Venus rose as the Morning Star on August 26, 1318 AD; a Total Solar Eclipse beginning around 11:20 AM covered the entire Mogollon region including the Upper Gila, the San Francisco River and the Mimbres Valley.⁵⁰⁸ The sudden shadow also fell over the lower Rio Grande and covered the Jornada near Hueco Tanks.

 

“This eclipse was very much like the July 11, 1991 eclipse … Partiality    was visible     almost   everywhere    in      the Americas.”⁵⁰⁹ Mogollon elders and leaders gathered to discuss the omens but   could   only   recall   the political chaos and religious shifts associated with similar SunBird manifestations since the Miraflores sages had made   first   contact. The consensus of tribal elders may have been that a sacrifice was required. The human burial recovered from Room 35 in Cave Three, or the Scarlet macaw remains from the same cave, may represent such a sacrifice. The synchronicity of the Morning Star and this Total Solar Eclipse may have been the deciding factors which spurred the Tularosa Mogollon’s immediate departure from the Gila Cliff Dwellings. At any rate, the exact reason why the last Mogollon left is still unknown.

 

Were the Gila Cliff Dwellings abandoned? If the Mogollon were a hybrid people similar to the ancient Red Hairs who were later called the Si-Te-Cah,⁵¹⁰ they might have been driven out of their original caves and territory; their numbers were minimized by encroaching Mongoloid and Mesoamerican groups.