3 Incidents of Travel: Mayan Ruins

Part 3: The House of the Dwarf

 

John Lloyd Stephens

John Lloyd Stephens, the New York attorney who made his fortune selling books chronicling his extensive travels around the world in the early 1800’s, was so successful, I think, because he was interested in everything and that made him an interesting read.  While exploring the ruins of the Mayan city Uxmal that had been decaying and vacant in the jungles of Yucatan for a thousand plus years, he was fascinated by how fearful the natives were of the city and its buildings, especially at night.  Like a good researcher, he questioned one of the natives about a large building the natives referred to as “House of the Dwarf” and came up with this explanation:

“The Indians regard these ruins with superstitious reverence.  They will not go near them at night, and they have the old story that immense treasure is hidden among them.  Each of the buildings has its name given to it by the Indians.  This is called the Casa del Anano, or House of the Dwarf, and it is consecrated by a wild legend, which, as I sat in the doorway, I received from the lips of an Indian, as follows:

Uxmal from a distance by Frederick Catherwood

 

“There was an old woman who lived in a hut on the very spot now occupied by the structure on which this building is perched who went mourning that she had no children. In her distress she one

day took an egg, covered it with a cloth, and laid it away carefully in one corner of the hut.  Every day she went to look at it, until one morning she found the egg hatched, and a criatura, or baby, born.  The old woman was delighted, and called it her son, provided it with a nurse, took good care of it, so that in one year it walked and talked like a man; and then it stopped growing.  The old woman was more delighted than ever, and said he would be a great lord or king.  One day she told him to go to the house of the gobernador and challenge him to a trial of strength.  The dwarf tried to beg off, but the old woman insisted, and he went.  The guard admitted him, and he flung his challenge at the gobernador.  The latter smiled, and told him to lift a stone of three arrobas or seventy-five pounds, which the little fellow cried and returned to his mother, who sent him back to say that if the governador lifted it first, he would afterward.  The gobernador lifted it, and the dwarf immediately did the same.  The gobernador then tried him with other feats of strength, and dwarf regularly did whatever was done by the gobernador.  At length, indignant at being matched by a dwarf, the gobernador told him that, unless he made a house in one night, higher than any in the place, he would kill him.  The poor dwarf again returned crying to his mother, who bade him not to be disheartened, and the next morning he awoke and found himself in this lofty building.  The gobernador, seeing it from the door of his palace, was astonished, and sent for the dwarf, and told him to collect two bundles of cogoiol, a wood of very hard species, with one of which he, the gobernador, would beat the dwarf over the head, and afterward the dwarf should beat him with the other.  The dwarf again returned crying to his mother; but the latter told him not to be afraid, and put on the crown of his head a tortillita de trigo, a small thin cake of wheat flower.

 

House of the Dwarf [Pyramid of the Magician]
Uxmal

“The trial was made in the presence of all the great men in the city.  The gobernador broke the whole of his bundle over the dwarf’s head without hurting the little fellow in the least.  He then tried to avoid the trial on his own head, but he had given his word in the presence of his officers, and was obliged to submit.  The second blow of the dwarf broke his skull in pieces, and all the spectators hailed the victor as their new gobernador.  The old woman then died; but at the Indian village of Mani, seventeen leagues distance, there is a deep well, from which opens a cave that leads underground an immense distance to Merida.  In this cave, on the bank of a stream, under the shade of large tree, sits an old woman with a serpent by her side, who sells water in small quantities, not for money, but only for a criatura to give the serpent to eat; and this old woman is the mother of the dwarf.”

 

All cultures have their colorful myths and legends often based upon at least some remnant of fact.  They are a way of interpreting and explaining things that need explaining but may not lend themselves to an obvious explanation.  The “House of the Dwarf”, known today more commonly as “Pyramid of the Magician”, separates itself from other ruins with its soft, rounded corners and majestic, almost pure, architecture.  It just had to have been built by someone extraordinary.

Link to Part 1

 

Link to Part 2

 

-- Courtney Miller

 

Have you been to one of the Mayan Ruins?  Share your story.



2 - Incidents of Travel: Mayan Ruins



Part 2: Uxmal, featuring incidents of Travel by Rhondda Hartman



John Lloyd Stephens 1836

The last city visited by John Lloyd Stephens and Frederick Catherwood in their monumental trip to Central America in 1839 and the first site revisited on their return was Uxmal.  Stephens described the ruins as follows:

“The hacienda of Uxmal was built of dark gray stone, ruder in appearance than any of the others [cities visited].  … In the afternoon, [I] set out for a walk to the ruins.  The path led through a noble piece of woods, in which there were many tracks, and [my] Indian guide lost his way.  We took another road, and, emerging suddenly from the woods, to my astonishment came at once upon a large open field strewed with mounds of ruins, and vast buildings on terraces, and pyramidal structures, grand and in good preservation, richly ornamented, without a bush to obstruct the view, and in picturesque effect almost equal to the ruins of Thebes.

Uxmal by Frederick Catherwood

“The place of which I am now speaking was beyond all doubt once a large, populous, and highly civilized city.  Who built it, why it was located away from water or any of those natural advantages which have determined the sites of cities whose histories are known, what led to its abandonment and destruction, no man can tell.



Uxmal today

“… The first object that arrests the eye on emerging from the forest is the building [House of the Dwarf, see below].  From its front doorway I counted sixteen elevations, with broken walls and mounds of stones, and vast, magnificent edifices, which seemed untouched by time.

“… The other building is called Casa de las Monjas, or House of the Nuns, or the Convent.  It is situated on an artificial elevation about fifteen feet high.  Its form is quadrangular, and one side, according to my measurement, is ninety-five paces in length.  … Like the House of the Dwarf, it is built entirely of cut stone, and the whole exterior is filled with the same rich, elaborate, and incomprehensible sculptured ornaments.”



Uxmal "The Nunnery"

“While I was making the circuit of these ruins, Mr. Catherwood proceeded to the Casa del Gobernador.  It is the grandest in position, the most stately in architecture and proportions, and the most perfect in preservation of all the structures remaining at Uxmal. … There is no rudeness or barbarity in the design or proportions; on the contrary, the whole wears an air of architectural symmetry and grandeur; and as the stranger ascends the steps and casts a bewildered eye along its open and desolate doors, it is hard to believe that he sees before him the work of a race in whose epitaph, as written by historians, they are called ignorant of art, and said to have perished in the rudeness of savage life.  If it stood at this day on its grand artificial terrace in Hyde Park or the Garden of the Tuileries, it would form a new order, I do not say equaling, but not unworthy to stand side by side with the remains of Egyptian, Grecian, and Roman art.”

Compare Stephen’s  impression of Uxmal to this visit by Rhondda Hartman:
 

Rhondda Hartman

“We went in the early 1970s and took our 2 oldest girls with us; they were about 12 & 14.  Uxmal is the most delightful of all the pyramids I have visited, and the first.   It is 'soft' and architecturally beautiful with its rounded walls and elliptical shape.   I would call it a boutique archaeological site! Chichen Itsa, by comparison, is harsh and sharp and a military compound.   Uxmal is more like a palace.

  
“My belief is that the sacrificial rituals that are attributed to the Mayans were introduced by other civilizations of Toltec and Aztec!   As in Chichen Itsa,  Mayans are a peaceful culture, I think, at least Uxmal feels that way to me!  We were on a tour and our hotel was nearby.  One of my daughters and I could not wait for the guide.  We went on our own and climbed all over the pyramid and surrounding areas and felt so comfortable.   [House of the Dwarf pictured below]

 
“We also joined the tour at the established time, but when that was done, we wandered off by ourselves again and found the un-restored area of the park.  A kind worker saw our interest and gave us a tour of the jungle-covered part of the Mayan city and outside the walls where the commoners lived.  We were so comfortable and felt as though it was familiar territory for us. We seemed to know where we were and where to go!  Well, do I need to tell you that it sparked an interest in the Mayan civilization for both of us?  And you can be sure that if there is reincarnation, my daughter and I lived there!

 
“It was about that time that I went to UCD to get a Masters and I took several courses on the culture.  I have an interest in a trip to see the more important Mayan cities of Tikal , Palenque , Copan and Bonampak.  I cannot revisit Uxmal since the first time was so magical I could probably never achieve that experience again!”

-- Rhondda Hartman is an expert on natural childbirth, renowned speaker and is the author of “Exercises For True Natural Childbirth”.  Rhondda has travelled all over the world and says that one of her favorite places in the world is Uxmal.

 

Have you travelled to see the Mayan ruins? I would like to hear your story. If you are willing to share your story, please submit it by clicking here. Throughout this series, I will be posting stories from readers and comparing their experiences with those of Stephens and Catherwood.

 

Link to Part 1

 

-- Courtney Miller

1 - Incidents of Travel: Maya Ruins

Part 1: John Lloyd Stephens and Frederick Catherwood



John Lloyd Stephens

 On a dark night in October, 1839, a wealthy attorney from New York and an architect from England, set sail on an adventure that they could not have imagined.   The attorney, John Lloyd Stephens, had made his wealth as an author profiting from a trip to Europe for “health reasons”.   He had acquired a “persistent streptococci throat” while politicking for Andrew Jackson.   His doctor recommended a trip to Europe.  While in Europe, he sent articles on “incidents of travel’ back to his friend at the American Monthly magazine which were quite successful.  The influx of immigrants to America flooded all means of transport back home, so Stephens extended his travels to Egypt, Arabia, the Holy Lands, Petra, Turkey, Russia, Poland and eventually England.  While visiting Jerusalem, he met Frederick Catherwood, an English architect trying to make a living drawing the ruins of Rome and sketching the architecture of the Holy Lands.  Stephens purchased a map of the Holy Lands drawn by Catherwood and was so impressed by it that he later looked up Catherwood in England.  They became great friends.
 

Frederick Catherwood
self-portrait

Back in New York, Stephens compiled his notes and “Incidents of Travel in Egypt, Arabia Petraea, and the Holy Land” was published in 1837.  It was wildly successful and was followed up by “Incidents of Travel in Greece, Turkey, Russia, and Poland” setting up Stephens financially.   

Rumors of great cities in Central America were floating about and Stephens enlisted his friend Catherwood, who had relocated to New York, to join him for a trip to Central America.  Stephens described his friend as, “… an experienced traveler and personal friend, who had passed more than ten years of his life in diligently studying the antiquities of the Old World; and whom, as one familiar with the remains of ancient architectural greatness …”

At that time, only three archaeological sites were known in Central America – Copan, Palenque, and Uxmal.  No one connected the cities with any known culture and the name “Maya” was scarcely known.  According to Victor Wolfgang von Hagen, who wrote an introduction for a re-printing of Stephen’s book, “Incidents of Travel in Yucatan”,  “The acceptance of an indigenous ‘civilization’ demanded of an American living in 1839 a complete reorientation; to him an ‘Indian’ was one of those barbaric, half-naked tipi dwellers, a rude subhuman people who hunted with animal stealth.”

Before leaving, his old friend and now president of the United States, Andrew Jackson, appointed Stephens Ambassador to Central America.  He accepted the post hoping it would aid him in his search for “lost civilizations”.  Again from von Hagen, “Landing within the political and social chaos which was Central America, they found that it was far easier to find lost cities than to locate lost governments."

So, in October, 1839, John Lloyd Stephens and Frederick Catherwood set sail for Belize on a momentous journey that would expose, for the first time, the wonders of the lost Mayan civilization to America. 

Stelae in Copan
by Frederick Catherwood

As the pictures at left/right and below show, Frederick Catherwood's drawings were amazingly accurate and provide a true feel for what they discovered in their visits to Central America. The statues are the stelae found at Copan. Below a picture of Uxmal compared with Catherwood's.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Uxmal, by Frederick Catherwood

 

 

 

 

 

Recent picture of Uxmal

Have you travelled to see the Mayan ruins?  I would like to hear your story.  If you are willing to share your story, please submit it by clicking here.  Throughout this series, I will be posting stories from readers and comparing their descriptions of what it is like now to what Stephens and Catherwood experienced in 1839

preview video

 

 



-- Courtney Miller