Aztec Ruins National Monument offers an in-depth introduction to Chaco Culture. If you are visiting Chaco Culture National Historical Park, it’s well worth it to come here as well.
Since Aztec Ruins is less than 30 minutes from Salmon Ruins, you can easily combine seeing both archaeological sites in the same day. I visited them after going to Chaco Canyon and they expanded on what I learned from my trip there. But if you go before visiting Chaco Canyon, you’d get an excellent overview of Chaco culture that would only enhance your enjoyment of the national park.
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| Entrance to the site |
First established as a national monument in January 1923 and designated a World Heritage Site in 1987 along with Chaco Canyon, Aztec Ruins is not actually associated with the Aztec civilization of Mexico. The site acquired its name because in the 19th century, European settlers mistakenly believed the Aztecs had emigrated north from Mexico. In fact, Aztec Ruins was constructed by Ancestral Pueblo people.
The home of Earl Morris, an archaeologist who excavated Aztec Ruins in the early 20th century, has been converted into the Visitor Center. Besides a well-stocked gift shop, it includes a museum with exhibits about the people who inhabited Aztec Ruins, how buildings were constructed, and how dendrochronology was used to date the site. Another section of the museum provides information about the descendants of the Ancestral Puebloans – the many Indigenous cultural groups who live in the Four Corners region today. A video about Aztec Ruins and its importance to present-day Pueblo people offers another perspective about the site.
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| View of Visitor Center from the back |
Before beginning your walk through the site, you’ll definitely want to get the trail guide because otherwise, you won’t know what you are looking at. You can buy a print booklet or use a QR code to download a guide to your smartphone. I bought the booklet because I wanted to use my phone to take photos -- it was raining off and on and I didn't want my camera to get wet -- and also because I wanted to support the site.
After exiting the Visitor Center, a short walk along an asphalt path brought me to the Great House complex. Encircled by a stone wall, the structures here were built in the early 12th century. Because they resemble the buildings at Chaco Canyon, the Aztec Ruins National Monument is considered a Chaco outlier site.
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| View of part of Aztec Ruins |
There are actually two sections of Aztec Ruins National Monument – Aztec Ruins East and Aztec Ruins West. It’s the western section that visitors can explore and the Great Kiva is the most impressive building at the site. It was reconstructed in 1934 by Errol Morris.
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| The Great Kiva |
Since none of the other kivas I saw at Chaco Canyon or Salmon Ruins had been rebuilt, the interior of this Great Kiva was fascinating. The stairs are modern touches – ladders would have been used by the Ancestral Puebloans to descend into the kiva. In the center, the small square shape is a hearth. Three large pillars are visible but there are four altogether; two of them rested on top of floor vaults. The purpose of the floor vaults is not definitively known but they may have been used for storage or as floor drums, as the park ranger explained when I asked about them. He also told me the flat round stones were used as the base for pillars, to help stabilize them.
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| Interior of the Great Kiva |
But the Great Kiva is not the only kiva at Aztec Ruins. A much smaller one is located close by, near the central plaza. This kiva had a hearth, which is partially visible in the central foreground, but no floor vaults, and is similar to the kivas I saw at the other Chaco archaeological sites.
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| Another kiva |
Following the pathway, I walked through a corridor inside some of the buildings (seen in the background of the photo above). It isn’t possible to step inside all of the individual rooms; however, the guidebook pointed out notable features in them. The most interesting is a mat made from willow branches that are tied together with cord made of yucca. According to the guidebook, this mat is in the same place where the people who lived here more than 800 years ago hung it.
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| Willow mat hanging from opening |
Another original feature of these rooms are the ceilings. Large beams supported smaller logs placed on top of them at right angles. Over them, thinner pieces of wood were laid. Each layer was constructed from different species of trees. To hold everything together, mud was pressed into the layers of wood and that became the floor of the room above it. Because the logs have been well-preserved, dendrochronology enabled archaeologists to date Aztec Ruins with a high degree of accuracy.
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| Closeup of the ceiling of a room at Aztec Ruins |
A third type of kiva found at Aztec Ruins is called a tri-wall kiva. Two circular stone walls surround the third wall that forms the actual kiva. According to the Aztec Ruins Facebook page, only 10 such multi-wall kivas have been discovered in the Southwest.
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| The tri-wall kiva |
Archaeoastronomy was part of Chaco culture, including at Aztec Ruins. One of the walls at the site lines up with sunrise during the summer solstice and sunset during the winter solstice. When the sun rises or sets, the light shines along the wall.
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| Wall used for archaeoastronomical purposes |
The masonry at Aztec Ruins is just as impressive as it is at other Chaco sites. But one thing sets Aztec Ruins apart: A band of green stones creates a horizontal stripe on one of the walls along the visitor pathway. It’s a beautiful contrast and just one more reason to visit this wonderful place.
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| Green band of stones in wall |
For more information about Aztec Ruins National Monument, please visit their website.
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