Acoma Pueblo

A living pueblo, not a ruin, and visited on the tribe’s terms

Acoma Pueblo is a Keres pueblo about 60 miles west of Albuquerque, made up of four communities: Sky City, or Old Acoma, on its mesa, and Acomita, Anzac and McCartys. The Acoma have lived in the area for more than 2,000 years, and it is one of the oldest continuously inhabited communities in the United States. The Acoma themselves date Sky City to the 11th century, with buildings on the mesa as early as 1144. The name does not mean sky city; some tribal authorities link it to háak'u, a place of preparedness, and other elders say it means the place that always was.

The village stands on a mesa 365 feet high. Hernando de Alvarado of Coronado's expedition, who saw it in 1540, called it one of the strongest places they had seen. The only way up was a stairway built by hand, about 200 broad steps and then about 100 narrower ones, finished by holes in the rock for hands and feet, with stones at the top that defenders could roll down without showing themselves.

In December 1598 the Acoma killed Juan de Zaldívar, nephew of the colonizer Juan de Oñate, and 11 of his men in a clash that began over corn; Acoma oral history says it started with an attack on Acoma women. In January 1599 his brother Vicente returned with 70 soldiers. Over three days they dragged a cannon through the streets, burned most of the village and killed about 800 people. Men over 25 had their right feet cut off and were forced into 20 years of slavery, and young people from the age of 12 were taken from their parents. Philip III later exiled Oñate from New Mexico for mismanagement, false reporting and cruelty, and a row of houses on the north side of the mesa still bears marks from the fire.

Survivors rebuilt between 1599 and 1620. From 1629 to 1641, under Father Juan Ramirez, the Acoma were made to build San Esteban del Rey, moving 20,000 short tons of adobe, straw, sandstone and mud to the mesa and bringing ponderosa pine from Mount Taylor, over 40 miles away. The Acoma regard it as a cultural treasure their ancestors' hands built, and in 2007 the National Trust for Historic Preservation named Sky City, church and all, its 28th National Trust Historic Site. A 1999 conditions assessment the Pueblo requested found its mission and convento walls badly deteriorated, and the tribe's Historic Preservation Office has been restoring it since with the church caretakers, the sacristans and gaugushti.

About 300 two- and three-storey adobe buildings stand on the mesa, reached by exterior ladders, with no electricity or running water. Around 30 people live there permanently, more at weekends, and some 55,000 visitors come each year. The tribe receives them at its Haak'u Museum and visitor centre.