Pueblo settlement-houses

The word pueblo, i.e. a “village, settlement” is of Spanish origin. This is how the conquistadors referred to surface multi-storey and multi-rooms settlement-houses of the farmers of the South-West (Arizona and New Mexico) constructed from stones fastened together with clay or from adobe bricks. To make such bricks clay was mixed with straw and left to dry in the sun. The ready bricks were fastened together with a mixture made of clay. The Indians of the South-West must have adopted the technique of bricks making, as well as many other peculiarities of their culture, from Mexico. If a pueblo was located on a slope, houses attached to one another were rising up in stairs – the roof of a lower house served as a yard for the upper one. Roofs were made of wooden beams above which branches were put and covered with a layer of clay. Houses were entered from flat roofs with the help of ladders. Construction of walls was a male occupation, while women coated walls and roofs with clay. Inside such settlement-house there were sanctuaries – kiwa.

The Spanish word “pueblo”, which originally was used to refer to settled farmers of the South-West, was then fixed to denote such Indians in scientific literature.

Pueblo Laguna, the New Mexico State. Early 20th cent.		Sacrarium of the Pueblo Indians. The New Mexico State. USA. New-Mexico. Pueblo Indians, 19th c.		Pueblo Santa Clara, the New Mexico State. USA. New-Mexico. Pueblo Indians, 19th c.
Pueblo Taos, the New Mexico State. USA. New-Mexico. Pueblo Indians, 19th c.