ARCHEOLOGY. (SOUTH AMERICA ENGLAND.) 



21 



is an elaborate figure with a death's-head, evi- 

 dently the portrait in bas-relief of a dead mon- 

 arch. On one side are figures supposed to be two 

 priests, with several rows of hieroglyphs, and 

 on the other side a single priest with more hiero- 

 glyphs. The back is covered with hieroglyphs. 

 .But the greatest discovery was the finding of a 

 pot of jade objects in the mound. The jade re- 

 sembles Burmese jade, and has never yet been 

 found on this continent, while the jar contain- 

 ing the jade is of evident Maya origin. Pieces of 

 similar jade have been found in other parts of 

 Mexico, and they have been regarded by many as 

 evidence of the former communication of the 

 aboriginal races of Mexico with the Chinese, but 

 scientists still believe that jade may yet be found 

 in its native state somewhere in Mexico. The 

 specimens found at Monte Alban are beautiful in 

 color, elaborately carved, and highly polished. 

 One piece is about as large as the palm of the 

 hand, of a rich deep blue, graven to represent a 

 human face, said to resemble that of a China- 

 man. 



During the work of clearing and in some minor 

 excavating, many great slabs of stone with carv- 

 ings in bas-relief were found. Some represented 

 men, some animals, and some were covered with 

 hieroglyphs. The slabs usually covered the 

 tombs, and one represents the figure of a mon- 

 arch or prince, apparently wearing a royal head- 

 dress, sitting on some high place with the sign 

 of speech extending from the mouth, with a row 

 of hieroglyphs following. The stone is 3 meters 

 in height and 2 meters in width. 



It is the opinion of Seiior Batres that the 

 ruined city was the sacred city of the people who 

 built it. The area cleared is 3 kilometers in 

 length by half a kilometer in width, and mounds 

 of less importance cover the surrounding moun- 

 tains, but these have not yet been touched. Those 

 so far uncovered appear to be the bases of the 

 great structures that surmounted them, and the 

 remains of these structures or temples have been 

 found on some of them. Excavations and explo- 

 rations of these remarkable ruins are to be con- 

 tinued during the season of 1903. 



South America. The remains of the Calcha- 

 qui, a South American Indian race with charac- 

 teristics much like those of the Northern Pueblo 

 Indians, who were exterminated by the Spanish 

 in the seventeenth century, have been the object 

 of exploration by Dr. Juan B. Ambrosetti. 

 Their monuments are found over a territory in 

 the Argentine Republic stretching 900 miles from 

 north to south, and about 200 miles from east to 

 .west. Their houses, constructed like those the 

 remains of which are found in Colorado and 

 Arizona, were built both in the valleys and on 

 the mountains to a great height. Several of 

 their villages have been explored by Dr. Ambro- 

 setti, who has recovered from them a large num- 

 ber of articles of various kinds in stone, copper, 

 bronze, turquoise, gold, and silver. 



England. The excavations at Silchester on 

 the site of a large Romano-British city which has 

 been identified with the Calliva or Calleva Attre- 

 batum of the Antonine itineraries have been 

 carried on continuously, by the aid of the Sil- 

 chester Excavation Fund, since 1890. The area 

 of 100 acres, enclosed by the remains of the 

 Roman wall, nearly 2 miles in circumference, 

 has been explored steadily and systematically 

 till only a fractional part remains, and the foun- 

 dations of the houses and public buildings have 

 been traced more and more fully and with more 

 precision from year to year. The new informa- 

 tion gained each year has been most largely in 



extension and addition to that already obtained, 

 and the work has been little marked by sensa- 

 tional novelties of discovery. An area of 6 acres 

 in the northern half of the town was examined 

 in 1901. One of the houses had been enlarged 

 after it. was built to nearly double its -former size, 

 and presented two features that were specially re- 

 marked upon. One was the foundation of an 

 almost perfectly circular room, and the other was 

 the evidence that the house was half-timbered. 

 Wattle work and plaster had been combined, and 

 large pieces showed the ruts in the plaster for- 

 merly traversed by the osiers or small branches 

 . which held its substance together. The work re- 

 sembled that which has been found in neighbor- 

 ing houses, and has perhaps been traditionally 

 followed from the days of the city's prosperity 

 to the present. This half timber-work familiar 

 in such medieval cities as Brunswick and Hil- 

 desheim seems to have been widely prevalent; 

 and remains have been found of Gerinano-Roman 

 work clay filling in a half-timber construction 

 on the Danube which presents a likeness to 

 what has been found at Silchester. In a long 

 room in one of the houses were a number of 

 large jars fitting into holes in the flooring. In 

 this room were also masses of bones of fowls, 

 pheasants, and other birds. It is not easy to 

 conjecture the height of these houses. The walls 

 were about 18 inches thick and mostly of flint 

 and rubble, and being of such material can not 

 have been very lofty. 



The recent architectural discoveries at Stone- 

 henge were described in a paper on that sub- 

 ject read to the members of the Royal Institute, 

 Jan. 20, by Mr. Detmar Blow, who with Dr. 

 Gowland superintended the excavations which 

 were made in October, 1901, for Sir E. Antrobus, 

 owner of the estate. The author pointed out 

 that the great monolith called the leaning stone 

 was the largest in England, Cleopatra's Needle 

 excepted. It was one of the pillars of the high- 

 est trilithon, and stood behind the altar-stone, 

 near which it leaned at an angle of 65 degrees. 

 Half-way up it had a fracture one-half across it, 

 and the weight of stone above that fracture was 

 a dangerous strain upon it. It had now been 

 brought to a vertical position. One Roman coin 

 and one George III penny were found quite near 

 the surface. Numerous chippings of the sarsen 

 and bluestone of which Stonehenge was built 

 were discovered. The flints found were used for 

 the softer sarsen and bluestones, and the hand- 

 hammers and mauls for rough dressing. From 

 this the deduction had been made that the build- 

 ing belonged to the Paleolithic period. All au- 

 thorities agreed that it was the work of a highly 

 civilized people. The construction was one of a 

 stone development, and the surface of the stone 

 was finished much like that of granite. The 

 design of the pillars was, in Mr. Blow's opinion, 

 evolved from the shapes of the flint instruments 

 used by the workman, to which his hand had 

 grown accustomed. Each pillar had a bold en- 

 tasis in its elevation, and in its plan foreshad- 

 owed the column. With the aid of illustrations 

 the author described the method by which the 

 leaning stone had been raised in the work of res- 

 toration and the sifting process by which the im- 

 plements, etc., had been recovered. Stonehenge 

 had generally been supposed to be of the bronze 

 age till these implements were discovered, and 

 this was believed to be the only occasion on 

 which the implements were found actually next 

 to the stone building where they were used. In 

 the discussion of the paper, Sir Norman Lockyer 

 remarked that the conclusion was justified from 



