Pueblo Bonito, Spanish for "beautiful town" or "pretty village", is the largest and most
famous ruin in Chaco Canyon. Built in stages beginning around 919 AD, the pueblo
reached five stories in height along its back wall and may have contained as many as
800 rooms. Behind Pueblo Bonito is a series of petroglyphs depicting six-toed feet
made in the late 900s or early 1000s. Although the meaning is unknown, extra digit
appendages can be found on other Anasazi rock art as well.

Aztec Ruins, one of the largest Ancestral Pueblo communities in the Animas River
valley, was built and used over a 200-year period beginning in the late 1000s. The
early builders of this multi-story pueblo of about 400 rooms were influenced by
Chaco Canyon to the south, where another large Ancestral Pueblo community
is located. By the 1200s, the people who used the area showed a strong cultural
relationship to the people in the Mesa Verde region to the north.

Tyuonyi Ruins in Frijoles Canyon in Bandelier National Monument, New Mexico.
Adolph F. Bandelier first visited Frijoles Canyon with his Cochiti Indian guides on
October 23, 1880. The first archaeologist to excavate the Tyuonyi ruins was Edgar
Lee Hewett. On February 11, 1916, 42 square miles of the Pajarito Plateau, including
Frijoles Canyon, was declared a national monument by President Woodrow Wilson.

Chetro Ketl, one of the largest pueblos in Chaco Canyon located about one-quarter
mile southeast of Pueblo Bonito, contained over 500 rooms and 12 kivas including
a great kiva in the central courtyard. The rear wall was nearly 500 feet long and
supported five stories of rooms. Tree ring dating of support beams shows that
construction began around 945 AD with the greatest period of building between
1030 and 1090. There are carved stairways in the cliffs behind the ruin that lead
to prehistoric roadways to other communities.

White House Ruin, the best known and most photographed Anasazi cliff dwelling
in Canyon de Chelly, Arizona. It gets it's name from a long wall in the upper ruin
that is covered with white plaster. These ruins date from around 1200AD and are
some of the oldest in the canyon.

Lowery Ruins, Colorado. Built after 1090AD by Chacoan Anasazi the pueblo
reached a size of 40 rooms and nine kivas plus one great kiva nearby. The site
was occupied by around 100 people and was abandoned about 1140, probably
due to drought.

The Castle is part of The Square Tower Group of Hovenweep National Monument.
The Monument protects five prehistoric, Puebloan-era villages spread over a
twenty-mile expanse of mesa tops and canyons along the Utah-Colorado border.
Hovenweep has an undeveloped, natural character. Outlying groups include
Cutthroat Castle, Holly, Horseshoe, Hackberry, and Cajon.

Antelope House, Canyon DeChelly, Arizona. Built between the years 1050 and 1300.

Betatakin cliff dwelling in Navajo National Monument, was built and occupied for
only 50 years, then abandoned around 1300AD by prehistoric Pueblo Indians, the
Kayenta Anasazi due to lack of water for their crops. The ruins are strung along
a long ledge protected inside a 500 foot cliff overhang in Tsegi Canyon in the
Navajo Nation in Northern Arizona.