File:The ancient cities of the New World - being travels and explorations in Mexico and Central America from 1857-1882 (1887) (14782660482).jpg

Identifier: ancientcitiesofn00char (find matches)
Title: The ancient cities of the New World : being travels and explorations in Mexico and Central America from 1857-1882
Year: 1887 (1880s)
Authors: Charnay, Désiré, 1828-1915
Subjects: Indians of Mexico Indians of Central America
Publisher: London : Chapman and Hall
Contributing Library: Getty Research Institute
Digitizing Sponsor: Sloan Foundation

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ificentedifices. The second palace, 160 yards north-east of the first, is like-wise reared on a pyramid, fronted by an esplanade with twocisterns and a picote ; it has besides a second plateau, consistingof a range of ruined apartments. A flight of steps to the centre,supported by a half-triangular arch, leads to the edifice. Thispalace is only 16 feet high, and in strong contrast with therich, elaborate ornamentation of the first. Its outer walls areplain, except groups of three short pilasters each surroundingthe edifice above the cornice, forming a sloping rather than Kauai I and Uxmal. 3^3 perpendicular frieze, like those at Palcnque, and in mostYucatec monuments. The front, 162 feet, is almost entire andpierced by seven openings; two have columns and primitiverude capitals, corresponding to the same number of narrow lowapartments. As usual the ornamental wall is narrowing towardsthe top, and is distincdy seen through the vegetation coveringthe roof. /■• If ^ir ■< * ^*, \
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■3-?S SHOWING STEPS AND INTERIOR OF FIRST PALACE OF KABAH. The rear is a complete ruin. Traces of painting, of whichtracings were made, are still visible in the central chamber. Itwas here that I thought I recognised the rude drawing of ahorse and his rider, which was hailed with Homeric laughter ;but, although I was mistaken in my supposition, I was verynear the truth, since the fact I erroneously heralded at Kabahwas found in the north. The discovery is due to S. Salisbury,who, in 1861, whilst exploring a group of mounds and structures,near the hacienda of Xuyum, fifteen miles north of Merida, 384 The Ancient Cities of the New World. unearthed the remains of two Jwrscs heads, made of very hardchalk, with bristhng hair Hke a zebra.* The work showsconsiderable artistic skill, and the explorer thinks that it formedpart of some bas-reliefs which had belonged to the demolishedmonuments. Indeed, it is highly probable that these headswere placed on the edifices built by the natives betwe

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