Across Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico, can be found many ruins of elaborate stone cities and settlements on mesa tops or in the sheltered recesses of the canyon walls.. These were the dwellings of Native Americans of very early years. The ruins speak of a people adept at building, artistic in their crafts and skillful at wresting a living from a difficult land. These were the structures of the Anasazi (Navajo for "ancient ones"), Puebloan, Mogollon, Sinagua, Salado, Hohokam (Pima for "those who are gone"), and others.

The pithouse was the beginnings of a settled way of life, based on agriculture. Consisting of a shallow pit with log sides that angled up to a flat roof covered by grass, mud, bark, and poles. Then they began building houses above ground, with upright walls made of poles and mud, one against another in long, curving rows often with a pithouse or two in front. They became known as Pueblos, Spanish for village dwellers. They advanced from pole-and-adobe construction to skillful stone masonry. Walls of thick, double-coursed stone often rose two or three stories high and were joined together into units of 50 rooms or more.

The midi is "Sacred".

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