5 - Incidents of Travel: Mayan Ruins

Part 5: Accomodations at Copan, 1839 and Now

Terramaya Hotel
Copan

Accomodations at Copan have changed dramatically since John Lloyd Stephens and Frederick Catherwood visited the ruins in 1839.  Here is an excerpt describing one of the many nice Hotels in the area now, the Terramaya, “Absolutely charming, small boutique hotel. Rooms are spacious and updated/modern while retaining that hacienda charm. Breakfast served on the terrace every morning was delicious with fresh fruit, granola, and a hot plate that varies every morning from scrambled eggs to pancakes to huevos rancheros. The hour long massage in the garden was well worth the $40. … the upstairs rooms facing the back had a nice balcony with a hamock.”

In 1839, however, the ruins were privately owned and part of a large ranch.  Compare Stephen’s account of his accomodations, “… Don Gregario arrived.  He was about fifty, had large black whiskers, and a beard of several day’s growth.  It was easy to see that he was a domestic tyrant.  The glance which he threw at us before dismounting seemed to say to us, “Who are you?" I told him that we had come into that neighbourhood to visit the ruins of Copan, and his manner said, ‘What’s that to me?’ but he answered that they were on the other side of the river.  I asked him whether we could procure a guide, and again he said that the only man who knew anything about them lived on the other side of the river. 

As yet we did not make sufficient allowance for the distracted state of the country;…  but relying on the reputation of the country for hospitality, I was rather slow in coming to the disagreeable conclusion that we were not welcome.  I ordered the muleteer to saddle the mules; but the rascal refused to saddle his beasts again that day.

“Don Gregario was the great man of Copan; the richest man, and the petty tyrant; and it would be most unfortunate to have a rupture with him, or even to let it be known at the village that we were not well received at his house.  Mr. Catherwood took a seat on the piazza.  The don sat on a chair, with our detestable muleteer by his side, and a half-concealed smile of derision on his face, talking of “idols,” and looking at me.  By this time eight or ten men, sons, servants, and laborers had come in from their day’s work.  The women turned away their heads; and the men, taking their cue from the don, looked so insulting, that I told Mr. Catherwood we would tumble our luggage into the road, and curse him for an inhospitable churl; but Mr. Catherwood warned me against it, urging that, if we had an open quarrel with him, after all our trouble we would be prevented seeing the ruins.

“After supper all prepared for sleep.  The don’s house had two sides, an inside and an out.  The don and his family occupied the former, and we the latter; but we had not even this to ourselves.  All along the wall were frames made of sticks about an inch thick, tied together with bark strings, over which the workmen spread an untanned oxhide for a bed.  There were three hammocks besides ours, and I had so little room for mine that my body described an inverted parabola, with my heels as high as my head.

“In the morning Don Gregario was in the same humour.  We made our toilet under the shed with as much respect as possible to the presence of the female members of the family, who were constantly passing.  We had made up our minds to hold on and see the ruins; and fortunately, early in the morning, one of the crusty don’s sons brought over from the village Jose, the guide of whom we stood in need.”

The guide led Stephens and Catherwood to the ruins.  Clearly, Stephens was not disappointed.  Here is his account of his first glimpse of a Mayan ruin, “We came to the bank of a river, and saw directly opposite a stone wall, perhaps a hundred feet high, with a furze growing out of the top, running north and south along the river, in some places fallen, but in other entire.  It had more the character of a structure than any we had ever seen ascribed to the aborigines of America, and formed part of the wall of Copan, an ancient city on whose history books throw but little light.”

 

 

 

-- Courtney Miller

 

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4 - Incidents of Travel: Mayan Ruins

Part 4: Copan

Stela (Monument) at Copan
by Frederick Catherwood

“The sight of this unexpected monument put at rest at once and forever, in our minds, all uncertainty in regard to the character of American antiquities, and gave us the assurance that the objects we were in search of were interesting, not only as the remains of an unknown people, but as works of art, proving, like newly-discovered historical records, that the people who once occupied the Continent of America were not savages,” wrote John Lloyd Stephens’ when he first found the stelae at Copan. 

When Stephens and his artist friend, Frederick Catherwood, travelled to Central American the first time, they sailed all the way around the Yucatan Peninsula to Belize so that they could begin their exploration of lost cities at Copan, which was one of only three archaeological sites in 1839.  He continued:

“… [our guide] conducted us through the thick forest, among half-buried fragments, to fourteen monuments of the same character and appearance, some with more elegant designs, and some in workmanship equal to the finest monuments of the Egyptians; one displaced from its pedestal by enormous roots; another locked in the close embrace of branches of trees, and almost lifted out of the earth; another hurled to the ground, and bound down by huge vines and creepers; and one standing, with its altar before it, in a grove of trees which grew around it, seemingly to shade and shroud it as a sacred thing; in the solemn stillness of the wood, it seemed a divinity mourning over a fallen people."

Topled Monument
by Frederick Catherwood

In addition to the beautiful and exquisitely carved “monuments”, they found great pyramids.  Again, Stephens’ description:

Pyramid and Stela at Copan
by Frederick Catherwood

“We returned to the base of the pyramidal structure, and ascended by regular stone steps, in some places forced apart by bushes and saplings, and in others thrown down by the growth of large trees, while some remained entire.  They were ornamented with sculptured figures and rows of death’s heads.  Climbing over the ruined top, we reached a terrace overgrown with trees, and, crossing it, descended by stone steps into an area so covered with trees that at first we could not make out its form, but which, on clearing the way with the machete, we ascertained to be a square, and with steps on all the sides almost as perfect as those of the roman amphitheatre.  The steps were ornamented with sculpture, and on the south side, about half way up, forced out of its place by roots, was a colossal head, evidently a portrait.  We ascended these steps, and reached a broad terrace a hundred feet high, overlooking the river, and supported by the wall which we had seen from the opposite bank.

“We sat down on the very edge of the wall, and strove in vain to penetrate the mystery by which we were surrounded.  Who were the people that built this city?  In the ruined cities of Egypt, even in the long-lost Petra, the stranger knows the story of the people whose vestiges are around him.  America, say historians, was peopled by savages; but savages never reared these structures, savages never carved these stones.  We asked the Indians who made them, and their dull answer was “Quien sabe?” “Who knows?”.

Have you been to Copan?  Please share your story.

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-- Courtney Miller