Abstract
AN important discovery in the ruins of Copan, the ancient city of the Maya in Honduras, is reported in The Times of February 21. An expedition of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, now working at Copan under Dr. Gustav Stronsvik, in exposing a large stone staircase, has found an extensive system of canals and sewers connecting a massive series of buildings, which is now underground. The buildings thus revealed include amphitheatres in which are monoliths and large statues in stone. A statue of a warrior is described as of gigantic size. Other discoveries are cruciform rooms, of which the floors are covered with red paint; and among the artefacts are a number of bead-collars. Of even greater importance for the archaeologist is a pair of solid gold boots, nearly two inches high, of exquisite workmanship. With two doubtful exceptions, objects of worked gold have not been found hitherto in that period of the Maya civilisation to which the ruins of Copan are assigned. Unless further and more intensive study should point to a foreign origin, these boots of gold must be accepted as evidence that the Maya added no little skill in this technique to their artistic accomplishment, and that a neglect of gold-working, which has always seemed somewhat surprising, has been attributed to them in error. Further details of the stone statues and monoliths will be awaited by archaeologists with the greatest interest, as owing to the conditions of discovery, they should throw further light on the development of the Maya art of stone carving, for which the site of Copan is already remarkable among Maya remains.
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Archæological Discovery in Honduras. Nature 135, 334–335 (1935). https://doi.org/10.1038/135334e0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/135334e0