The adobe walls are built only as
thick as is absolutely necessary, few of them being more than a foot in
thickness. The walls are thus, in proportion, to height and weight,
sustained, thinner than the crude brick construction of other peoples,
and require protection and constant repairs to insure durability. As to
thickness, they are evidently modeled directly after the walls of stone
masonry, which had already, in both Tusayan and Cibola, been pushed to
the limit of thinness. In fact, since the date of the survey of Zu?i, on
which the published plan is based, the walls of several rooms over the
court passageway in the house, illustrated in Pl. LXXXII, have entirely
fallen in, demonstrating the insufficiency of the thin walls to sustain
the weight of several stories.
The climate of the pueblo region is not wholly suited to the employment
of adobe construction, as it is there practiced. For several months in
the year (the rainy season) scarcely a day passes without violent storms
which play havoc with the earth-covered houses, necessitating constant
vigilance and frequent repairs on the part of the occupants.
Though the practice of mud-coating all walls has in Cibola undoubtedly
led to greater carelessness and a less rigid adherence to ancient
methods of construction, the stone masonry may still be seen to retain
some of the peculiarities that characterize ancient examples. Features
of this class are still more apparent at Tusayan, and notwithstanding
the rudeness of much of the modern stone masonry of this province, the
fact that the builders are familiar with the superior methods of the
ancient builders, is clearly shown in the masonry of the present
villages.
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