THE ENCHANTED MESA OF ACOMA.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XIX, Issue XIV, 25 September 1897, Page 440

THE ENCHANTED MESA OF ACOMA.

Professor Wiluam Libby, of Princeton University, baa started for the Acoma country in New Mexico to explore the enchanted mesa. Romance, song, and story, says a New Mexico correspondent of the New York Sun, have clustered about thia spot for more than two centuries. Near the centre of the plains of Acoma —a vast expanse of wild prairie land, situated west by south of Albuquerque some seventy-five miles rises a rectangular rock of red and grey sandstone, shaped like the figure 8, with perpendicular sides 700 feet high. This rock is called * Mesa Encantada'—enchanted mesa. The outcroppings of stone project from the face of the walls at the top, making the summit wholly inaccessible. The summit of this elevated tableland or mesa covers an area of some forty acres. Here there flourished, according to tradition, in the sixteenth century, a thrifty community of * pueblo ’ or village Indians, the Acomas, who then numbered about 1,500 souls. They cultivated their corn, chili, and bean patches in the valley near the foot of the rock, pastured their stock thereabouts, and made their homes on the tableland, their only means of ascent and descent being narrow steps cut in the stone on the east side, and reaching an elevation of about 300 feet, whence, through a landing, the entrance of which was arched like that of some great cathedral, the way is supposed to lead into the rock and up another flight of steps, or, perhaps, a series of them, to the top, where were located their rude yet well-kept and frugal homes, constructed of stone and sun-dried adobe bricks.

One day, the story goes, an awful calamity came to this community of red men. While the younger men of the village, the women and children were engaged in their Oelds below, a terrific storm came on, and a bolt of lightning struck the projecting rock in which the steps were cut, completely demolishing it, and effacing all trace of their improvised stairway from the ground up 300 feet to the cathedral-like entrance. The aged men and women and infant children who had been left in the homes on the mesa were forever cut off from their kinsmen below, and these, in turn, were unable to ascend to their homes. To add to their distress, the falling stone had crushed to death a score or more ot those who had taken shelter from the storm at the base of the rock. Many sorrowful days and nights ran into weeks, until finally no sad face peered over the jagged edge of the rocks above to greet the wistful watchers from below, and they knew that all their people at home had succumbed at last to their fearful fate and perished from hunger and thirst. Then the sorrowing Acomas gathered

together their scanty effects, and, carrying their wounded on crude litters woven from the spines of the amole plant, wandered away into the desert in search of a new home.

They founded their second village two miles distant, on top of a mesa rock almoat the counterpart of their previous home, though not so high by, perhaps, 150 feet, and there they built of stone and mud and hewn timbers, transported on their backs up a rocky declivity nearly 600 feet high, their village as it stands to day, an impregnable fortress in time of danger, the wonder and admiration of hundreds of American tourists who visit the place, particularly in September, when their feasts are in progress. In the calamity which befell the ‘enchanted mesa ’ it is said 300 souls perished. In the revolt of 1680 against Spanish rule the Spanish Catholic missionary stationed on the * enchanted mesa ’ with the Acomas was the only priest who escaped the wrath of the Pueblo Indians and was not killed.

When the Spaniards besieged the base of the rock the Indian women sacked the village church and were on the verge of stoning the friar to death, but he made his escape and jumped from the top of the mesa, landing uninjured 700 feet below. That he made the leap in safety is ascribed to the fact that his outer garment was a large scrape—a heavy blanket having an opening in its centre, which fits over the head and brings the blanket down over the shoulders—which in his flight downward served the purpose of a parachute. This priest was afterward captured by the Acoma warriors, who, after a council of war, decided that he must surely be either a saint or devil to have successfully made so miraculous a leap, and upon his consenting to renounce his religion he was taken to their home and became one of them. Subsequently he married one of the belles of the village, and his descendants are today among the sturdiest sons and daughters of the pueblo of Acoma. That Professor Libby, should he carry out his expressed intention of scaling the walls of * Mesa Encantada' and reaching the tableland, will find in the ruins there a rich and valuable assortment of prehistoric treasures is scarcely to be questioned. About the base of the rock are to be found at this date many fragments of beautiful pottery, the rich colouring of which centuries of exposure to the elements has not effaced, and since the Acomas have always been noted for the superiority of their earthenware, as well as their expertness in the production of gold and silver ornaments, jewellery, etc., no doubt the explorers will be abundantly rewarded for their undertaking.

Professor Libby’s plan for throwing a line over this tableland by the use of tandem kites is believed to be perfectly feasible, since a strong southwest breeze usually prevails in that locality in July. In making the ascent it is probable that the explorers will not be required to scale the rocks to the very top, but will find their task one of comparative ease after going aloft 300 feet to the opening in the side of the cliff.