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Puerco Ruin and Petroglyphs

Archaeology
Near Holbrook, Arizona
4.3 mi from Route 66
National Register of Historic Places

Puerco Ruin and Petroglyphs is the site of a large Ancestral Puebloan village inside Petrified Forest National Park, near Holbrook, AZ, about 5 miles off the old road. At its height, around 1300 CE, the pueblo held more than 100 rooms. It is the biggest known archeological site in the park and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Rock art rounds out the stop.

What is Puerco Ruin and Petroglyphs?

The ruin is what remains of a big pueblo, a village of connected rooms built by Native people. With more than 100 rooms, it was a sizable community, and no larger archeological site is known within the park. The name also points to the petroglyphs, images pecked into rock, that are part of the same listing.

The village was at its largest around 1300 CE. The ruins, together with the petroglyphs, are listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and many sources describe them as Anasazi, an older name for the Ancestral Puebloan people.

Visiting Puerco Ruin and Petroglyphs: tips

Plan on a detour of about 5 miles from Route 66 into the national park. Restrooms are on site and the site is listed as wheelchair accessible, which is not always the case at desert ruins. Allow half an hour or so to walk around the pueblo and look for the rock art.

Newspaper Rock, with its hundreds of petroglyphs, is only about a mile away, and the old settlement of Adamana is about 1.6 miles off. Together they make an easy loop through the park's human history.