The building, including the walls, measures some 26 feet, the walls are 3 feet 9 inches in thickness, the size of the apartments is about 8 feet, and the depth of the vault inside some 23 feet (see Plate). The palace was brightly painted, as may yet be seen in the north corner, which is of a deep red. The miscellaneous compound to be met at Tula and Teotihuacan is not observable here, where obsidian came from a great distance and was accordingly rare; pottery was consequently replaced by fruit-shells, which had the advantage of being more durable, cheaper, and lighter. These shells are worked into a variety of shapes differing in size and value: there are the jicaras, small cups, pure and simple; tecomates, large cups; atotoniles, cubiletes, cocos, etc.; then the jicara-flor, or half-shell cut crosswise; the most prized of all, the jicara-boton, half upper shell; the jicara-barba, or shell cut lengthwise. All these shells are given elegant shapes whilst growing on the tree, and when dry are ornamented with pretty devices either sunk or in relief. A calabash having a very large shell is also fashioned into a vase called atecomate by the Indians, and painted with fast colours of which the natives alone seem to have the secret.
RUINS OF PALACE.
But if few fragments were found in comparison with those unearthed on the high plateaux, I had the good fortune to pick up two bricks covered with curious sunk designs, most rare, for they were the only two specimens I could find of the kind. A concentric drawing covers the first, whilst the second bears the full likeness of a warrior, with feathers about his head—it is a rude drawing which was done on the soft clay before it was baked. Both bricks are in the Trocadéro.
Some 35 feet to the south-east of the palace, on a cemented platform over 26 feet broad by 38 feet long, is a tower (No. 1 in our plan) which is supported and bound by the roots of large trees surrounding it. It is oblong in shape, most picturesque, and, save the base, similar to that at Palenque. This tower has three storeys, of which two are still standing, and it may be assumed from what remains that the second storey was divided into four compartments or small rooms, the dimensions of which are the following: two inner rooms, of 5 feet 7 inches on one side, correspond to other two, and form a kind of outward passage, having three openings, which are separated by two pillars of 2 feet on one side. The first storey underneath reproduced probably the same distribution. We penetrated in the only accessible room, measuring some 8 feet by 5 feet 8 inches.
The ornamentation of this tower must have been gigantic; the fragment which was found among a heap of rubbish, and which we reproduce, is no less than 6 feet. The figures or characters seen on the wall, and which recall Arabic inscriptions, are over 3 feet high, and in strong relief. This was obtained by applications of freshly-made plaster—a process belonging to the first epoch, and which we shall meet at Palenque, Tikal, and particularly Aké and Izamal in the Yucatan peninsula.
Tower No. 2, some 32 feet to the south-east of the palace, is a ruinous mass, but must have been far more important than the first. Nothing remains save fragments of walls, so shapeless as to make it difficult to draw an approximate plan of the building. To the north, however, a flight of steps in fair preservation allows us to reconstruct the first storey. The four sides were probably similar, having doors opening on the stairs by which the terrace was reached, giving access to four rooms, now underground, of about 8 feet by 6 feet 8 inches. Our drawing gives the stairs and the entrance to one of the rooms. In this tower the ornamentation must have been as peculiar as that of No. 1, as shown by an enormous unbroken fragment of wall lying on the ground, representing the full-size figure of a man, whose fine proportions are very remarkable. The upper portion of the body, the fore-arm, and part of the leg are wanting; of the clothing nothing remains save the girdle and a bit on the thigh. The statue had presumably no other covering but the maxtli, as is the case at Palenque in the decoration of the inner wing of the palace.
ORNAMENTATION OF SOUTH-EAST TOWER, COMALCALCO.
This tower (No. 2), with its flight of steps and its platform on which rose the body of the edifice, answers the description of similar monuments at Cozumel and along the seaboard given by Oviedo and Grijalva’s chaplain; and both towers and palaces, as also the temples we shall visit later, must have gleamed on the astonished gaze of the Spaniards, as did those of the maritime cities in Yucatan. We know that the first were inhabited at the time of the Conquest; have we not the right to affirm as much for Comalcalco? And if Comalcalco was inhabited, what shall be said of Palenque, where we shall find a far greater number of buildings in better preservation?