The native races of the Pacific states of North America, 4. köide |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
aboriginal altar Amer ancient Annales des Voy antiquities Aztec blocks Brasseur de Bourbourg building built carved Casa Casa Grande centre Charnay Colorado Chiquito Copan covered described doorways Dupaix edifices enclosure exploration feet high feet in diameter feet long feet square feet wide figures forty four fragments front Geog Guat Guatemala height hewn hieroglyphics hill Hist human Humboldt hundred feet idols inches interior Kabah leagues Maya Mayapan mentioned ments Mérida Mexican Mexico miles Mitla monuments mortar mounds Nahua natives Nicaragua northern Nouvelles Annales original ornaments painted Palace Palenque plates platform pottery Pueblo pyramid Quirigua Rambles in Yuc relics remains reported river round Ruines Amér sculptured shown side slope southern Squier stairway standing Stephens stone stories structures stucco summit surface temple Teotihuacan terrace three feet tion town traces Uxmal valley vases Waldeck walls Xochicalco Yucatan
Popular passages
Page 314 - They are adorned with rich head-dresses and necklaces, but their attitude is that of pain and trouble. The design and anatomical proportions of the figures are faulty, but there is a force of expression about them which shows the skill and conceptive power of the artist.
Page 364 - Notwithstanding these points of similarity, the Palenque architecture has little to remind us of the Egyptian, or of the Oriental. It is, indeed, more conformable, in the perpendicular elevation of the walls, the moderate size of the stones, and the general arrangement of the parts, to the European. It must be admitted, however, to have a character of originality peculiar to itself.
Page 736 - Stephens saw an earthwork consisting of two concentric circles of earth about three feet high with a ditch between them. The outer circle is eighty yards in diameter, and within the inner one are about twenty cellars, or excavations, thirty feet across and three feet deep, like the cellars of modern native houses scattered over the country without, however, any enclosing circles. These works are located on a terrace about fifteen feet high, bounded on either side by a...
Page 529 - city of signals,' and Toltecat are sometimes applied in the native traditional annals.76 These monuments stand on a plain which slopes gently toward the south, and are included in a rectangular space of about a third of a mile from east to west and a mile and a half from north to south, extending from the Tulancingo road on the north to the Otumba road on the south, with, however, some small mounds outside of the limits mentioned. By reason of its nearness to Mexico, Teotihuacan, like Cholula, has...
Page 666 - ... round like a spiral stairway ; and the Indians have, in some way, fixed logs of wood in the rock, radiating from a vertical axis, like steps. These afford foothold to man and beast in clambering up. "We were constantly meeting and passing Indians, who had their 'burros
Page 657 - ... of the wall— the whole resembling mosaic work. Niches, varying in size from two inches to two feet and a half square, and two inches to one and a half feet in horizontal depth, were scattered irregularly over the walls, at various heights above the floor. Near the place of the ceiling, the walls were penetrated...
Page 352 - Zapote-wood, and in perfect preservation. The entrance to this sanctuary was much obstructed by fallen fragments, and the natives, who had never dared to penetrate the mysterious recess, believed the passage to lead by a subterranean course to Palenque. Stephens succeeded in entering the room, and found its walls covered with stucco decorations, including two life-sized human figures and a monkey. From the top of the first building was seen another of similar plan and construction, but in a more...
Page 637 - Wherever the mountains did not impinge too close on the river and shut out the valley, they were seen in great abundance, enough, I should think, to indicate a former population of at least one hundred thousand ; and in one place there is a long wide valley, twenty miles in length, much of which is covered with the ruins of buildings and broken pottora.
Page 669 - Each pueblo is built around a rectangular court, in which we suppose are the springs that furnish the supply to the reservoirs. The exterior walls, which are of stone, have no openings, and would have to be scaled or battered down before access could be gained to the interior. The successive stories are set back, one behind the other. The lower rooms are reached through trap-doors from the first landing. The houses are three rooms deep, and open upon the interior court. The arrangement is as strong...
Page 666 - ... stories high). In front each story retreated back as it ascended, so as to leave a platform along the whole front of the story: these platforms are guarded by parapet walls about three feet high.