whats a kiva?

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G'day 2littlebadones,

Thanks for your question.

A kiva is a room used by modern Puebloans for religious rituals, many of them associated with the kachina belief system. Among the modern Hopi and most other Pueblo peoples, modern kivas are square-walled and above-ground, and are used for spiritual ceremonies.

Similar subterranean rooms are found among the ancient peoples of the American southwest, including the Ancient Pueblo Peoples, the Mogollon and the Hohokam. Those used by the Ancient Pueblos of the Pueblo I Era and following, designated by the Pecos Classification system developed by archaeologists, were usually round, and generally believed to have been used for religious and other communal purposes. When designating an ancient room as a kiva, archaeologists make assumptions about the room's original functions and how those functions may be similar to or differ from kivas used in modern practice. The katchina belief system appears to have emerged in the Southwest at approximately AD 1250, while kiva like structures occurred much earlier. This suggests that the room's older functions may have been changed or adapted to suit the new religious practice.

Kivas are entered through a hole in the roof. A stone bench for sitting lines the inside wall, sometimes interrupted by support columns for the roof. There is usually a hole or indentation in the floor, now called a sipapu. Pueblo belief systems state that the sipapu symbolizes the connection from birth with Mother Earth. It may also represent the spot from which the original inhabitants emerged from the lower world. Near the center of the kiva is a fire pit. A ventilation shaft on one side supplies floor-level air for the fire.

As cultural changes occurred, particularly during the Pueblo III period between 1150 and 1300, some kivas were also built above ground. Kiva architecture became more elaborate, with tower kivas and great kivas incorporating specialized floor features. For example, kivas found in Mesa Verde were generally keyhole shaped. In most larger communities, it was normal to find one kiva for each five or six rooms used as residences. However, after 1325 or 1350, except in the Hopi region, the ratio changed to 60 to 90 rooms for each kiva. This may indicate a religious or organizational change within the society, perhaps affecting the status and number of clans among the Pueblo people.

You can find more about kivas in this work:

* Cordell, Linda S. Ancient Pueblo Peoples. St. Remy Press, Montreal and Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C., 1994. ISBN 0-89599-038-5

I have enclosed more sources for your reference.

Regards...Show more

Kivas are an important Southwestern architectural form. 'Kiva' is a Hopi word used to refer to specialized round and rectangular rooms in modern Pueblos. Modern kivas are used by men's ceremonial associations. Archeologists assume that ancient kivas served similar functions. Chacoan kivas are round, usually semi-subterranean, and built into great houses. Like modern kivas, they were entered by a ladder from the roof down to the center of the kiva floor. During ceremonies today, the ritual emergence of participants from the kiva into the plaza above represents the original emergence by Puebloan groups from the underworld into the current world. Late in the Chaco sequence two-to-three story tower kivas were also built.

Archeologists believe kivas developed out of earlier pit structures that were used as dwellings. Chacoan kivas have formal features like fire pits, floor vaults, wind deflectors, and benches, and contain evidence of domestic as well as ritual life. Historically, Puebloan men used kivas as sleeping quarters and meeting rooms at various times of the year.

Kivas come in all sizes. The largest are called great kivas. Two great kivas in Chaco Canyon - Casa Rinconada and Kin Nahasbas - are free-standing; the other great kivas are located in plazas of great houses. Great kivas are assumed to have housed community-level activities, whether ceremonial, social, or political. Small kivas are sometimes called clan kivas, and suggest use by small kin-based family groups....Show more

Kiva means cerimonial room (more or less). In Hopi tradition this was the center of religious life - usually partly subterranean. .

Some historians believed each clan may have had its own kiva in which they celebrated various rites of passage. However, this isn't wholly confirmed.

Ancestral rememberances were often shared here akin to how we share family stories around a fire or stove.

this site gives a lot of good history FYI:

www.ancestral.com/cultures/north_america/hopi.html...Show more

Not absolutely positive, but I think it was a native american enclosed prayer circle.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiva...Show more

It's like a house bulit of dirt and sand built by the aztec indians like a LONG time ago...Show more