MOUNDS NEAR ANTIGUA 243 



BUILDING K 



This structure (plate cm) was evidently an important one in Cempoa- 

 lan, although its pyramidal form is diiEcult to discover. It lies in an 

 open field, but is more or less covered with bushes and is considerabh^ 

 broken. In the printed plan illustrating the Troncoso exploration, thi.s 

 building and the adjacent mounds are designated Sii^tema de los Pare- 

 dones ("■ S^^stein of Walls'"). 



The four buildings described in the preceding pages give a fair 

 idea of the architecture of typical Totonac temples and pyramids, 

 not onl}^ in the valley of the Actopan, but also elsewhere on the 

 coast of Vera Cruz. But when Totonac buildings or temples in other 

 parts of this state are considered it will be found that building mate- 

 rial or environment has strongly affected their construction. In the 

 plains where Cempoalan is situated there are no quarries from which 

 stones could have been obtained, but instead a multitude of small water- 

 worn bowlders; hence the builders made use of the latter in their 

 buildings. In mountainous regions stones were employed and these 

 stones were hewn or cut into shape, as at Papantla. The forms of the 

 Cempoalan temples remind one of Yucatan, Chiapas, and Tobasco and 

 resemble those of the Valley of Mexico, l)ut the building material 

 is difl'erent. 



MOUNDS NEAR ANTIGUA 



In all accounts of the preliniiniiry settlements founded l)y Cortes in 

 the coast region of the Totonac country, there is found associated with 

 Cempoalan another city called Quiauistlan, said to have been situated 

 only a few miles from the Totonac metropolis." The site of this place 

 has never been satisfactorily studied, although its proximity to the 

 first cit}' founded by Cortes in Mexico is given by several early writers. 

 Bernal Diaz says that Coi'tes traced the plaza and church, Villa Rica 

 de la Vera Cruz, in the plain a half league from the fortified pueblo 

 called Quiauistlan. This city was later removed to another site, also 

 called Vera Cruz, where remains of crumbling walls and the little 

 church mark the oldest settlement of Europeans on the continent of 

 America. Antigua, as its station on the railroad is now called, ofl'ers 

 little to interest the traveler. It has an unfinished church and remains 

 of barracks ascribed to General Santa Ana, who owned a hacienda in 

 the neighborhood, liut with the exception of these and its old walls, 



" On Brasseiir's map Quiauistlan is placed north of Cempoalan, but its exact site is as yet an open 

 question. Cort<5s founded the eit>'. Villa Rica de la Vera Cruz, about a mile from Quiauistlan. 

 Clavijero, as pointed out by Humboldt (Ensayo Politico sobre de la Nueva Espaiia) shows that there 

 were three cities called Vera Cruz founded by Cortes— the present metropolis of that name, Villa 

 Rica de la Vera Cruz, now called Antigua, which was the second of that name, and the first settle- 

 ment, that near Quiauistlan. G6mara speaks of the second as near Chiavitzlan or Aquiahuitzlan, 

 the Indian settlement. Field work is necessary to determine whether the Villa Rica de la Vera Cruz 

 near Quiauistlan was the first or the second Villa Rica, for if the latter, it wassouth of Cempoalan. 



