La Cieneguilla Pueblo (LA 16)

La Cieneguilla Pueblo (LA 16) is located on the eastern banks of the Santa Fe River.

Pueblo La Cieneguilla is a large, Pueblo IV period Ancestral Pueblo village consisting of at least 30 small and large roomblocks with up to 1000 above-ground rooms. The site ceramics indicate two main periods of occupation at the pueblo. The first one took place between AD 1300 and the mid-AD 1400s while the second was from the late La Cieneguilla Pueblo (LA 16)AD 1400s to the Spanish Entrada. The larger roomblocks probably had at least two stories and the individual rooms were made using adobe-and-rock construction. While most of the Galisteo Basin pueblos have a layout consisting of several rectangular plazas surrounded by roomblocks, several of the La Cieneguilla roomblocks appear to be placed freely within the pueblo. Only two kivas have been identified at the site. At the west end of the site is the San Antonio de Cieneguilla chapel which was built in AD 1820. The chapel is not used for regular Sunday services although it is attended on the feast day of San Antonio in June.

Major work at the site was performed by N.C. Nelson in 1914 when he excavated up to 122 rooms and first defined the limits of the site. Other scientific research at the site include 4-5 rooms excavated in 1956 by the Santa Fe Archaeological Society and test excavations performed in the 1980s by the School of American Research in Santa Fe. Analysis both in the field and of collected surface artifacts has been conducted in the past few decades

Diagnostic ceramic types include several Rio Grande Glazewares such as Cieneguilla Glaze-on-yellow, Agua Fria Glaze-on-red, San Clemente Glaze-polychrome, Cieneguilla Glaze-polychrome, Espinoso Glaze-on-red, and Espinoso Glaze-polychrome. Earlier carbon paint black-on-white pottery includes Biscuit A and Santa Fe Black-on-white. Historic aqua glass, majolica, late 19th century crockery, and many pieces of unidentified china are found on the surface.

The La Cieneguilla Pueblo is located within the La Cieneguilla Land Grant with approximately 40% of the site area still being owned by the Bureau of Land Management.