals and ceremonies. However, excavators found no evidence of a roof or other floor features typical of a kiva. Archeologists speculate that this open-air community room could have served as a central gathering place. Imagine voices carrying to others assembled on the pueblo roof tops. People may have come from nearby and distant villages to participate in ceremonies held here. Maybe rituals focused the community and solved problems, or served to redistribute materials and food. - Nearby Homes
The extent of this community is not obvious, but hundreds of small family dwellings surround us forming a cluster. Another cluster exists on the uplands to the west (where you may visit Citadel and Lomaki Pueblos). We don't know if the Wupatki and Citadel communities were autonomous, cooperatives, or competitors. From this point, you can see two other nearby homes. These sites are not open to visitation.
"We found... all the prominent points occupied by the ruins of stone houses of considerable size... They are evidently the remains of a large town, as they occurred at intervals for an extent of eight or nine miles and the ground was thickly strewed with pottery in all directions." -Journal entry, Sitgreaves Expedition, October 8, 1851 - Ballcourt Interpretative Panel
This depiction of a ball game is based on descriptions of games played by the Mayan and Aztec cultures of Mexico and speculations on the Hohokam games in southern Arizona.
Ballcourts were common in southern Arizona from A.D. 750 to 1200, but relatively rare here in the northern part of the state. This suggests that the people of Wupatki intermingled within their southern Arizona neighbors – the Hohokam – who may have borrowed and modified the ballcourt idea from earlier contact with the Indian cultures of Mexico. Located along major natural drainages and travel routes, ballcourts may have provided opportunities for social exchange between villages. They were often within a one-day walk of a neighboring village. There is continued speculation about the uses of the ballcourts. Because of the work involved in building a ballcourt and the numbers that have been found (over 200 in Arizona), ball games may have been an important part of life for the people of Wupatki and their southern neighbors. The Hohokam balls – found at archaeological sites containing ballcourts – were made of carefully shaped rock and perhaps covered with pin pitch or other material. One form of the game might have involved moving the ball toward a goal using a curved stick.
The Wupatki ballcourt is 78 feet wide, 102 feet long, and had a 6-foot-high wall. Excavated and stabilized in 1965, a large part of the interior wall has been reconstructed. - A Possible Kiva
This room, on the southeastern corner of the pueblo, is one of the largest in the village, yet no household tools or utensils were found inside. This suggests it was a special space, perhaps a ceremonial room known as a kiva. However, a kiva would have a single bench on the north side of the room. There is no record of this, but early excavations may have missed such a feature. In a village this size, one or two kivas would have been expected. They may have been used for the private aspects of ritual, while the larger, open community room served public ceremonies. Today, rectangular clan kivas persist in Hopi villages, while larger, round community kivas endure in the eastern Pueblos. Kivas are an integral part of Puebloan society and remain a cultural trait that can be traced from past to present.
Compare the possible kiva to the room to the left. Note the size difference? The inset shows the interior hearth (firepit) and deflector.