A stele is a stone or wooden slab, generally taller than it is wide, erected for funerals or commemorative purposes, most usually decorated with the names and titles of the deceased or living — inscribed, carved in relief A stele ' onMouseout='HidePop("69914")' href="http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Acropolis">acropolis
Acropolis literally means city on the edge . In Greek, Acropolis means "Highest City". For purposes of defense, early settlers naturally chose elevated ground, frequently a hill with precipitous sides...
" (a large complex of overlapping step-pyramids, plazas, and palaces). The stelae and sculptured decorations of the buildings of Copán are some of the very finest surviving art of ancient
MesoamericaMesoamerica or Meso-America is a region and culture area in the Americas, extending approximately from central Mexico to Honduras and Nicaragua, within which a number of pre-Columbian societies flourished before the Spanish colonization of the Americas in the 15th and 16th centuries...
.
Many structures are elaborately decorated with stone sculptures, usually constructed from a mosaic of carved stones of a size that one person could carry.
The site also has a large court for playing the
Mesoamerican ballgameThe Mesoamerican ballgame was a sport with ritual associations played for over 3000 years by the pre-Columbian peoples of Mesoamerica. The sport had different versions in different places during the millennia, and a modern version of the game, ulama, is still played in a few places by the local...
.
At its height in the late classic period Copán seems to have had an unusually prosperous class of minor
nobilityNobility is a state-privileged status which is generally hereditary, but which may also be personal only. Titles of nobility are usually associated with present or former monarchies. The term originally referred to those who were "known" or "notable" and was applied to the highest social class in...
, scribes, and artisans, some of whom had homes of cut stone built for themselves (in most sites a privilege reserved for the rulers and high priests), some of which have carved hieroglyphic texts.
The buildings suffered significantly from forces of nature in the centuries between the site's abandonment and the rediscovery of the ruins. There have been numerous
earthquakeAn earthquake is the result of a sudden release of energy in the Earth's crust that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes are recorded with a seismometer, also known as a seismograph...
s -- none of the roofs of the stone buildings were intact when the site was rediscovered, and the hieroglyphic stairway had collapsed. The Copán river changed course and
meanderA meander in general is a bend in a sinuous watercourse. A meander is formed when the moving water in a river erodes the outer banks and widens its valley. A stream of any volume may assume a meandering course, alternatively eroding sediments from the outside of a bend and depositing them on the...
ed, destroying part of the acropolis (revealing in the process its archaeological stratigraphy in a large vertical
cutIn Archaeology and archeological stratification a cut or truncation is a context that represents a moment in time when other archaeological deposits were removed for the creation of some feature such as a ditch or pit...
) and apparently wiping out various subsidiary architectural groups in the region. In the long period when the site was overgrown the buildings and sculptures suffered from the invasive thick jungle vegetation and periodic forest fires.
Archeologists have consolidated and restored many structures at the site.
Pre-Columbian history
The fertile Copán River valley was long a site of agriculture before the first known stone architecture was built in the region about the 9th century BC.
A
kingdomThe person who heads a monarchy is called a monarch. It was a common form of government in the world during the ancient and medieval times. A Monarchy is a form of government in which supreme power is absolutely or nominally lodged with an individual, who is the head of state, often for life or...
seems to have been established in Copán in 159 . It grew into one of the most important Maya sites by the 5th century. Large monuments dated with hieroglyphic texts were erected in the city from 435 through 822.
Xukpi was one of the more powerful Maya city states, a regional power, although it suffered a catastrophic defeat at the hands of its former vassal state
QuiriguaQuiriguá is an ancient Maya archaeological site in the department of Izabal in south-eastern Guatemala. It is a medium-sized site covering approximately along the lower Motagua River, with the ceremonial center about from the north bank. During the Maya Classic Period , Quiriguá was situated at...
in 738, when the long-ruling Xukpi ruler Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil (18 Rabbit) was captured and beheaded by Quirigua's ruler K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat (Cauac Sky). Though Copán's rulers began to build monumental structures again within a few decades. Although many theories have been proposed to explain the decline of most of Mayan civilization by ~900 AD (Copán's last known dynastic monuments date to 822 AD), the lack of data has prevented any firm conclusions (Coe, 1999. p.68). Popular hypotheses include invasion by foreign forces, revolutions that swept the region, unsustainable population growth, and environmental and agricultural disasters such as soil depletion, overuse of land, and climatic deterioration (Coe, 1999. p. 69).
The area of Copán continued to be occupied after the last major ceremonial structures and royal monuments were erected, but the population declined in the 8th century - 9th century from perhaps over 20,000 in the city to less than 5,000. The ceremonial center was long abandoned and the surrounding valley home to only a few farming hamlets at the time of the arrival of the
SpanishSpain , officially the Kingdom of Spain , is a country located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula.
[The Spanish constitution does not establish any official denomination of the country, even though España , Estado español and Nación española are used interchangeably...]
in the 16th century.
List of known Xukpi rulers
- 1. K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo'
K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo is named in Maya inscriptions as the founder and first ruler of the pre-Columbian Maya civilization polity centered at Copán, a major Maya site located in the southeastern Maya lowlands region in present-day Honduras...
("Great-Sun First Quetzal Macaw") before 435
- 2. "K'inich Popol Hol" ("Great-Sun ?"); c. 437
- 3. "Ruler 3", name unknown; c. 455
- 4. "Ku Ix" (possibly K'altuun Hix or Tuun K'ab' Hix); c. 465
- 5. "Ruler 5", name unknown; c. 476
- 6. "Ruler 6" (Muyal Jol ?); c. 485
- 7. B'alam Nehn, ("Jaguar Mirror"; "Waterlily-Jaguar") after 504-544
- 8. "Ruler 8" (Wi'-Ohl-?, "Head on Earth"); 532-551
- 9. "Ruler 9" (Sak-lu ?);551-553
- 10. "Moon Jaguar" (tzi-b'alam, "? Jaguar"); 553-578
- 11. Butz' Chan ("Smoke Serpent", "fire-eating serpent"); 578-628
- 12. Chan Imix K'awiil ("Smoke Jaguar"); 628-695
- 13. Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil
Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil , was a ruler of the powerful Maya civilization polity associated with the site of Copán from January 2, 695, to 738...
("18 Rabbit"); 695-738
- 14. K'ak' Joplaj Chan K'awiil ("Smoke Monkey"); 738-749
- 15. K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil ("Smoke Shell"; "Smoke Squirrel"); 749-763
- 16. Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat
Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat, also known as Yax Pasaj Chan Yoaat, Yax Pac and Yax Pasah, was ruler of the Maya kingdom of Xupki from 763 to 810 or later. This is on the site of the city of Copán in western Honduras. He is the king who made Altar Q.He was the sixteenth and last king in line, whose name...
(aka "Yax Pac") 763-after 810
- (probably period where throne was vacant)
- 17? Ukit Took'; 822
- Royal ceremonial center of city abandoned by 984
The first sixteen names, from Yax K'uk' Mo' to
Yax Pasaj Chan YopaatYax Pasaj Chan Yopaat, also known as Yax Pasaj Chan Yoaat, Yax Pac and Yax Pasah, was ruler of the Maya kingdom of Xupki from 763 to 810 or later. This is on the site of the city of Copán in western Honduras. He is the king who made Altar Q.He was the sixteenth and last king in line, whose name...
, are depicted on
Altar QAltar Q is the designation given to one of the most notable of the rectangular sculpted stone blocks recovered at the Mesoamerican archaeological site of Copán, present-day Honduras....
, an artifact that has provided researchers clues to the history and origins of Copán.
http://mayaruins.com/copan/a1_1170.html
Archaeological investigations
By the time of the Spanish conquest of Honduras, the site had long been overgrown by rainforest. Although this large ruined city was known locally since early colonial times, it remained largely unknown by the outside world until a series of explorers visited it in the early 19th century.
Juan GalindoJuan Galindo was a Central American explorer and army officer. He fought for Central American independence from Spain and led the charge that took the fortress at Omoa, the last Spanish stronghold in Central America....
wrote a description of the ruins in 1834, which was published the following year. This sparked the interest of
North AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
explorer and travel writer
John Lloyd StephensJohn Lloyd Stephens was an American explorer, writer, and diplomat. Stephens was a pivotal figure in the rediscovery of Maya civilization throughout Middle America and in the planning of the Panama railroad....
and
EnglishEngland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the North Sea to the east, with the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
architect and draftsman
Frederick CatherwoodFrederick Catherwood was an English artist of Northern Irish ancestry, and architect, best remembered for his meticulously detailed drawings of the ruins of the Maya civilization. He explored Mesoamerica in the mid 19th century with writer John Lloyd Stephens...
whose illustrated books describing Copán and other sites excited a great deal of interest in
MesoamericaMesoamerica or Meso-America is a region and culture area in the Americas, extending approximately from central Mexico to Honduras and Nicaragua, within which a number of pre-Columbian societies flourished before the Spanish colonization of the Americas in the 15th and 16th centuries...
n antiquities among American and European scholars, and its publication is regarded as the commencement of modern Mayan studies which continue to this day.
The site was the subject of one of the first modern archeological surveys and excavations in the Maya area, conducted by the
Peabody Museum of Archaeology and EthnologyThe Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology is a museum affiliated with Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts.Founded in 1866, it is one of the oldest and most renowned museums focusing on anthropological material, and is particularly strong in New World and Mesoamerican ethnography...
of
Harvard UniversityHarvard University is a private university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts and a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1636 by the colonial Massachusetts legislature, Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and currently comprises ten separate academic units...
from 1891 to 1900. In 1934, Sylvanus G. Morley struck a deal with the Honduran government that American archaeologists from the Carnegie Institution of Washington would receive 50% of the artifacts from the site in exchange for excavation and restoration. Further excavations and restorations were begun by the Peabody Museum again in the 1970s, followed by the Government of Honduras's
Proyecto Copán beginning in the late 1970s and continuing to this day.`
Threats to Copan
Looting remains a serious threat to Copan, after a tomb was looted in 1998 ironically as it was being excavated by archaeologists.
See also
- Maya civilization
The Maya is a Mesoamerican civilization, noted for the only known fully developed written language of the pre-Columbian Americas, as well as its art, architecture, and mathematical and astronomical systems. Initially established during the Preclassic period , many Maya cities reached their highest...
- Quiriguá
Quiriguá is an ancient Maya archaeological site in the department of Izabal in south-eastern Guatemala. It is a medium-sized site covering approximately along the lower Motagua River, with the ceremonial center about from the north bank. During the Maya Classic Period , Quiriguá was situated at...
- List of archaeoastronomical sites sorted by country
- List of megalithic sites
External links
- "Lost King of the Maya" companion site to PBS's "Nova" television documentary on Copán
- "Hieroglyphs and History at Copán" article by Mayanist epigrapher David Stuart
David Stuart is a Mayanist scholar and Professor of Mesoamerican Art and Writing at the University of Texas at Austin. He is the son of Mayanist scholars George Stuart and Gene Stuart. He began deciphering Mayan hieroglyphs at the age of 8, under the tutelage of Linda Schele...
at the Peabody Museum
- PAPAC, Proyecto Arqueologico para la Planificacion de la Antigua Copan (Copan Urban Planning Project), academic-sponsored project for preservation and documentation of the site