I close my account of Maya antiquities with the following brief quotations respecting Palenque, and the degree of art exhibited in her ruined monuments. "These sculptured figures are not caricatures, but display an ability on the part of the artists to represent the human form in every posture, and with anatomical fidelity. Nor are the people in humble life here delineated. The figures are royal or priestly; some are engaged in offering up sacrifices, or are in an attitude of devotion; many hold a scepter, or other baton of authority; their apparel is gorgeous; their head-dresses are elaborately arrayed, and decorated with long feathers."[VI-70] "Many of the reliefs exhibit the finest and most beautiful outlines, and the neatest combinations, which remind one of the best Indian works of art."[VI-71] "The ruins of Palenque have been perhaps overrated; these remains are fine, doubtless, in their antique rudeness; they breathe out in the midst of their solitude a certain imposing grandeur; but it must be affirmed, without disputing their architectural importance, that they do not justify in their details the enthusiasm of archæologists. The lines which make up the ornamentation are faulty in rectitude; the designs in symmetry; the sculpture in finish; I except, however, the symbolic tablets, the sculpture of which seemed to me very correct." "I admire the bas-reliefs of Palenque on the façades of her old palaces; they interest me, move me, and fill my imagination; but let them be taken to the Louvre, and I see nothing but rude sketches which leave me cold and indifferent."[VI-72] "The most remarkable remains of an advanced ancient civilization hitherto discovered on our continent." "Their general characteristics are simplicity, gravity, and solidity."[VI-73] "While superior in the execution of the details, the Palenque artist was far inferior to the Egyptian in the number and variety of the objects displayed by him."[VI-74]
CHAPTER VII.
ANTIQUITIES OF OAJACA AND GUERRERO.
Nahua Antiquities—Home of the Zapotecs and Miztecs—Remains in Tehuantepec—Fortified Hill of Guiengola—Petapa, Magdalena, and Laollaga—Bridge at Chihuitlan—Cross of Guatulco—Tutepec—City of Oajaca and Vicinity—Tlacolula—Etla—Peñoles—Quilapan—Ruins of Monte Alban—Relics at Zachila—Cuilapa—Palaces of Mitla—Mosaic Work—Stone Columns—Subterranean Galleries—Pyramids—Fortifications—Comparison with Central American Ruins—Northern Monuments—Quiotepec—Cerro de las Juntas—Tuxtepec—Huahuapan—Yanguitlan—Antiquities of Guerrero.
NAHUA MONUMENTS.
I now enter what has been classified in a preceding volume of this work as the home of the Nahua nations,—nations, most of which were at the time of the Spanish conquest, and during the preceding century, subjected to the allied powers of Anáhuac, and were more or less closely related to the nations of the central valley, in blood, language, or institutions. It has been seen, in what has been said on the subject,[VII-1] that the dividing line between the Nahuas and Mayas, drawn across the isthmus of Tehuantepec, is not a very sharply defined one. Many analogies, linguistic, institutionary, and mythologic, were found between nations dwelling on different sides of the line; so in monumental relics, and in traditional history, we shall find many points of similarity; but on the whole, the resemblances will be so far outweighed by the differences, as "to indicate either a separate culture from the beginning, or what is more probable, and for us practically the same thing, a progress in different paths for a long time prior to the coming of the Europeans," to repeat the words of a preceding chapter.
The relics to be described in the present chapter are those of the isthmus proper, and of that portion of the Mexican Republic above the isthmus which lies in general terms south of the eighteenth parallel of latitude, including the states of Oajaca and Guerrero, and stretching on the Pacific from Tonalá to the mouth of the Rio Zacatula, a distance of between five and six hundred miles. The province of Tehuantepec, belonging politically to the state of Oajaca, includes the central continental mountain chain, with the plains on the Pacific at its southern base, a region somewhat less fertile and attractive than those in which many of the ruins already described are situated. The two chief mountain ranges of the Mexican Republic, one skirting the Atlantic, the other the Pacific shore, draw near each other as the continent narrows, and meet in Tehuantepec. The southern portions of these two converging ranges, the broad mountain-girt valleys in the angle formed by their junction, and a narrow strip of tierra caliente on the southern coast, constitute the state of Oajaca, the home of the Miztecs, Zapotecs, and other tribes somewhat less civilized, powerful, and celebrated. The interior valleys are for the most part in the tierra templada, and include some of the best agricultural land in the country, with all the larger towns grouped round the capital as a centre. Guerrero is made up of the very narrow lowlands of the coast, the southern mountain range extending through its whole length from north-west to south-east, and the valley of the Zacatula further north. It is a region but little known to travelers, except along the great national highway, or trail, which leads from Acapulco, the most important port of the state, to the city of Mexico.
RUINS OF GUIENGOLA.
Five or six leagues from the city of Tehuantepec, the capital of the province of the same name, and in the south-western corner of the province, have been found the remains of an aboriginal fortification or fortified town, which, according to the traditional annals of the country, was built by the Zapotecs, not very long before the Conquest, to resist the advance of the Aztec forces. The principal remains are on a lofty hill, the cerro of Guiengola, but the fortified territory is said to extend over an area measuring one and a half by over four leagues, the outer walls being visible throughout the entire circumference at every naturally accessible point. Besides the protecting walls there are remains of dwellings, all of stone without mortar, except a cornice on the larger walls. Three fortresses covered with a coating of hard plaster are mentioned. Ditches accompany the walls and add to the strength of the works. From a subterranean sepulchre were taken about two hundred pieces of pottery, including vases and imitations of various animals. The tombs had a coating of compact cement, and the skeletons found in them were lying face down. The preceding information I take from a very vague account written by Sr Arias and published in the Museo Mexicano. Arias visited the locality in 1833; he claims to have sent some very interesting relics, found at Guiengola and other localities in the vicinity of Tehuantepec, to the museum at Oajaca; but the man to whom they were entrusted probably disposed of them in a manner more profitable to himself, if less advantageous to the museum. Several natural caves are spoken of by Arias, and one of them, seventy feet deep, showed traces, according to the German traveler Müller, of having been formerly inhabited. The latter also found vestiges of dwellings scattered throughout the vicinity, and speaks of a well-preserved tumulus standing not long before his visit in a valley close by. It was thirty-three feet high, with a base of ninety by one hundred and five feet, and a summit platform sixty by seventy-five feet, reached by a stairway of twenty-five wide steps. At the side of this tumulus was a quadrilateral elevation covering an area of about two acres, and enclosed by a wall eight feet high and twelve feet thick. Whether these structures are identical with the 'castles' of Arias is uncertain. A correspondent of Hutchings' Magazine in 1858 describes a wall of rough stones four feet thick and thirty feet high, said to extend nine miles. This writer speaks also of buildings with pillars in their centre, and of quarries from which the stone was originally taken. Some plans accompanied Arias' report but were not published. Unsatisfactory as it certainly is, the preceding is all the information extant respecting these remains,[VII-2] or at least referred definitely to Guiengola by name; but some remains were described by Dupaix and sketched by Castañeda, at a point three leagues west of Tehuantepec, which undoubtedly belonged to this group, and were probably the same ruins which the other writers so vaguely mention. On the top of a high hill, surrounded by other grand ruins, are two pyramids of hewn stone and mortar. The first is fifty-five by one hundred and twenty feet at the base, and thirty by sixty-six feet at the summit. The main stairway, thirty feet wide, of forty steps, leads up the centre of the western slope; there are also narrower stairways on the north and south. The pyramid is built in four terraces, the walls of the lower one being perpendicular; and of all the rest sloping. The whole surface was covered with a brilliant cement of lime, sand, and red ochre. No remains whatever were found on the summit. A remarkable feature is noticed on the surface of the second story, from which project throughout the whole circumference, except where interrupted by the stairways, four ranges of flat stones, forming hundreds of small shelves. The only suggestions made respecting the possible use to which these shelves were devoted are that they supported torches or human skulls.