The Prehistoric World; Or, Vanished Races

by Emory Adams Allen

In the village of Palenque, built in the wall of a church,³⁸ are two stone tablets which once stood on each side of the doorway of the altar containing the tablet of the cross.³⁹ Mr. Stephens was under the impression that they were originally placed on the altar of the tablet of the sun, and they are so represented in the cut (Altar in the Temple of the Sun.) earlier. This plate represents the left-hand figure. The only explanation which we have met is contained in that oft-quoted article by Mr. Holden. He regards it as the representation of the Maya god of war. We are warned that the weak part of Mr. Holden’s method is his assumption that the mythology of the Mayas was the same as that of the Aztecs, when the evidence is not strong enough to assert such a fact.⁴⁰

We feel that we have been somewhat lengthy in describing the ruins of Palenque. But it is one of the most important groups of ruins that this continent possesses. The most faithful work on the part of the scholars of all lands has not as yet succeeded in clearing up the mystery connected with it. We can tread the courts of their ancient citadel, clamber up to the ruined temples and altars, and gaze on the unread hieroglyphics, but, with all our efforts, we know but little of its history. There was a time when the forest did not entwine these ruins. Once unknown priests ministered at these altars. But cacique, or king, and priest have alike passed away. The nation, if such it was, has vanished, and their descendants are probably to be found in the savage tribes of Yucatan to-day. “In the romance of the world’s history,” says Mr. Stephens, “nothing ever impressed me more forcibly than the spectacle of this once great and lovely city, overturned, desolate, and lost, discovered by accident, overgrown with trees for miles around, without even a name to distinguish it. Apart from every thing else, it was a mournful witness to the world’s mutation.

“‘Nations melt
From power’s high pinnacle, when they have felt
The sunshine for awhile, and downward go.’”

The ruins at Palenque have been so well known, that but little attention has been given to other ruins in the States of Tobasco and Chiapas; and yet, according to M. Charney, imposing ruins of great extent exist in the western part of Tobasco. At a place about thirty-five miles from San Juan, in a north-westerly direction, he found veritable mountains of ruins “overgrown with a luxuriant vegetation.”⁴¹ In the absence of cuts, we can not do more than give a general idea of these ruins.

He asserts that the whole State of Tobasco, and part of Chiapas, is covered with ruins. One landed proprietor informed him that, on his estate, he had counted over three hundred pyramids, all of them covered with ruins. In this connection he refers to the assertions of some of the early Spanish voyagers, that, when skirting the shores of Tobasco, they “saw on the shore, and far in the interior, a multitude of structures, whose white and polished walls glittered in the sun.” On one large pyramid, one hundred and fifteen feet high, he found the remains of a building two hundred and thirty-five feet long.

This building is named the palace. In this building we met with the type that we have learned is the prevailing one further south—that is, three parallel walls, forming two rows of rooms. In general, the rooms are not well arranged for comfort, according to our opinion; but they were, doubtless, well adapted to the communal mode of life prevalent among the Indians. M. Charney seems to have been strongly impressed with the number and importance of the ruins in this State; but, strangely enough, others have not mentioned them.⁴² He says: “I am daily receiving information about the ruins scattered all over the State of Tobasco, hidden in the forests. . . . The imagination fails to realize the vast amount of labor it would involve to explore even a tithe of these ancient sites. These mountains of ruins extend over twelve miles. We still see the hollows in the ground whence the soil was taken for the construction of these pyramids. But they did not consist merely of clay; bricks, too, entered into their construction, and there were strengthening walls to make them firmer. These structures are more wonderful than the pyramids and the other works at Teotihuacan, and they far surpass the pyramids of Egypt.”

In the neighboring State of Chiapas, we find the location of several groups of ruins. At Ocosingo, we have the evident traces of a large settlement. Mr. Stephens mentions four or five pyramids crowned with buildings. Immediately beyond these pyramids he came upon an open plateau, which he considered to have been the site of the city proper. It was protected on all sides by the same high terraces, overlooking for a great distance the whole country around, and rendering it impossible for an enemy to approach from any quarter without being discovered. “Across this table was a high and narrow causeway, which seemed partly natural and partly artificial, and at some distance on which was a mound, with the foundation of a building that had probably been a tower. Beyond this the causeway extended till it joined a range of mountains. . . . There was no place we had seen which gave us such an idea of the vastness of the works erected by the aboriginal inhabitants.”⁴³