Canyon de Chelly National Monument
See also: National Parks and Monuments (table)National Parks and Monuments
National Parks
Name Type1 Location Year authorized Size
acres (hectares)
Description
Acadia NP SE Maine 1919 48,419 (19,603) Mountain and coast scenery.
..... Click the link for more information.
Canyon de Chelly National Monument
(də shā`) [De Chelly, Sp. corruption of Navajo Tsegi = rock canyon], 83,840 acres (33,955 hectares), NE Ariz.; est. 1931. The area contains the ruins of several hundred prehistoric Native American villages, most of them built A.D. 350–1300. The spectacular cliff dwellings include Mummy Cave, with a three-story tower house. Artifacts have been found, and there are numerous pictographs in rock shelters and on cliff faces. The earliest people living in the region were the Basket MakersBasket Makers,name given to the members of an early Native North American culture in the Southwest, predecessors of the Pueblo. Because of the cultural continuity from the Basket Makers to the Pueblos, they have been jointly referred to by archaeologists as the Anasazi culture.
..... Click the link for more information. , predecessors of the PuebloPueblo,
name given by the Spanish to the sedentary Native Americans who lived in stone or adobe communal houses in what is now the SW United States. The term pueblo is also used for the villages occupied by the Pueblo.
..... Click the link for more information. . The NavajoNavajo
or Navaho
, Native North Americans whose language belongs to the Athabascan branch of the Nadene linguistic stock (see Native American languages). A migration from the North to the Southwest area is thought to have occurred in the past because of an affiliation
..... Click the link for more information. came to the canyon c.1700, and it became their chief stronghold. In 1805 a Spanish expedition fought the Navajo in a rock shelter (dubbed Massacre Cave) in Canyon del Muerto (site of a prehistoric burial ground). In 1864 a U.S. cavalry force under Kit CarsonCarson, Kit
(Christopher Houston Carson), 1809–68, American frontiersman and guide, b. Madison co., Ky. In 1811 he moved with his family to the Missouri frontier. After his father's death, he was apprenticed to a saddler in Old Franklin, an outfitting point on the Santa Fe
..... Click the link for more information. engaged the Navajo in Canyon de Chelly. See National Parks and MonumentsNational Parks and Monuments
National Parks
Name Type1 Location Year authorized Size
acres (hectares)
Description
Acadia NP SE Maine 1919 48,419 (19,603) Mountain and coast scenery.
..... Click the link for more information. , table.
Canyon de Chelly National Monument
Chinle, AZ 86503
Phone:928-674-5500
Fax:928-674-5507
Web: www.nps.gov/cach/
Size: 83,840 acres.
Established: Authorized on February 14, 1931.
Location:In northeastern Arizona. Visitor center is 3 miles from Route 191 in Chinle.
Facilities:Lodge, campground, picnic area, groceries, restaurant/snacks, visitor center, museum/exhibit, horse rental, jeep tours.
Activities:Camping, hiking, horseback riding, auto touring, interpretive programs, guided tours.
Special Features:At the base of sheer red cliffs and in canyon wall caves are ruins of Indian villages built between AD 350 and 1300. Modern Navajo Indians live and farm here. Park offers a 34-mile (round trip) North Rim Drive, with views of some of the most beautiful Navajo cliff dwellings in the area, and a 37-mile (round trip) South Rim Drive, with panoramic views of the canyons, the Defiance Plateau, and the Chuska Mountains.
See other parks in Arizona.