Montezuma Castle National Monument

Established in 1906 by President Theodore Roosevelt, Montezuma Castle was one of the nation’s first national monuments. Easy to get to off I-17 between Phoenix and Flagstaff, Montezuma Castle National Monument can be a quick stop and a brief look at an unusual prehistoric building in a cliff wall. Basically a photo-op. Or it can be much more, especially if you take a little time and also go to the Montezuma Well unit.

Montezuma Castle has absolutely nothing to do with the Aztec emperor Montezuma. It was either named in the 1800’s by settlers who thought it was built by Aztec refugees or by the U.S. Army as one ranger related. At any rate, neither Montezuma nor any of the Aztecs were ever close to this area. The “castle” was built by the prehistoric Sinagua people.

We’ve visited many prehistoric dwelling ruins – pithouses, cliff dwellings, canyon dwellings, pueblos, etc. but there is something very different about Montezuma Castle. I think it has to do with the fact that it appears to be clinging to the side of a limestone cliff and is very vertical. Many of the other ruins are in alcoves in sandstone cliffs or on canyon floors.

Until 1951, all visitors to Montezuma Castle were allowed to enter the ruin by climbing a series of ladders. As visitation and impact on the structural integrity increased so did the difficulty in ensuring visitor safety. All public tours were discontinued. Now the closest you get is the trail at the base of the cliff.

The Sinagua people were living in the Verde Valley as early as 650 CE but they began building permanent living structures around 1050 CE. This prehistoric group was named in 1939 by Dr. Harold S. Colton who first identified the culture. The name Sinagua comes from the Spanish meaning “without water.” Ironically, the Sinagua in the Verde Valley actually had plenty of water. Montezuma Castle resides above the banks of Beaver Creek, a tributary of the Verde River, which was a constant water source. The Sinagua were farmers, hunters and gatherers. They grew corn, beans and squash and gathered wild plants and spread their seeds in cleared spots. They also built canals for irrigation.

The Sinagua abandoned Montezuma Castle around 1400 CE and it remains whole today because its location naturally protected it from the elements. There are remnants of dozens of other dwellings in this area but none survived as well as Montezuma Castle.

The “castle” is a five-story, 20-room mud-and-stone structure built on ledges into a cavity in the cliff face. The walls are made of limestone rocks stacked and held together with clay. Once the walls were completed, an adobe plaster was used to coat and seal the exterior. It is almost wholly intact. The primary entrance is a doorway in Level 2 with access to other levels through interior ladders via holes in the ceilings. These rooms would have been smoky and dark but inhabitants probably spent most of their time on the open rooftop on Level 5 or in the fields and woods below.

About 11 miles by road from the “castle” is Montezuma Well which became a sub-unit of Montezuma Castle National Monument in 1947. The Well is a natural limestone sinkhole through which some 1,500,000 gallons of water emerge every day. Water is fed into the Well through several vents at the bottom and exits the well through a swallet and cave system. The outlet drains into a prehistoric irrigation canal. The land around Montezuma Well has been home to many prehistoric groups of people since as early as 11,000 CE. Two small pueblos and a small alcove home are observable at Montezuma Well.

The question of the depth of the Well long sparked curiosity. In the late 1800’s Capt. Warren Day tied a rock to a rope, determined it to be 65 feet but announced to his fellow soldiers at Fort Verde that it was bottomless. In 1948 diver H. J. Charbonneau went into the Well and reported the bottom was at 55 feet and composed of fine silt. There have been nine documented dives to the bottom since that first descent.

In 1962 diver G. J. Murray became the first to report that the mysterious bottom was perhaps not the bottom but rather a “false bottom”. This false bottom has been described as an irregular boiling surface like thin mush cooking, quick sand or boiling oatmeal.

In 2006 a team of divers from the National Park Service Submerged Center was invited specifically to study the “false bottom”. They confirmed the false bottom is caused by pressurized groundwater entering the bottom of the well and holding fluidized sand in suspension and causing it to have a boiling appearance.

To view a video of the 2006 exploration: https://www.nps.gov/media/video/view.htm?id=DECA76BE-1DD8-B71B-0B5CAB240E16714F

The water level and temperature remain nearly constant throughout the year. Extreme chemical concentrations in the water make it impossible for fish to live in the Well and organisms living in the water have had to adapt in order to survive. There are five species living in the Well that are not known to occur anywhere else in the world.

One discovery made during the 2006 dive was the correlation of the scientific research with the traditional stories of the Yavapai and Apache people. The stories of the tribal elders said there was a place at the bottom from which once something emerged, it could never return. Everything the scientists tried putting down the holes – cameras, rovers, sensors – kept being pushed back out.

From the Well, one can see evidence of permanent settlement spanning more than 1,000 years. Montezuma Well has long been a refuge on the dry desert landscape.