Anasazi

Name applied by their Navajo neighbors to modern Pueblo peoples of the U.S. southwest, and to various landscape features associated with them, from Navajo anaasazi "ancestors of the enemies." Said to first have been applied to the ancient Pueblo ruins of southwestern United States in the Mesa Verde region c. 1889 by rancher and trader Richard Wetherill, who began exploration of the sites in the area; established in archaeological terminology 1927.