[V-26] 'Double-headed cat or lynx,' cut from Stephens' Yucatan, vol. i., p. 183; and Baldwin's Anc. Amer., p. 133. 'Un autel, au centre, soutenait un tigre à deux têtes, dont les corps reliés au ventre figurent une double chimère.' Charnay, Ruines Amér., p. 372. 'Rude carving of a tiger with two heads.' Norman's Rambles in Yuc., p. 156. 'En un mismo cuerpo contiene dos cabezas de tigre de tamaño regular, vueltas hácia fuera: su actitud es la misma que la en que generalmente se representa la esfinge de la fábula; y si su excavacion no fuera tan reciente, probablemente habria corrido la suerte de otras estátuas y objetos preciosos, que à nuestra vista y paciencia han sido sacados del pais para figurar en los museos extranjeros.' M. F. P., in Registro Yuc., tom. i., pp. 364-5. Mr Heller, Reisen, p. 259, confounds this monument with the picote.
[V-27] Stephens' Yucatan, vol. i. pp. 229-32. Sr Peon, proprietor of Uxmal, believed that these excavations were originally used as granaries, not deeming the plaster sufficiently hard to resist water. 'Excavations ... with level curbings and smoothly finished inside.' Norman's Rambles in Yuc., p. 156.
[V-28] Stephens' Yucatan, vol. i., pp. 253-6, with a view in the frontispiece. Although Stephens says the pyramid is only sixty-five feet high, it is noticeable that in Catherwood's drawing it towers high above the roof of the Casa del Gobernador, which is at least sixty-eight feet in height. Norman, Rambles in Yuc., p. 157, calls this a pile of loose stones, about two hundred feet square at the base, and one hundred feet high, and covered on the sides and top with débris of edifices. Friederichsthal, Nouvelles Annales des Voy., 1841, tom. xcii., p. 308, says the summit platform is seventy-seven feet square.
[V-29] Stephens' Yucatan, vol. i., p. 319. A distant view of this pyramid is included in Stephens' general view, p. 305, and in Charnay's photograph 49. Norman, in both plan and text, unites this pyramid at the base with that at E, and makes its height eighty feet. Rambles in Yuc., p. 157.
[V-30] Stephens' Yucatan, vol. i., pp. 318-19, with view of the Casa de Palomas; cut also in Id., Cent. Amer., vol. ii., p. 426. 'Une muraille dentelée de pignons assez élevés, percés d'une multitude de petites ouvertures, qui donnent à chacun la physionomie d'un colombier.' Charnay, Ruines Amér., pp. 371-2, phot. 49. 'A wall of two hundred feet remains standing upon a foundation of ten feet. Its width is twenty-five feet; having ranges of rooms in both sides, only parts of which remain. This wall has an acute-angled arch doorway through the centre.... The top of this wall has numerous square apertures through it, which give it the appearance of pigeon-holes; and its edge is formed like the gable-end of a house, uniformly notched.' Norman's Rambles in Yuc., p. 165, with plate showing one of the peaks of the wall.
[V-31] Stephens' Yucatan, vol. i., p. 320; Norman, Rambles in Yuc., p. 165, speaks of this part of the ruin as 'an immense court or square, enclosed by stone walls, leading to the Nun's House,' C of the plan. He says, also, that some of the scattered mounds in this direction have been excavated and seem to have been intended originally for sepulchres.
[V-32] Mr Stephens, Yucatan, vol. i., p. 320, refers to his appendix for a mention of some of the relics found in this group. The reference is probably to a note on vestiges of the phallic worship on p. 434, which from motives of modesty the author gives in Latin.
[V-33] Mr Norman's statements, Rambles in Yuc., p. 166, differ materially from those of Stephens, Yucatan, vol. i., pp. 298-9. He states that the walls are only twelve feet apart, that the eastern façade only has the entwined serpents, that the western is covered with hieroglyphics, that the structure contains rooms on a level with the ground, and implies that the western ring was still perfect at the time of his visit. This building is called by Charnay the Cárcel, or Prison.
[V-34] In these dimensions I have followed Mr Stephens' text, as usual in Uxmal, as far as possible. Although the Casa de Monjas has received more attention than any of the other structures, yet, strangely enough, no visitor gives all the dimensions of the buildings and terraces; hardly any two authors agree on any one dimension; and no author's text agrees exactly with his plans. Yet the figures of my text may be considered approximately correct. I append, however, in this instance a table of variations as a curiosity.
Respecting the height of the buildings, except the northern, we have no figures from any reliable authority; but we know that both eastern and western are lower than the northern building and higher than the southern, whose rooms are 17 feet high on the inside, and moreover that the eastern is higher than the western.