Part 8

THE RUINS IN YUCATAN.

The remains of ancient cities are abundant in the settled portion of Yucatan, which lies north of the great forest. Charnay found “the country covered with them from north to south.” Stephens states, in the Preface to his work on Yucatan, that he visited “forty-four ruined cities or places” in which such remains are still found, most of which were unknown to white men, even to those inhabiting the country; and he adds that “time and the elements are hastening them to utter destruction.”

Previous to the Spanish Conquest, the region known to us as Yucatan was called Maya. It is still called Maya by the natives among themselves, and this is the true name of the country. Why the Spaniards called it Yucatan is unknown, but the name is wholly arbitrary and without reason. It is said to have arisen from an odd mistake like that which occasioned the name given to one of the capes by Hernandez de Cordova. Being on the coast in 1517, he met some of the natives. Their cacique said to him, “Conèx cotoch,” meaning “Come to our town.” The Spaniard, supposing he had mentioned the name of the place, immediately named the projecting point of land “Cape Cotoche,” and it is called so still.

At that time the country was occupied by the people still known as Mayas. They all spoke the same language, which was one of a closely related family of tongues spoken in Guatemala, Chiapas, Western Honduras, and in some other districts of Central America and Mexico. Yucatan was then much more populous than at present. The people had more civilization, more regular industry, and more wealth. They were much more highly skilled in the arts of civilized life. They had cities and large towns; and dwelling-houses, built of timber and covered with thatch, like those common in England, were scattered over all the rural districts. Some of the cities now found in ruins were then inhabited. This peninsula had been the seat of an important feudal monarchy, which arose probably after the Toltecs overthrew the very ancient kingdom of Xibalba. It was broken up by a rebellion of the feudal lords about a hundred years previous to the arrival of the Spaniards. According to the Maya chronicles, its downfall occurred in the year 1420. Mayapan, the capital of this kingdom, was destroyed at that time, and never afterward inhabited.

Merida, the present capital of Yucatan, was built on the site of an ancient Maya city called Tihoo. It is stated in the old Spanish accounts of Merida that it was built on that site because there was in the ruins an abundance of building material. There is mention of two “mounds” which furnished a vast amount of hewn stone. Mr. Stephens noticed in some of the edifices stones with “sculptured figures, from the ruins of ancient buildings;” and he mentions that a portion of an ancient building, including an arch in the Maya style, was retained in the construction of the Franciscan convent.

MAYAPAN.

We shall notice only some of the principal ruins in Yucatan, beginning with Mayapan, the ancient capital. The remains of this city are situated about ten leagues, in a southern direction, from Merida. They are spread over an extensive plain, and overgrown by trees and other vegetation. The most prominent object seen by the approaching explorer is a great mound, 60 feet high and 100 feet square at the base. It is an imposing structure, seen through the trees, and is itself overgrown like a wooded hill. Figure 34 shows one view of this. Four stairways, in a ruinous condition, 25 feet wide, lead up to an esplanade within 6 feet of the top, which is reached by a smaller stairway. The summit is a plain stone platform 15 feet square. This, of course, was a temple. Sculptured stones are scattered around the base, and within the mound subterranean chambers have been discovered.

It is probable that the principal edifices at Mayapan were not all built wholly of stone, for they have mostly disappeared. Only one remains, a circular stone building 25 feet in diameter, which stands on a pyramidal foundation 35 feet high. This is represented in Figure 35. On the southwest side of it, on a terrace projecting from the mound, was a double row of columns without capitals, 8 feet apart. There are indications that this city was old, and that the buildings had been more than once renewed. Brasseur de Bourbourg classes some of the foundations at Mayapan with the oldest seen at Palenque and Copan. This point, however, can not be determined with sufficient accuracy to remove all doubt. Mayapan may have stood upon the foundations of a very ancient city which was several times rebuilt, but the city destroyed in 1420 could not have been as old as either Palenque or Copan.

UXMAL.

The ruins of Uxmal have been regarded as the most important in Yucatan, partly on account of the edifices that remain standing, but chiefly because they have been more visited and explored than the others. It is supposed, and circumstantial evidence appears to warrant the supposition, that this city had not been wholly deserted at the time of the Spanish Conquest, although it had previously begun to be a ruin. It was wholly a ruin in 1673. The area covered by its remains is extensive. Charnay makes it a league or more in diameter; but most of the structures have fallen, and exist now only in fragments scattered over the ground. It may be that many of them were not built wholly of hewn stone, and had not “Egyptian solidity” with their other characteristics.

The most important of those remaining was named “Casa del Gobernador” by the Spaniards. It is 320 feet long, and was built of hewn stone laid in mortar or cement. The faces of the walls are smooth up to the cornice. Then follows, on all the four sides, “one solid mass of rich, complicated, and elaborately sculptured ornaments, forming a sort of arabesque.” Figure 36 gives a view of the south end of this edifice, but no engraving can show all the details of the ornamentation.

This building has eleven doorways in front, and one at each end, all having wooden lintels, which have fallen. The two principal rooms are 60 feet long, and from 11 to 13 feet wide. This structure is long and narrow The arrangement and number of the rooms are shown in the following ground plan of the building (Figure 37):

It stands on the summit of one of the grandest of the terraced foundations. This foundation, like all the others, is pyramidal. It has three terraces. The lowest is 3 feet high, 15 wide, and 575 long; the second is 20 feet high, 275 wide, and 545 long; the third, 19 feet high, 30 wide, and 360 long. Structures formerly existed on the second terrace, remains of which are visible. At the northwest corner one of them still shows its dilapidated walls, portions of them being sufficiently complete to show what they were. This edifice was 94 feet long and 34 wide. It seems to have been finely finished in a style more simple than that of the great “casa” on the upper terrace. The figures of turtles sculptured along the upper edge of the cornice have given it the current designation, “House of the Turtles.” Sculptured monuments have been found buried in the soil of the second terrace. The opening of a small, low mound situated on it brought to view the double-headed figure shown in No. 38. Figure 39 shows part of the sculptured decoration over the centre doorway of Casa del Gobernador.

Another important edifice at Uxmal has been named “Casa de las Monjas,” House of the Nuns. It stands on a terraced foundation, and is arranged around a quadrangular court-yard 258 feet one way and 214 the other. The front structure is 279 feet long, and has a gateway in the centre 10 feet 8 inches wide leading into the court, and four doors on each side of it. The outer face of the wall, above the cornice, is ornamented with sculptures. The terrace without and within the inclosure was found covered with a very dense growth of vegetation, which it was necessary to clear away before the walls could be carefully examined. All the doorways, save those in front, open on the court. Mr. Stephens found the four great façades fronting the court-yard “ornamented from one end to the other with the richest and most intricate carving known to the builders of Uxmal, presenting a scene of strange magnificence which surpasses any other now seen among its ruins.” The long outer structure, on the side facing the entrance, had high turret-like elevations over each of its thirteen doorways, all covered with sculptured ornaments. This building appears to have inclosed another of older date. Figure 40 shows the ground plan of “Las Monjas.”

Other less important edifices in the ruins of Uxmal have been described by explorers, some of which stand on high pyramidal mounds; and inscriptions are found here, but they are not so abundant as at Palenque and Copan.

KABAH.

The ruins known as Kabah are on the site of what must have been one of the most imposing and important of the more ancient cities. Here the most conspicuous object is a stone-faced mound 180 feet square at the base, with a range of ruined apartments at the bottom. Three or four hundred yards from this mound is a terraced foundation 20 feet high and 200 by 142 in extent, on which stand the remains of a great edifice. At the right of the esplanade before it is a “high range of ruined structures overgrown with trees, with an immense back wall on the outer line of the esplanade perpendicular to the bottom of the terrace.” On the left is another range of ruined buildings, and in the centre a stone inclosure 27 feet square and 7 feet high, with sculptures and inscriptions around the base. Some of the ornamentation of this building has been described in the strongest terms of admiration. Mr. Stephens said of it, “The cornice running over the doorways, tried by the severest rules of art recognized among us, would embellish the architecture of any known era.” At Uxmal the walls were smooth below the cornice; here they are covered with decorations from top to bottom.

This field of ruins is extensive, and only a portion of it has been examined. It is so overgrown that exploration is very difficult. The buildings and mounds are much decayed, and they seem to be very old. It is believed that ruined edifices of which nothing is known are hidden among the trees in places which no explorer has approached. Mr. Stephens gave the first account of Kabah, and described three other important edifices besides that already named. One of these he thought was, when entire, the most imposing structure at Kabah. It was 147 feet long by 106 wide, and had three distinct stories, each successive story being smaller than that below it. Another, standing on the upper terrace of an elevated foundation 170 feet long by 110 broad, was 164 feet in length, and comparatively narrow. It is mentioned as a peculiarity of this edifice that it had pillars in its doorways, used as supports. The other, found standing on a terrace, is also long and narrow, and has a comparatively plain front.

Remains of other buildings are visible, but in all cases they are so completely in ruins as to be little more than heaps of débris. Some of the ruins in the woods beyond that part of the field which is most accessible, are visible from the great mound described. A resolute attempt to penetrate the forest brought the explorers in view of great edifices standing on an elevated terrace estimated to be 800 feet long by 100 feet wide. The decorations seemed to have been abundant and very rich, but the structures were in a sad state of dilapidation. One remarkable monument found at Kabah resembles a triumphal arch. It stands by itself on a ruined mound apart from the other structures. It is described as a “lonely arch, having a span of 14 feet,” rising on the field of ruins “in solitary grandeur.” Figure 41 gives a view of it.

Kabah was an ancient city. The ruins are old, and the city may have belonged to the first age of the Maya period.

CHICHEN-ITZA.

The ruins of Chichen-Itza are situated east of Mayapan, about half way between the eastern and western coasts of the peninsula of Yucatan. A public road runs through the space of ground over which they are spread. The area covered by them is something less than a mile in diameter. The general character of the ruined structures found here is in every respect like that shown by ruins already described.

One of the great buildings at this place has a rude, unornamental exterior, and does not stand on an artificial terrace, although the ground before it was excavated so as to give the appearance of an elevated foundation. It is one hundred and forty-nine feet long by forty-eight deep. Its special peculiarity consists of a stone lintel, in a very dark inner room, which has an inscription and a sculptured figure on the under side. The writing closely resembles that seen at Palenque and Copan. Was this sculptured stone made originally for the place it now occupies, or was it taken from the ruins of some older city which flourished and went to decay before Chichen-Itza was built?

Another structure seen here closely resembles Las Monjas at Uxmal, and bears the same name, but it differs somewhat from the Uxmal Monjas in arrangement. In the descriptions, special mention is made of “the richness and beauty” of its ornaments.

A noticeable edifice connected with the Monjas, called the “Church,” is 26 feet long, 14 deep, 31 high, and has three cornices, the spaces between them being covered with carved ornaments. There is but one room in it. One of the most picturesque ruins at Chichen-Itza is circular in form, and stands on the upper level of a double-terraced platform. It is 22 feet in diameter, and has four doors, which face the cardinal points. Above the cornice it slopes gradually almost to a point, and the top is about 60 feet above the ground. The grand staircase of 20 steps, leading up to this building, is 45 feet wide, and has a sort of balustrade formed of the entwined bodies of huge serpents. At some distance from this is the ruined structure known as the “Casa Colorada,” or Red House. This is shown in Figure 42.

It is 43 feet long by 23 deep, and stands on a platform 62 feet long by 55 wide. It was ornamented above the cornice, but the decorations are much defaced by decay. A stone tablet extending the whole length of the back wall, inside, is covered by an inscription.

A remarkable structure is found at this place, which Mr. Stephens called the “Gymnasium, or Tennis Court.” It consists of two immense parallel walls 274 feet long, 30 thick, and 120 apart. On elevations facing the two ends of the open space between them, 100 feet from the ends of the walls, stand two edifices much ruined, but showing, in their remains, that they were richly ornamented. Midway in the length of the walls, facing each other, and 20 feet above the ground, are two massive stone rings or circles 4 feet in diameter, each having in the centre a hole 1 foot and 7 inches in diameter. On the borders around these holes two entwined serpents are sculptured, as seen in Figure 43.

There was a similar structure in the old city of Mexico, and remains of one like it are found at Mayapan. They were, probably, used for games of some kind. Among the other ruins at Chichen-Itza are the remains of a lofty edifice which has two high ranges or stories. On the outside the ornamentation is simple and tasteful, but the walls of its chambers are very elaborately decorated, mostly with sculptured designs, which seem to have been painted. In one of the upper rooms Mr. Stephens found a beam of sapote wood used as a lintel, which was covered with very elegantly carved decorations. The walls of this room were covered, from the bottom to the top of the arched ceiling, with painted designs similar to those seen in the Mexican “picture writing.” Decay had mutilated these “pictures,” but the colors were still bright. There are indications that painting was generally used by the aboriginal builders, even on their sculptures. The colors seen in this room were green, red, yellow, blue, and reddish-brown. Another edifice, standing on a high mound, is reached by means of the usual great stairway, which begins at the bottom, with a sort of balustrade on each side, the ends of which are stone figures of heads of immense serpents.