For fans of antiquities like GB and me, no trip to Durango is complete without visiting the two very distinct sets of ruins at La Ferrería, about 5 miles south of Durango proper.
The more recent site of La Ferrería (= "The Iron Works") comprises the 19th Century hacienda and private foundry/smelter outbuildings that had been used to refine the iron ore that was found in the region. As technology developed, the foundry structures fell into disuse and, eventually, ruins. In the 1980s ownership of the property transferred from private hands to the State of Durango, which restored the hacienda, transforming it into a museum and community center. Durango further stabilized the remaining foundry buildings and developed them and the surrounding area into a public park. We and several local folk enjoyed strolling around the grounds and peeking into the remains of the smelter, but a century ago it must have been a very treeless, loud, and dusty place.
The site of La Ferrería that interested GB and me the most, though, was perched atop a flat bluff overlooking a bend of the Tunal River (photo, above right, shows a bit of river and the city of Durango in the background). It represented human occupation that was a bit older. Like, going back 2000 years with its apex from 800 CE - 1450 CE. This time period especially interested us because it is generally the same time frame in which the cultures further north in the US Southwest and in Mexico's Northwest (Mimbres- Mogollon, Hohokam, Ancestral Puebloans, Paquimé) were active.
Current archaeological opinion suggests that over the centuries
several different native groups migrated in, out, and around the
greater US Southwest/Mexico Northwest region; and La Ferrería seems to have fit this model well. Similar to Mesoamerican sites further south, such as Copalita, La Ferrería's ruins include low stone platforms (2 photos, left) that had originally supported wood-and-thatch temples that disintegrated centuries ago (artist's rendition in
photo, right). Other buildings surrounded sunken patios (third photo, bottom, on left; other structures downhill in background), which archaeologists observe is characteristic for La Ferrería's region and time period.
Archaeologists excavated the ruins of La Ferrería in the late 1940s-early 1950s. Unfortunately, some of the artifacts they recovered and relied upon to determine dates of occupation and cultural groups have since disappeared. Moreover, during the following decades the site was repeatedly looted. Thus much of the archaeological record - both excavated and still in situ - was lost to later researchers. Salvage and restoration began in the 1980s and continued through the end of the 1990s, and was done with more modern archaeological sensibilities. Meaning, today's visitors are not allowed to climb upon the ruins nor touch the petroglyphs (that one up on the right is so badly weathered it's hard to make out what the circles and lines may represent; and the one down here on the left is interpreted as a priest with a deer-antler headdress; but I see 2 individuals with deer-antler
headdresses [a mirror image? The hero twins?]). The public must keep to the trails that wind among some of the ruins and around the hillside. Not all structures are made available to the public. Site stewards stroll along the trails as well, providing information about the ruins as well as keeping their eyes open for any potential shenanigans. There is an on-site museum that houses some of La Ferrería's artifacts, but it was undergoing remodeling when we visited. Tourism is like that sometimes.
Some visitors feel that there is very little to see at La Ferrería, and much is left to the imagination. That is an understandable critique, but the site and its museum are worthwhile for any visitor to Durango to learn something about the region's cultural history, which includes the US Southwest. An avocational archaeologist may find a visit here more rewarding. At the very least, walking the trails under blue skies, looking downhill to the river and toward the city in the distance, can be restorative on its own.
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