The first thing then to be realized about the entire group of structures at Copan is their composite unity; then that this is not the result of a single construction, but of growth and successive additions; then that these periods of enlargement are separated by other, more or less long, periods of continued use and occupation, during which the civilization of the people maintained itself, somewhat modified by time, but not broken or interrupted. And finally, this evidence, together with that of the monumental dates, to which we will come, has so far only to do with the ground plan and the structures we can discover by a few feet of digging on the surface of the plain of Copan; for we have not the slightest means as yet of relating anything we can see at Copan to the various strata of occupation, with intervening silence, marked on the 120 feet of the disintegrating river wall. Those periods of silence may indeed, for everything we can yet tell, be the silence of non-occupation, of civilizations destroyed and forgotten, only to be followed by others. One Copan after another may have been built upon the obliterated site of its predecessor. Whatever evidence there is, read in comparison with similar evidence elsewhere, points to that; a few years ago we disbelieved in a historical Troy, only to find successive Troys, and many like places elsewhere, built one above the other. To deny the like or its probability at Copan, would be foolish.
But to return to the Copan whose remains we can see, one great question is forced upon us at the very outset. That is this: what must have been the state of the American continent, as regards civilization, during the ages into which we are trying to look? And that they were long ages, even for the Copan we have before us, we shall presently see. While all this was going on there, what was the rest of the continent like? Our preconceived notions of savagery or nomadic tribal communities must be thrown entirely to the winds, together with the statement of the historian Robertson, made in 1777, that in all New Spain there is not "any monument or vestige of any building more ancient than the Conquest."
As a first step towards an appreciation of the place of Copan in American history, we must consider the actual state of New Spain (that is, the region from the Rio Grande to Panama, approximately) at the time of the Discovery. The Aztecs were in possession of the valley of Mexico, with an elaborate civilization, fairly comparable if not superior to that of Europe at the same time; but their history only goes back a few hundred years, for they were merely a warlike nation who had come in, probably from the north, and were about comparable to the Manchus in China, or the Goths in Rome. They settled upon and appropriated some (a very small part) of the civilization before them. Around them were various semi-independent peoples whom they had neither destroyed nor entirely subdued, and among whom they had only a primacy of force. To the southwest of Mexico the ancient Zapotec kingdom still existed, a link with the past, towards its end, but still owing nothing to the Aztecs. In Yucatan and Central America were the fragments of the Mayan peoples, broken up into half a dozen main language stocks, and a score of separate dialects. Between the Mayas and those of Mexico there was some intercourse and a little borrowing, with some very ancient traditions probably in common. In culture and mythology, as to which we have limited material for comparison, and in language, as to which we have ample material, they were about as much alike, or as closely related, as the ancient Germans to the ancient Romans. Both were Americans, as the others were Aryans, with a common inheritance of tradition, mythology, and language type; no more.
Beyond all possible dispute, the Mayas were indefinitely the older people. The Aztecs had but a picture or rebus writing, and there is no evidence they ever had more than this. There are slight traces of writing akin to the Maya, among the Zapotecs. But the Mayas had a complete system of genuine hieroglyphic writing, certainly not derived from the Aztec picture-writing, but dissimilar from this in every way, with monuments antedating the period of Aztec history, on which the hieroglyphic forms are fully developed and perfect. The civilization, monuments, and hieroglyphs of Copan, Palenque, and of Tikal in southern Yucatan, are Mayan; but they are not the Mayan of the time of the Discovery.
The period immediately preceding the entry of the Spaniards is a historical period. We have various chronicles written by native hands, princes, priests or recorders, giving us some of the early cosmic traditions, brought down into contemporary times. We have these in Maya for Yucatan, and in Quiché-Cakchiquel for Guatemala. In each case the period of definable history goes back several centuries, but throws no light on the earlier period. In 1500 the triple Quiché kingdom was still a powerful and civilized nation; and if we know less of it than we do of the Aztec it is only because it was more quickly wiped out, because Lake Tezcoco and not Lake Atitlán became the seat of the Spanish capital, and because no efforts were made at the time to preserve the Mayan knowledge and traditions, as was done by a few in Mexico.
Lomaland Photo. and Engraving Dept.
THE HIEROGLYPHIC STAIRWAY: COPAN
(AFTER EXCAVATION, SHOWING ONE-SIXTH OF ORIGINAL HEIGHT)
From Peabody Museum Memoirs
