Chaco culture

Ceccanti Marta, Kebe Dame & Tropea Daisy

Criterion III

The Chaco Canyon sites graphically illustrate the architectural and engineering achievements of the Chacoan people, who overcame the harshness of the environment of the southwestern United States to found a culture that dominated the area for more than four centuries.

This heritage site is located in the South-West of the United States (North-Western part of New Mexico)

Date of Inscription: 1987

Impact of Unesco label

It started to have a lot of visitors from the 1960s such as 40’000 people per year, in 1997 this site had the record of visitors and after this year the number of visitors has gone down with the greatest flow between March and July.

Chaco is a Pueblo culture of the south-western part of the USA which preserves outstanding elements of a vast pre-Columbian settlement; It is remarkable for its monumental public and ceremonial buildings; The World Heritage property includes the Aztec Ruins National Monument and several smaller Chaco sites managed by the Bureau of Land Management.

Introduction

Chaco is a Pueblo culture of the south-western part of the USA which preserves outstanding elements of a vast pre-Columbian settlement;
Chaco is remarkable for its monumental public and ceremonial buildings;
The World Heritage property includes the Aztec Ruins National Monument and several smaller Chaco sites managed by the Bureau of Land Management.

Location

This heritage site is located in the South-West of the United States (North-Western part of New Mexico)

History

The Chacoan society reached its height between 1020 and 1110 years.
These sites were a focus for ceremonies, trade, and political activity and they are remarkable for their monumental public and ceremonial buildings and distinctive multi-storey “great houses.”
The sites were linked by a system of carefully engineered and constructed roads, many of which can still be traced.

Archaeological Areas

Chaco Culture NHP was first proclaimed under the Antiquities Act as Chaco Canyon National Monument on March 11, 1907

“…the extensive communal or pueblo ruins . . . are of extraordinary interest because of their number and their great size and because of the innumerable and valuable relics of a prehistoric people which they contain, and it appears that the public good would be promoted by preserving these prehistoric remains as a National Monument with as much land as may be necessary for the proper protection thereof.”

The Presidential Proclamation (35 Stat. 2119, see Appendix A) states

Chaco Culture National Historical Park

Chaco canyon:

Pueblo Bonito;
Pueblo del Arroyo;
Casa Rinconada;
Kin Klekso;
Pueblo Alto.

Directions

Car:

Chaco Canyon is located in northwestern New Mexico. The park can only be accessed by driving on dirt roads

Plane:

The nearest airports are Farmington, NM, Gallup, NM, Durango,CO, and Albuquerque, NM

Public Transportation:

There is no public transportation to the park

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