Aztec Ruins National Monument, NM
Encyclopedia of Aztec Ruins National Monument
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is for Kiva. |
Ancient Chacoan kivas, the type found at Aztec Ruins, are round or keyhole shaped, usually semi-subterranean, and built into great houses. Like modern kivas, they were entered by a ladder through a hatch in the roof down to the center of the kiva floor, or in the case of great kivas, via stone staircases leading from ground level down into the kiva.
Kivas were built in all sizes. Great kivas, like the one in the plaza at Aztec Ruins, are believed to have been used for community-level activities, whether ceremonial, social, or political. Small kivas are sometimes called clan kivas, and were probably used by small kin-based family groups for ceremonial, social, work and other activities.
During ceremonies today, the ritual emergence of participants from the kiva into the plaza above represents the original emergence through the sipapu, or navel, by Puebloan groups from the underworld into the current world.
