El Morah: Inscription Rock

El Morah — Inscription Rock

By Joseph E. Robinson, President of the California Mission

In a little-known part of western New Mexico, about forty

miles from Zuni (the present home of more than one thousand

Pueblo Indians, and all that is left of the famed "Seven Cities

of Cibola"), and twelve miles from the little "Mormon" settle-

ment of Ramah, is perhaps the most famous cliff in the world,

and yet but few people, comparatively, are aware of it.

More than three hundred years ago the Spanish fathers

named this cliff "El Morah" — the castle; Americans of today

call it "Inscription Rock," and it is the signal object of interest

and veneration in the El Morah National Government Reserve.

El Morah is composed of very fine, white sandstone, stands

over two hundred feet high, with precipitous sides, and its tur-

rets, bastions, and embattlements warrant the name "Castle"

given it. Upon its apex are the ruins of two ancient pueblos,

set opposite each other by a chasm that has nearly cleft El

Morah in twain.

This historic place used to be a favorite rendezvous for the

early Spanish explorers and adventurers who traversed the great

southwest of America and discovered the Pueblo Indians, the

Grand Canyon of the Colorado, and the Gulf of Lower Califor-

nia, more than three hundred years ago.

El Morah is called the "Stone Autograph Album," for it

bears the name of nearly every man of note who traveled in the

great southwest in the early days of Spanish adventure. The

oldest identified autograph is that of Don Juan de Onate, April

16, 1605. There is one other, that of Pedro Romero, which

appears to have been written apparently in 1580. If that be

Elder Orson F. Whitney, President D. K. Udall and Brother Waite at "El

Morah." The lettering in the face of the cliff may be noted

with a magnifying glass.

true, he was a comrade of Sanchez Chamuscade, who made his

remarkable march of exploration that year. There is another

that looks to be "1526," but I have learned that the "5" is most

probably an old style "7", and therefore this date would be

1726, as it is thought no white man set foot in New Mexico two

hundred years earlier than this period. The old Conquistadors

who wrote their names in this wonderful album, with the points

of their swords or poniards, have left in many instances a pa-

thetic history behind them. One such was Diego de Vargas, a

generous hero who re-conquered New Mexico after the fearful

Pueblo rebellion of 1680, in which twenty-one missionaries and

four hundred Spaniards were massacred by the Indians in one

day, and their survivors driven back into old Mexico. De Vargas'

statement is as follows:

"Aqui estaba el Gen. Dn. Do. de Vargas quien conquisto a

nuestra Santa Fe y a la Real Corona todo el nuero menco a su

Our party on top oj a Zuni Pueblo, second story.

Costa, ano de 1692:" which translated freely, means:

"Here General Don Diego de Vargas conquered for our holy

faith, and for the royal crown (of Spain) all of New Mexico at

his own expense, in the year 1692."

His writing is very pretty. So also is that of Ensign Don

Zuni Indian vegetable gardens, each walled in, and the plants cultivated

individually.

Joseph de Payba Basconzelos, who stated that in February, 1726,

he "brought the Town Council of the Kingdom of New Mexico,

at his own expense, by that rock."

Along with the many interesting Spanish names are

ancient Indian pictographs which would doubtless be as

full of interest and reveal as much history of an earlier

date still as that which has been engraven by the Span-

iards. There is one other short statement of a common

soldier contained in two tiny, quaint lines, which state that "I

am a soldier from the land of Felipe de Arellano, on the 16th

of September." If this is so, he was one of the three men left

of the massacred Spanish garrison that was guarding the city of

Zuni in 1700.

Nearly all these old heroes, for such they were, record the

fact that all they did was for their faith and the glory of Spain,

and I feel that they are worthy of homage because of their cour-

age, loyalty, and devotion, even though today we may differ with

them in a concept of the right of religion, conquest and ex-

ploitation. It is well worth one's time and means, if he be in

the vicinity of El Morah, to visit it and see the hundreds of

writings thereon, some most handsome in execution and design,

and others so crude that it takes a learned student to decipher

them.

I visited this interesting place in company with Elder Orson

F. Whitney, President David K. Udall and Brother Waite.

The hour was too late to secure a good photograph, but I am

enclosing such as I made, but failed to get a close-up picture

that would show the autographs. However, with a magnifying

glass, one can see some of the inscriptions cut into the enduring

stone, just in front of the above-mentioned party.

Zuni women winnowing wheat on top of Pueblo. The Zuni huts in the

background are built on the modern plan. The corrals or

yards are upright cedar posts.

Elder Orson F. Whitney at the Grand Canyon of Arizona.

While there, and "under the spell of the hour," I penned

the following lines, which Brother Whitney passed by with a

shrug of his shoulder and a lift of his eyebrow, but I submit

them to the Era for what they are worth:

El Morah (Inscription Rock)

Thou mighty tome of distant age,

Windcarved and worn by frost and sun,

What tales are writ upon thy page

Of battles lost — of virtues won!

Sublime, majestic, set apart,

Thou sentinel of solitude,

Containest sphinxdike in thy heart

The history of a multitude.

A race so long since dead and gone

That men know not their name nor place,

Have carved in symbols yet unknown

Their lifework on thy stony face;

And others than the race forgot,

Conquistador and pioneer,

With Spanish priest who shared their lot,

Have each in turn made record here.

Could'st thou but speak, what tales of woe

Thy stormy lips might tell us then,

And stories, too, that warm and glow

With bravest deeds of val'rous men;

For those who found thee in this place,

So far removed from worldly ken,

Were heroes all, and set the pace

For years to come, for other men.

Los Angeles, Cal.