1843.] 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



133 



Maria (in the manner displayed in a large section exhibited) ; and the tra- 

 veller now ascends to the lantern hetween the two crusts or plates forming 

 the inner and the outer domes. 



Michael Angelo adopted this contrivance in the dome of St. Peter's ; and 

 almost all the subsequent domes are upon the same idea. 



The Professor pointed out these instances of analogy as sufficient to show 

 that the architect might thus avail himself of the whole range of Nature's 

 works; and that the universe furnished him the inexhaustible models from 

 which his inventions might be drawn. 



REVIEWS. 



THE ANCIENT RUINS OF YUCATAN. 

 Rambles in Yucatan. By B. M. Norman. New York : 1843. 



The last quarter of a century has been distinguished by the scien- 

 tific and successful researches which have been made into the mate- 

 rial and moral world of unrecorded ages. What the far-seeing pre- 

 dicted, but hardly hoped would occur, what the visionary exhausted 

 himself in vain efforts to ascertain, has now taken place ; the film, 

 the mist which concealed and disfigured the unknown past, is giving 

 way before the labours of men of science, and the long-hidden forms 

 of antiquity's infancy are becoming revealed to our eyes: while the 

 progress made is such that we can scarcely doubt of a glorious har- 

 vest of discovery in the end. While geology and palaeozoology have 

 shown us the rudiments of the physical world, portrayed its vegeta- 

 tion, and pictured the creatures which inhabited it, philology 

 and palestiology have thrown glorious light upon the early history of 

 the human race. While geology was pursued on a false system, and 

 theories were formed before facts were accumulated, its votaries 

 were the derision of the world ; nor did the philologists suffer less 

 deservedly : their wild speculations drew from Voltaire the definition 

 that their science was one in which "la consonne y entrail pour fort pen 

 de chose et la votjelk pour rien :" and Goldsmith sarcastically determines 

 from the resemblance of the letters, that Cox-fu-ci-us and Noah were 

 the same personages. This time, however, has now passed, and both 

 geology and philology, studied upon the principles of Bacon, have 

 become fixed sciences. From philology has sprung paleaetiology, or 

 the science of applying philological evidence to the history of the 

 human races, and Bopp, Pott, Raske, Prichard, Winning, and others 

 have successfully laboured in this department. In connection with 

 these studies is that of the early monuments of art, the elucidations 

 of which in Egypt, in Iranistan, in India, and America, deeply engage 

 the attention of men of science. If in the old world we are astonished 

 at the gigantic records of ancient civilization, we were totally un- 

 prepared to find the new continent as rich in these memorials as our 

 own. Records of a race which seems to have "died and left uo sign," 

 works without a name, monuments bearing the impress of the fathers 

 of civilization in India and Egypt — they are calculated to awaken 

 the deepest interest, and to enlist the strongest sympathy of the artist 

 and the scholar. Humboldt and Lord Kingsborough prepared the 

 way in the study of Mexican antiquities, which Waldeck, Stephens, 

 and Norman have followed out: and the result is, the opening a field 

 of study in Yucatan, rich in architectural and artistical interest. 



For a copy of Mr. Norman's work, we have been indebted to the 

 kindness of Messrs. Wiley and Putnam, and we proceed to give some 

 account of it and its author. Mr. Norman was led to Yucatan in a 

 chance excursion in the autumn of 1841, and commenced his re- 

 searches with no other instrumental aid than a knife and pocket com- 

 pass, and pencil and paper; yet, although he pretends to no scholar- 

 ship, he has produced a work, containing minute descriptions of the 

 ruins, with many notes derived from the works of his predecessors. 

 He seems to have been an active and energetic observer, and to have 

 gone about his task with all that poco-curautism for trifles, which the 

 wanderer in Spanish countries must possess if he would make himself 

 happy and useful. Mr. Norman's journal contains descriptions of the 

 manners and customs of the people, as well as accounts of the ruins, 

 which were the more especial objects of his visit. 



Yucatan, we need scarcely remind our readers, is a peninsula, 

 remarkable for running from south to north, bounded on the east by 

 the English settlement of Honduras, on the south by Guatimala, and 

 on the south-west by Mexico, of which it was recently a province, 

 although now independent. The west coast is known to us as the 

 Campeachy shore, and was the scene of many an exploit in the log- 

 wood-cutting times of the early part of the seventeenth century. 

 The country itself presents but little to interest us in its modern state, 

 but in the northern parts have been discovered the ruined cities of 

 Uxmal, Kabab, Zayi, Ticul, Sisal, Chi-Chen, and Espita; and it will 

 be observed that not more than a third of the country has been as yet 



imperfectly explored, while what the mountain regions of the interior 

 may present is unknown. The inhabitants are chiefly of Indian 

 descent, called Mayas, of whom we shall speak again hereafter. 



Leaving Mr. Norman to speak for himself, the first place to which 

 he leads us is Chi-chen, of which a plan is shown below. 



Fig. 1.— Plan of the Ruins of Chi-Chen. 



n, temple ; b. ruins ; c, pyramid ; d, dome : e. house of the Caciques ; 

 /. house ; g. hacienda ; It, evidences of large and splendid structures ; i, cross 

 erected by the Indians ; o, church of the Indians. 



" It was on the morning of the 10th of February that I directed my 

 steps, for the first time, toward the ruins of the ancient city of Chi- 

 Chen. 1 On arriving in the immediate neighbourhood, I was compelled 

 to cut mv way through an almost impermeable thicket of under-brush, 

 interlaced and bound together with strong tendrils and vines; in 

 which labour I was assisted by my diligent aid and companion, Jose, 

 I was finally enabled to effect a passage ; and, in the course of a few 

 hours, found myself in the presence of the ruins which I sought. For 

 five days did I wander up and down among these crumbling monu- 

 ments of a city which, I hazard little in saying, must have been one of 

 the largest the world has ever seen. I beheld before me, for a circuit 

 of many miles in diameter, the walls of palaces and temples and pyra- 

 mids, more or less dilapidated. The earth was strewed, as far as the 

 eye could distinguish, with columns, some broken and some nearly 

 perfect, which seemed to have been planted there by the genius of 

 desolation which presided over this awful solitude. Amid these 

 solemn memorials of departed generations, who have died and left no 

 marks but these, there were no indications of animated existence save 

 from the bats, the lizards, and the reptiles which now and then 

 emerged from the crevices of the tottering walls and crumbling stones 

 that were strewed upon the ground at their base. No marks of human 

 footsteps, no signs of previous visitors, were discernible ; nor is there 

 good reason to believe that any person, whose testimony of the fact 

 has been given to the world, had ever before broken the silence which 

 reigns over these sacred tombs of a departed civilization. As I 

 looked about me and indulged in these reflections, I felt awed into 

 perfect silence. To speak then, had been profane. A revelation 

 from heaven could not have impressed me more profoundly with the 

 solemnity of its communication, than I was now impressed on finding 

 myself the first, probably, of the present generation of civilized men 

 walking the streets of this once mighty city, and amid 



• Those temples, palaces, and piles stupendous, 

 Of which the very ruins are tremendous.' 



For a long time I was so distracted with the multitude of objects 

 which crowded upon my mind, that I could take no note of them in 

 detail. It was not until some hours had elapsed, that my curiosity 

 was sufficiently under control to enable me to examine them with any 

 minuteness." 



" My first study was made at the ruins of the Temple. 2 These re- 

 mains consist, as will be seen by reference to the engraving (a, Fig. 3, & 

 Fig. 1), of four distinct walls. 1 entered at an opening in the western 

 angle, which I conceived to be the main entrance ; and presumed, from 



■' 1 Chi-Chen signifies, mouth of a well. ' Itza.' said to he the Maya 

 name for one of the old possessors of these ruins, is sometimes added by the 



natives. .... , , 



- 2 The names by which I have designated these ruins, are such as were 

 suggested lo me by their peculiar construction, and the purposes fur which I 

 supposed them to have been designed. 



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