The variation in the size of the ruins given by different authors is astonishing, ranging from 1,500 square meters to 5 hectares or about 200,000 square meters. These extreme variations are obviously duetodiflereuceofjudgmentas what part of the area covered by the remains of the walls should be assigned to the C'asa Grande proper, for this structure, but part of a large group of ruins. So far as the writer knows, no accurate plan of the ruins of the Casa Grande has ever been made, although plans have been published; and very little information is available about the group it belongs to.
The conquest of the country by the "Army of the West" again drew attention to the ruin through the descriptions of Colonel Emory and Captain Johnston. Gushing was envious of the Congres International desAm^ricanistes^some "preliminary notes" on his work as director of the Hemenway Southwestern Archaeological Expedition. As a result - of which it was unfortunately only possible to present a modest statement - the report should be consulted by all stu-.
Walter Fewkes, also of the Hemenway expedition, under the title "On the present state of a ruin in Arizona called. The writer has never traversed the distance from the ruin to the river, but the ruin is about a mile from the Walker ranch, which is well known in that neighborhood, and about half a mile from the river Probably no two investigators would assign the same limits to the area covered by the group, as the margins of this area merge imperceptibly with the surrounding country.
The ruin of Casa Grande, as the term is here used, occupies a position near the south-west corner of the group, and it will be noticed.
MINDELEFF COMPARATIVE AGE OF RUINS. 301
302 CASA GRANDE EUIN. [eth.ann.13 each four or five times the size of the Casa Grandernin, resting on a . flat plinth or terrace about 5 feet above the general level. The height is not exceptional, the hill on the east side being less than 3 feet lower, while the one on the south-east lacks less than 4 feet of its height. The characteristic feature, however, and one which is difficult to explain except on the hypothesis stated, is the sharpness of the edges.
It will be noticed that the raised base or terrace on which the mounds are located is not perfectly flat, but on the contrary has a raised edge. There is an abundance of space between the top of the edge and the bottom of the terrace for a row of single rooms, enclosing a courtyard within which the main buildings stood, or such a courtyard may be wholly or partly covered by clusters of rooms, attached to the exterior being single storey, but rising in the middle, in two main clusters three or more stories high. The problem with this last hypothesis, however, is that underneath it we should expect to find a larger depression between the base of the hills and the edge of the terrace.
The most reasonable hypothesis is therefore that the space between the base of the mounds and the edge of the terrace was occupied by rooms on one floor. The walls of the structures they represent, protected by the adjacent low walls of the single-story rooms, would not appreciably undermine the ground level, and if the central room or rooms in each cluster were higher than the double-rounded rooms, as is the case in Casa Granderuin, the interior walls that are the interior walls would be the last to succumb, the clusters would be.
MINDELEFF] FARMING OUTLOOKS. 303
It measures at the top 150 feet from north to south and about 80 feet from east to west, but covers a ground area of 200 feet by 120 feet, or more than half an acre. The bottom of the storey in the main structure is currently approximately 30 cm below the surrounding ground surface, but must originally have been considerably more, as the profile indicates long-term exposure to atmospheric erosion and impacts. No excavation has been made and the character of the structure cannot be determined, but it is apparently a simple earthen structure - not divided into blocks, as at the Casa Grande.
UINDELEFF] OCCURRENCE OF DEPRESSIONS. 305 To the east aud to the west are two large depress'ous, each about 5
CASA GRANDE RUIN
STATE OF PRESERVATION
The court east of the ruin is good. marked by the contours and apparently entered through a gateway. This height accommodated two stories, but the top of the wall is now 1 to 2 feet higher than the roof level of the second story. Adobe construction, if we limit the word to its proper meaning, consists in the use of molded brick, dried in the sun, but not baked.
The horizontal lines, marking what might be called trajectories, are very well defined, and although the vertical joints are not clearly visible in the illustration, close inspection of the wall itself is possible. In addition, the exterior of the north wall of the middle room, above the second roof level of the north room, is heavily eroded. In support of the hypothesis that the second roof level of the northern room was the upper roof, it may perhaps be stated that there is no trace of an opening in the walls above that level except on the western side.
These blocks occupy the entire thickness of the offset on the second roof level - perhaps an indication that the upper story was added later. Almost directly above these about 3 feet and about 2 feet higher than the top of the door are two similar liolas. There were no openings on the second floor or middle room of the middle floor except a door in the east wall and two small ones. openings in the west wall.
That . was covered with double lintels made of rods 2-4 inches indiameter, the lower series about 3 inches above the top of the door. The opening was originally filled up in the same manner as that above described, leaving only 8 or 10 inches of the upper part open. The gap in the south wall of the south room, shown in the plan, though now open from the bottom, represents the position of two doorways, one above the other.. MINDELEPTE] OPENINGS IN OUTER WALLS.
The east opening in the south wall of the north room is well preserved, the lintels having been torn out by relic hunters without much destruction of the surrounding masonry. Perhaps the immediate openings of the shield were formed of thin flat sticks, as the architraves are often a few inches above the top of the opening. A small fragment of masonry above the cord remains, and this is within a quarter of an inch of the top of the opening.
The height of the opening was 4 feet 3 inches, and its width at the top 2 feet, at the bottom 2 feet 1:^ inches. Some of these lintel bars, as well as those in the opening above it, extend 3 feet into the wall, others only a sliver.
CONCLUSIOISIS
