Coronado Historic Site is the

Tiwa Tiwa and Tigua may refer to: * Tiwa Puebloans, an ethnic group of New Mexico, US * Tiwa (Lalung), an ethnic group of north-eastern India * Tiwa language (India), a Sino-Tibetan language of India * Tiwa languages, a group of Tanoan languages of the ...

pueblo of Kuaua and a historic site that is part of the State-governed

Museum of New Mexico The Museum of New Mexico is a collection of museums, historic sites, and archaeological services governed by the State of New Mexico. It currently consists of six divisions : the Palace of the Governors state history museum, the New Mexico Museum of ...

system. It is located along U.S. Federal Route 550, 1 mile west of

Bernalillo Bernalillo () is a town in Sandoval County, New Mexico, United States. As of the 2010 census, the town population was 8,320. It is the county seat of Sandoval County. Bernalillo is part of the Albuquerque Metropolitan Statistical Area. Histor ...

and 16 miles north of

Albuquerque Albuquerque ( ; ), ; kee, Arawageeki; tow, Vakêêke; zun, Alo:ke:k'ya; apj, Gołgéeki'yé. abbreviated ABQ, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of New Mexico. Its nicknames, The Duke City and Burque, both reference its founding in ...

History

The Coronado Historic Site is most noted for Kuaua Pueblo (Tiwa for "Evergeen"). The ''

pueblo In the Southwestern United States, Pueblo (capitalized) refers to the Native tribes of Puebloans having fixed-location communities with permanent buildings which also are called pueblos (lowercased). The Spanish explorers of northern New Spain ...

'' or village was settled about 1325 and abandoned toward the end of the 16th century. The Coronado Historic Site was the first state archaeological site to open to the public. It was dedicated on May 29, 1940, as part of the ''Cuarto Centenario'' commemoration (400th Anniversary) of

Francisco Vásquez de Coronado Francisco is the Spanish and Portuguese form of the masculine given name ''Franciscus''. Nicknames In Spanish, people with the name Francisco are sometimes nicknamed "Paco". San Francisco de Asís was known as ''Pater Comunitatis'' (father of ...

's entry into New Mexico. James F. Zimmerman was its first president. Flint & Flint New Mexico State Records and Archives Although it is named for Vasquez de Coronado, who camped in the vicinity in 1540–1542, the site is of Kuaua Pueblo which was one of several

-speaking pueblos in the area when the ''conquistador'' Vasquez de Coronado arrived, and the village was almost certainly abandoned due to Coronado and the after effects of the

Tiguex War The Tiguex War was the first named war between Europeans and Native Americans in what is now part of the United States. The war took place in New Spain, during the colonization of Nuevo México. It was fought in the winter of 1540-41 by the ex ...

(February 1541). The ruins of Kuaua Pueblo were excavated from 1934 to 1939 by an archaeological team led by

Edgar Lee Hewett Edgar Lee Hewett (November 23, 1865 – December 31, 1946) was an American archaeologist and anthropologist whose focus was the Native American communities of New Mexico and the southwestern United States. He is best known for his role in ...

and

Marjorie F. Tichy Marjorie Ferguson Lambert (1908–2006) was an American anthropologist and archaeologist, who primarily studied Native American and Hispanic cultures in the American Southwest. Her most known archeological excavation was the dig at Paa-ko located ...

(later Lambert). The excavation revealed a south-to-north development over the village's three centuries of existence, as well as six

kivas A kiva is a space used by Puebloans for rites and political meetings, many of them associated with the kachina belief system. Among the modern Hopi and most other Pueblo peoples, "kiva" means a large room that is circular and underground, ...

built in round, square and rectangular shapes. The site is particularly noted for a series of pre-contact (pre-1541) murals that were recovered from a square kiva in the pueblo's south plaza. These murals represent one of the finest examples of pre-contact Native American art to be found anywhere in North America.

Visitor's Center

The Coronado visitor's center was designed by noted Southwest architect

John Gaw Meem John Gaw Meem IV (November 17, 1894 – August 4, 1983) was an American architect based in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He is best known for his instrumental role in the development and popularization of the Pueblo Revival Style and as a proponent of ar ...

. It displays fourteen of the restored kiva murals as well as Pueblo Indian and Spanish Colonial artifacts. An interpretive trail winds through the ruins and along the west bank of the

Rio Grande The Rio Grande ( and ), known in Mexico as the Río Bravo del Norte or simply the Río Bravo, is one of the principal rivers (along with the Colorado River) in the southwestern United States and in northern Mexico. The length of the Rio G ...

References

External links

Coronado Historic Site Blog
An informative blog that is updated weekly with events and activities*
Coronado Historic Site
at New Mexico Historic Sites
American Southwest, a National Park Service ''Discover Our Shared Heritage'' Travel Itinerary
{{Authority control Archaeological sites on the National Register of Historic Places in New Mexico Ruins in the United States Museums in Sandoval County, New Mexico Native American museums in New Mexico History museums in New Mexico Protected areas of Sandoval County, New Mexico National Register of Historic Places in Sandoval County, New Mexico Tiwa Puebloans

History

Visitor's Center

See also

References

External links