Pueblo Alto facts for kids
Pueblo Alto means "High Village" in Spanish. It is an ancient building site built by the Ancestral Puebloans. These people lived in the southwestern United States a long time ago. Pueblo Alto is a type of large building called a "great house." It is found in Chaco Culture National Historical Park in New Mexico.
This important historical site is located on top of a flat-topped hill called a mesa. It sits near the center of Chaco Canyon. Pueblo Alto is about 0.6 miles (1 kilometer) away from another famous great house, Pueblo Bonito. Construction on Pueblo Alto started between the years 1020 and 1050 AD.
What is Pueblo Alto?
Pueblo Alto was a large building with 89 rooms. It was built on a single floor. Its high location on the mesa made it easy to see from most places in the San Juan Basin. This area includes many other ancient villages. For example, it was only 2.3 miles (3.7 kilometers) north of Tsin Kletsin, another great house across the canyon.
What was Pueblo Alto used for?
Pueblo Alto was a very important place for making things. It was a center for processing beads and turquoise. Turquoise is a beautiful blue-green stone. The work done here influenced many other villages in Chaco Canyon. People also made tools from a type of rock called chert at Pueblo Alto.
The building had special rooms for storage. These storerooms opened to the outside, not into the main rooms of the building. There was also a very large pile of broken pottery and chert. This pile is called a midden. Most of the pottery and chert found here came from the Chuska area, about 43 miles (70 kilometers) to the west.
Who lived at Pueblo Alto?
Even though Pueblo Alto was a large building, research suggests that only a few families lived there. Perhaps only five to twenty families called it home. This small number of residents suggests that Pueblo Alto might not have been a main living area. Instead, it likely served other important purposes, like a center for trade or ceremonies.
Pueblo Alto shares its mesa with another great house called Nuevo Alto. Both of these ancient sites are now protected within the Chaco Culture National Historical Park.
