INSCRIPTIONS OF THE GREAT PERIOD. 231 
STELA D—continued. 
Text, (b) drawing: | Catherwood, 1844, plate 5. 
Maudslay, ibid, plates 45, 46, 48. 
Morley, 1915, plate 14. 
Stephens, 1841, vol. 1, 2 plates, facing p. 153. 
Thomas, 1904, plates 76, 77. 
References: Bowditch, 1910, pp. 169, 170, and table 29. 
Galindo, 1834, Appendix XI, p. 598. 
Goodman, 1897, p. 130. 
Gordon, 1896, pp. 24, 35- 
Gordon, 1902, pp. 171, 174. 
Maudslay, 1889-1902, vol. 1 of text, pp. 45-47. 
Morley, 1915, pp. 188-191. 
Seler, 1902-1908, vol. 1, pp. 768-771. 
Spinden, 1913, pp. 159, 161, and table 1. 
Stephens, 1841, vol. 1, pp. 153, 154. 
Thomas, 1900, pp. 778, 801. 
Thomas, 1904, pp. 221-223. 
Stela D stands in front of the southern base of Mound 2, with which it 
is correlated, at the north side of the Great Plaza. It is about 3.66 meters 
high and 1.08 meters wide. Stephens gives it the name of Statue P on his 
map.! The front (south side) shows a large human figure with a mask on 
its face, holes being cut for the forehead, eyes, and mouth. The drapery 
and costume of this figure extend around and completely cover the two 
sides. The back is sculptured with two parallel columns of glyph-blocks, 
16 in all, and on the basis of this arrangement, encountered here for the first 
time, it is necessary to create a new class for this stela, namely, Class 6. 
This inscription is one of the most remarkable texts in the entire Corpus 
Inscriptionum Mayarum. ‘This distinction is due to the fact that its glyphs 
are expressed by full-figure forms; that is, instead of the heads only, the 
whole bodies of human, animal, and bird forms are employed.” This is the 
first text of its kind thus far encountered, and the first occurrence of any 
full-figure glyphs, with the single exception of the uinal-signs in the Initial 
Series of Stele 24, 15, 12, and 2, yet found. 
Texts of this character are exceedingly rare. So far as the writer knows 
there are only five full-figure Initial Series now known in the Maya Corpus: 
(1) Stela D, Copan. 
(2) Date 24, Hieroglyphic Stairway, Copan.’ 
(3) Stela D East side, Quirigua. 
(4) Stela D West side, Quirigua. 
(5) Zobmorph B, Quirigua. 
Full-figure glyphs also occur sporadically in a few other inscriptions 
here at Copan, as the uinal-signs on Stele 24, 15, 2, and 12, already noted, 
and on Altars D’ and W’. 

1 Stephens, 1841, vol. 1, map facing p. 133, and p. 153. 
2 For a description of full-figure glyphs, see Morley, 1915, pp. 67, 68. 
8 Gordon (1902, p. 184) notes the possibility that there may have been another full-hgure Initial Series on the 
Hieroglyphic Stairway. An examination of the blocks thus identified leads the writer to the same conclusion 
(see p. 277), or more probably that this second full-figure Initial Series came from the temple on top of Mound 26. 
It is not included above, as being too doubtful. 
