Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 1.djvu/735

Rh ANTIQUITIES.] AMERICA 693 an eastward settlement, but treacherously attacked them while crossing the river. This conduct gave rise to inve terate hostilities, that terminated in the extermination or subjugation of their opponents, and the establishment of the red men in those regions. This not improbable, though imperfect, account of such rude communities, where neither letters nor hieroglyphics existed, is probably all that we shall ever learn of the people who executed those works that now excite our surprise. iral As we advance southward we find proofs of still greater erican refinement on the table-land of Anahuac or Mexico ; and quities. on descending into the humid valleys of Central America, the peninsula of Yucatan, and the shores of Honduras, we find striking remains of the semi-civilisation of the races that inhabited those countries before the Spanish invasion. The barbarous policy of Cortez and other invaders was to eradicate every trace of the former grandeur of the native races, and thereby to inure them to a degrading servitude. The systematic destruction of the native works of art and gorgeous buildings in Mexico was relentlessly carried on for ages, to the infinite regret of the modern ethnographical inquirer. Little positive information on these subjects can be gleaned from the early Spanish historians of the con quest ; and it was not until the publication of Humboldt s Researches that Europe knew anything of the state of the Great Mexican pyramid, or of the wonderful remains of Palenque and Papantla. In the middle of the last century, however, some Spanish adventurers penetrated with difficulty the dense forests of the Mexican province of Chiapas, in which they discovered the remains of an ancient city, of which all memory had been lost, and to which they gave the name of PALENQUE, from a poor adjacent village. Stimulated by their report, the Spanish Government some years afterwards despatched two intelligent travellers to explore those wilds ; but the report of Del Rio and Du Paix, from the commotions that agitated Europe and convulsed Spain, remained unpublished until a few years ago. It has since appeared, with very in teresting designs of the ruins they explored. Our know ledge of such remains, however, has been greatly enlarged by the labours of an enterprising North American traveller, Mr Stephens, given to the world in four volumes, entitled Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas, and Yucatan, 1838, and Incidents of Travel in Yucatan, 1842. This gentleman discovered, in the almost impenetrable forests of those regions, the remains of no less than 44 towns, some of them with extensive and highly decorated structures. These exhibit walls of hewn stone, admirably put together with mortar, often enriched by sculptures in bold relief, and hieroglyphical inscriptions, exactly resembling the Aztec MSS. in the museums of Europe, and in the publications of Humboldt ; well executed vaulted roofs, and obelisks covered with mythic figures and pictorial or hieroglyphical inscriptions. These curi ous remains have been concealed for ages by a luxu riant tropical vegetation, so dense that they seem to have been unknown to people living within half a mile of their site. The most conspicuous ruins are those of temples and palaces, which almost invariably have a pyramidal form, in several stages, with wide intervening terraces, the ascent to which is by grand flights of steps. The chambers in those buildings have generally a length disproportioned to their width, they have no windows, but receive their light from the doors, just as the rooms do at this day in Barbary and some other eastern countries. The apartments are in two parallel rows, a narrow corridor or series of chambers runs along the front, and the apartments behind this receive their light only from the front rocms into which they open. Yet those interior apartments ai3 often richly decorated with sculptures, ornamented with stuccos, and gaily painted red, yellow, white, and black. The ruins of Palenque, as may be seen in the researches of Humboldt, have the characters just mentioned. They are covered with hieroglyphics, and sculptures in relief, with ornamental cornices. The largest building stands on a terrace, faced with stone, measuring 310 by 260 feet; the building itself is 200 by 180 feet; its walls are 25 feet high. The stone has been originally covered with painted stucco; fronts the east, and contains 14 doors, separated by piers ornamented with stucco figures. In this building some of the figures are erect, while others sit cross-legged, in what we term the oriental fashion ; one statue, 10| feet high, was found at Palenque ; and two fragments of two torsos and a head were also discovered that exhibited a severe but fair style of sculpture, that recalls something of the early style of Greek art. The ruins at Copan, in Honduras, are of vast extent. Here a pyramidal structure remains, with an elevation of 150 feet measured along its slope, and this appears to be a principal temple, included with several smaller structures within a sacred enclosure, in the manner of the temples of ancient Egypt, On its walls are many skulls of a quadru- manous animal, well executed in high relief ; a large figure of a baboon was discovered among the ruins, bearing no in considerable resemblance to the cynocephalus of the Egyp tians. Here also several sculptured obelisks occur, from 11 to 13 feet in height, and from 3 to 4 feet wide, which, as well as the walls of the temple, were highly ornamented with sculptures in bold relief. The similarity between the ruins at Copan and Palenque, and the identity of the hieroglyphic tablets in both, show that the former inhabitants of Chiapas and Honduras had the same ivritten language, though the present Indians of those provinces do not understand each other. At several places, but more especially at Uxmal, in Yucatan, are very magnificent ruins of the same kind. Here are found sculptured obelisks, bearing on their prin cipal face the figure, probably, of some deity, with a be nignant countenance represented in full, and the hands applied to the breast. The other sides of the obelisks are covered with hieroglyphical tablets, proving that the same race once inhabited the plains of Honduras and the table land of Anahuac. The principal building at Uxmal seems to have been a very magnificent pyramid in three stages or terraces, faced with hewn stone, and neatly rounded at the angles. The first terrace is 575 fjet long, 15 feet broad, and 3 feet high, serving as a sort of plinth to the whole the second terrace is 545 feet long, 250 feet wide, and 20 feet high ; the third terrace is 360 feet long, by 30 feet wide, and 19 feet in height, From the centre of the second terrace, the upper part is gained by a vast flight of well- constructed steps 1 30 feet wide. This leads to the temple, the fa:ade of which is no less than 322 feet long, but has not had a greater elevation than 25 feet ; yet its grandeur is enhanced by the rich sculpture that covers the upper part above a fillet, or cornice, that surrounds the whole building at about half its elevation. The interior consists of two parallel ranges of chambers, 11 in each row. The front apartments are entered by 11 doorways, enriched -with sculpture, which gives sufficient light to those rooms; but the posterior row receives no light except what enters by their doors from the exterior rooms. The roofs here, unlike those of Palenque and Copan, are not stone arches, but are sup ported on bearers of a very hard wood, that must have been brought from a distance of some hundred miles, and these beams too are covered with hieroglyphics. The fiat roof of this building has been externally covered with a hard cement. In a building placed on a lower level is a rectan gular court, Avhich has been once wholly paved with well-