322 THE INSCRIPTIONS AT COPAN. 
The figures stand 1 meter high, and allowing for the now missing heads, 
and the doubtless elaborate head-dresses, they must originally have been at 
least 0.75 meter higher, or close to 2 meters for the height of the design above 
the hieroglyphic band. 
On the level of the top seat at each end of the stand there projects a 
pler, its vertical face flush with the back of the second seat. (See plate 30.) 
The top of each is sculptured with 2 glyphs and the face with 2, making 4 
for each pier. There are 15% glyph-blocks on each side of the central 
ornament, and these, with those on the flanking piers, make 4+15%+15% 
+4=39 for the entire text. This imposing construction is clearly not a 
stairway, since it leads nowhere, the riser of what would be the fifth step 
(the back of the fourth tier of seats) merging into the steep slope of the 
substructure of Temple 11. Moreover, these seats or steps are not placed 
directly in line with the back doorway of Temple 11 above, but, on the con- 
trary, they are in the middle of the north side of the Western Court, of which 
they command an excellent view. A glance at the map in plate 6 will 
establish their correlation with the Western Court rather than with Temple 
11 beyond any doubt, and will indicate their true function as a reviewing- 
stand for spectacles, ceremonies, comedies, dances, and the like, which were 
held in this court.1_ Allowing half a meter for each spectator, this stand 
would have accommodated about 150 people; probably only the elect of the 
city were privileged to sit here. 
When the writer first visited Copan in 1910 only the eastern third of 
this stand had been excavated, 7. ¢., the last 11 glyph-blocks, apparently 
where the work of the Peabody Museum had been suspended. In 1912, 
while he was at Copan with Morris, another 41% glyph-blocks were uncovered 
and the central ornament exposed. It was not until 1915, however, that the 
left half of the stand was cleared of the débris fallen from Temple 11 above, 
under which it was deeply buried, and the whole construction brought to 
light, photographs of it taken, and the inscription copied. 
Coming next to the consideration of the inscription, another interesting 
example of glyphic inversion for the sake of bilateral symmetry, as in the 
northern and southern doorways of Temple 11, may be noted. Three of the 
glyphs on the left, a1 on the back of the top seat, and a2b and a4 on the left 
pier all have their heads facing to the right, 2.¢., toward the center of the 
stairway, and the third, a4, clearly the day Ahau, also has its coefficient on 
itsright. This is an unmistakable inversion of the usual practice, doubt- 
less due to the desire to have the glyphs on the two piers face each other 
and balance. 
The first glyph, a1, is of unknown meaning. It would appear not to be 
a day, since the cartouche and trinal support are wanting and the coefficient 
1 Landa, in describing the ruins of Chichen Itza, northern Yucatan (see plate 1), states that the Maya had 
theaters: “At some distance in front of the stairway on the north there are two small theaters of stone with four 
staircases, paved on top, where they say that farces were represented, and comedies for the pleasure of the people.” 
(1881, p. 105.) Similar mounds, 7.¢., with stairways on one, two, or four sides and apparently without super- 
structures, are found throughout the Maya‘ area. 
