They Built Homes in the Cliffs. Why Did Their Communities Move?
On December 18, 1888, Richard Wetherill and Charles Mason went looking for cattle with their Ute guide, Acowitz. Across a Colorado canyon stood buildings beneath a rock overhang: Cliff Palace. Their visit brought wider attention to a place Indigenous peoples already knew.
Walls, beams and objects preserved clues to life in the village. An object left in a room does not prove that everyone left suddenly.
The residents moved to other communities. Which clues can help explain why they moved?
~1300 CE
Ancestral Pueblo families built and changed cliff villages over generations. By around 1300, they had moved from Mesa Verde. Living Pueblo communities maintain connections with these ancestral places.
150 rooms
An exceptionally large cliff village. Most of Mesa Verde’s cliff dwellings have only a few rooms.
~600
Cliff dwellings at Mesa Verde — from single rooms to entire villages.
23 years
Tree rings indicate a prolonged dry period in the late 1200s. This means reduced moisture, not twenty-three rainless years.
The Evidence
Cliff Palace
150 rooms, 23 kivas, and towers four storeys high — all built into a natural alcove in the cliff face. Constructed mainly in the late 1100s and 1200s using only stone tools. Remaining objects do not establish a sudden departure.
The Drought Record
Dendrochronology — the science of tree-ring dating — helped date suitable building timbers and reconstruct drought in the late 1200s. Regional beam dates extend into the 1280s; there was no universal early-1260s construction cutoff.
The Pottery Trail
Pottery, buildings and settlement histories help researchers investigate movement between regions. Similar objects may reflect trade as well as migration; several kinds of evidence need to be compared.
A Civilisation Rises and Departs
The First Homes
Ancestral Puebloans begin building pit houses — partly underground dwellings — on the mesa tops. They grow corn, beans, and squash.
Above Ground
Above-ground earthen buildings become common. Stone masonry develops later, as homes and communities continue changing.
Into the Cliffs
Many cliff villages grow in the late 1100s and 1200s. Building continues on mesa tops too. Alcoves offer shelter and, in some places, springs.
Changing Communities
Tree-ring dates vary across sites. Researchers compare them with other occupation evidence and climate records to investigate change.
The Great Drought
A prolonged dry period makes farming less dependable. Migration is already under way, and drought is one of several pressures researchers investigate.
Wider Attention
Richard Wetherill and Charles Mason visit Cliff Palace with Ute guide Acowitz. Indigenous knowledge and earlier visits are also part of its history.
The People in This Story
Richard Wetherill
A Colorado rancher who spotted Cliff Palace through falling snow in December 1888. He spent years exploring the ruins and guiding scientists to them — but also removed artefacts, sparking the first debates about preservation.
Gustaf Nordenskiöld
A Swedish scientist who photographed, measured and excavated cliff dwellings in 1891. His collection went to Europe; ancestral remains and funerary objects were returned to descendant representatives in 2020.
A.E. Douglass
An astronomer who invented dendrochronology — the science of tree-ring dating. In 1929, he bridged the gap in his timeline, allowing suitable timbers to be dated and helping reconstruct past growing conditions.
The Question That Remains
The cliff dwellers did not vanish. Their descendants — Pueblo communities — are still here. But the reason they left remains one of the most debated questions in American archaeology.
How did drought, relationships, conflict and opportunities elsewhere affect different communities? No single explanation needs to fit every family.
Read the full book to investigate the key clues and competing explanations — then decide for yourself.
Get the Full Book
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Part of the Lost Worlds Volume
Ancient cities, remarkable structures, and the communities who built them. Explore the evidence and the living histories behind the ruins.
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Check the evidence
What the evidence supports
Mesa Verde’s cliff villages developed mainly in the late 1100s and 1200s, while building continued on mesa tops. Cliff Palace is exceptionally large; the current park page lists about 150 rooms and 23 kivas. Ancestral Pueblo communities moved from the region during the late 1200s, with descendants maintaining connections today. Tree-ring crossdating dates suitable timbers; climate reconstructions indicate prolonged dry conditions. The park’s history includes Ute guide Acowitz on the 1888 ranching trip.
Where to be careful
A cutting date is not automatically a building or departure date: wood may be reused and outer rings missing. Drought, resource pressure, violence and social choices varied by community. Similar pottery may reflect trade as well as migration. Pueblo communities have distinct histories and traditions; no single account explains every journey.
Explore the sources
These selected sources support this guide and offer further reading. Some are written for adults; explore them with a parent or teacher.
- National Park Service: Mesa Verde people (April 2026)
- National Park Service: Mesa Verde places (April 2026)
- National Park Service: Cliff Palace
- National Park Service: histories of Mesa Verde
- National Park Service: Mesa Verde construction and migration overview
- Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research: Douglass and the 1929 bridge
- Crow Canyon Research Institute: the earlier 1130–1180 drought (2024)
- Crow Canyon: Sand Canyon Pueblo excavation conclusions
- Hopi Tribe: ancestral connections and Hisat Sinom
- National Museum of Finland: responsibility and completed 2020 return
The story and illustrations are modern retellings. Imagined scene details are not historical evidence. These sources are a starting point, not citations for every narrative detail.
Evidence guide reviewed .