22 RUINS OF IXKUN. 



shown in dotted lines. Near the middle doorway a rough unworked slab of stone was 

 lying, which had probably served as a lintel. The doorway in the back wall had been 

 blocked up after the house was built. The Avails still standing are about five feet high, 

 and, from the position of the stone lintel above the blocked-up doorway, I should 

 estimate the original height of the Avails at a little over six feet. The cement floor of 

 the house is still in fair condition, and there are traces of a cement-covered platform 

 which ran round the outside of it. Some fragments of rough pottery Avere found inside 

 the house. No roofing-stones of the type used in Copan, Tikal, and the other great 

 ruins could be found, and I am inclined to think that the very narrow chambers were 

 roofed Avith flat slabs, and some slabs Avhich would have answered the purpose were 

 found among the debris. There are several carved monoliths Avhich formerly stood on 

 the level ground in front of the buildings, but most of them are overturned and partly 

 destroyed. The only one in a good state of preservation is marked * in the Plan. 

 It is an upright stone measuring 12 feet 6 inches in height, 5 feet 10 inches in breadth, 

 and about 1 foot 6 inches in thickness. It is carved on the east side only (see 

 Plates LXVIII. & LXIX.). A circular disk-like stone about 12 feet in diameter is 

 lying in front of the monument. 



The carving on the monument represents two Maya priests or chieftains, with 

 elaborate head-dresses and ornaments, standing facing each other above a hieroglyphic 

 inscription, which commences Avith what I have called an " Initial Sequence," which 

 Mr. Goodman has proved to be a date. In the loAver panels are two unadorned 

 crouching human figures, Avith their necks and arms bound with ropes, evidently meant 

 to represent prisoners trodden under foot by the two gorgeously arrayed figures standing 

 above them. The marked difference in physiognomy betAveen the Mayas and their 

 captives is clearly shown, and this monument may celebrate the conquest of the 

 aboriginal inhabitants of the land or the defeat of some of those barbarous invaders 

 from the north Avhom some writers believe to have finally caused the overthroAV of the 

 Maya civilization. It is also Avorth noting that the Mayas carry only ornamented 

 staves in their hands and make no show of Aveapons of Avar. In one of the other partly 

 destroyed monuments a figure is represented carrying in his hand one of the " manikin 

 sceptres," of which so many examples occur on the sculptures at Quirigua. 



