256 



NA TURE 



[July 16, 1908 



ARCH.HOLOGICAL EXPLORATION IN 



GUATEMALA. 



'T'HE first part of the fourth volume of the Memoirs of 



the Peabody Museum, Harvard University, is devoted 



to an account of exploration by Mr. Teobert Alaler in the 



KiG. \. — Photographs al entrance of Tularosa Box Canyon below Jjcli^ars. 



valley of the Upper Usumatsintia, or the Usumacinta, as 

 it appears in some modern maps, a river rising in Guate- 

 mala, falling into the Gulf of Mexico, and forming for 

 part of its course the boundary between the Peten province 

 of Guatemala and the Chiampas oi 

 Mexico. The exploration has thrown 

 much new light on the geography 

 of a region which has up to the 

 present been very imperfectly ex- 

 plored. It is a wild country largely 

 covered with tropical jungle, the 

 main industry, that of lumber, 

 attracting a particularly disreputable 

 class of workmen, while agriculture 

 is confined to a few scattered maize 

 plantations. The author gives a 

 \'erv gloomy account of the popula- 

 tion. " The dubious elements," he 

 says, " sunk in sloth, filth, and every 

 possible vice, whose miserable habi- 

 tations are met with here and there, 

 are constantly shifting since they 

 acquire no fixed property rights." 

 Whoever commits murder across the 

 Mexican border takes refuge in 

 Guatemala, and vice versa. At- 

 tempts are, of course, made to secure 

 the extradition of offenders, but these 

 are generally unsuccessful. In fact, 

 the negro is gradually taking the 

 place of the Spanish-Indian popula- 

 tion, which, having become ener- 

 vated and degraded, is rapidly dying 

 out. 



The difficulty of exploration is 

 naturally increased in such a country 

 by the failure of the so-called Govern- 

 ment to enforce law and order. 



Further, in Spanish times many of the old native names 

 were replaced by those of Christian saints. The few that 

 have survived to our days have been supplanted by political 

 catch-words, Progresso, Libertad, and the like. More 



State seems unable to prevent. Mr. Maler tells a curious 

 slory which appears to show that certain valuable stclic 

 were destroyed during an attempt by a Government official 

 to prepare moulds of the sculptures for the Chicago Exhibi- 

 tion. It is quite lime that the .American Governmcnl 

 intervened to preserve these wonderful structures. 



Taking all these obstacles lo 

 nnhai'ological inquiry into account, 

 it is only natural that Mr. Maler's 

 survey was little more than a recon- 

 naissance. He had no opportunities 

 for excavation, but w-as able to pro- 

 cure photographs and moulds of the 

 most important remains. The four 

 great groups of ruins were visited — 

 those at the so-called Altar de Sacri- 

 ficios and the more important sites, 

 Itsimte-Sacluc, Seibal, Cankuere — the 

 order of their occurrence along the 

 course of the river. Of these, the 

 .Seibal site seems to be the most pro-, 

 mising, though nothing so interesting' 

 as the great sacrificial altar, a mass 

 of reddish sandstone 160 cm. in 

 diameter, was discovered here. In 

 the other sites the most remarkable 

 remains are the groups of stelje or 

 pillars which have survived, while 

 the buildings to which they formed 

 an adjunct are in such a state of 

 decay that without excavation little 

 of their character can be ascertained. 

 The stelre bear usually the repre- 

 sentation of a figure, probably hero, 

 priest, deity, or all combined, with 

 various emblems and accessories, 

 following generally the type charac- 

 teristir of Central .American art. . In some cases the 

 figure is seated in European fashion on a sort 

 of throne. In one stela at Seibal he holds in his 

 outstretched right hand a large sawfish lance, and in his 



serious is the damage to these ancient buildings, which the 

 NO. 2020, VOL. 78] 



Fig. 2. — ClifT-dwellings, west fork of the Gila. 



left a pouch decorated with elaborate arabesques and 

 loops. In another two personages sit in Turkish style 

 before an altar, at which they are performing some sacred 

 rite. More remarkable is the " tiger-paw man," whose 

 hands and feet are covered with tigers' paws fastened by 



