[Illustration: A MAYAN INDIAN. Frontispiece.]
THE
AMERICAN EGYPT
A RECORD OF TRAVEL IN YUCATAN
BY
CHANNING ARNOLD
AND
FREDERICK J. TABOR FROST
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS, MAP AND PLANS
LONDON
HUTCHINSON & CO.
PATERNOSTER ROW
1909
To
ALICE ALTHEA ARNOLD
PREFACE
In publishing the present volume, it is our privilege to produce the
first book ever written by Englishmen on Yucatan--that Egypt of the New
World, where, it is now generally admitted, Central American
Civilisation reached its apogee--and to be, for the present at least,
the only Englishmen who can claim to have explored the uncivilised
north-eastern portions of the Peninsula and the islands of her eastern
coast. Mr. A. P. Maudslay, who in 1889 made a lengthy stay at and a
detailed survey of Chichen, has done yeoman service to Central American
archæology by his years of patient work (alas! too little appreciated)
in Guatemala, in the Usumacinta district and Southern Mexico.
Work, and wonderful work, has been done in civilised Yucatan by bands of
earnest labourers from the States, from Germany, and from France. Among
these the most notable is the late J. L. Stephens, the American
traveller, who visited Yucatan in 1842, and who is justly regarded as
the Father of Mayan archæology. In his footsteps has followed, during
recent years, Mr. Edward H. Thompson, one of the most painstaking and
accomplished of American archæologists. France has been represented by
M. Desiré Charnay, and latterly by Count Perigny. Of the German
field-workers the most assiduous have been Professor Seler, T. Maler,
and K. Sapper; while all who wish to see the Mayan problem solved must
pay a meed of thanks to the eminent Professor Forstemann for his
attempts to decipher the inscriptions, even if they feel, as do we, that
he has allowed his enthusiasm to lead him too far astray on a
will-o'-the-wisp path of inquiry and theory.
The problem reviewed in this volume is a profoundly interesting one. The
ethnology of the Americas presents a problem as yet unsolved. The
average ethnologist has been content to label the vast affiliated hordes
and tribes of the two Americas "Mongolian." But the American
ethnological puzzle is deepened by the existence of what is known as the
Mayan civilisation and its many ramifications throughout Central
America. Whence came these building races? What cradle-land is one to
assign to architects whose achievements often rival in grandeur the
monuments of Egypt? How is one to believe that they were ordinary
members, or members at all, of that great affiliated race of American
Indians whose ideas of building were represented in the north by the
snow-house of the Eskimo and the wigwam of the Sioux, and in the south
by the leaf-shelters of the cannibal inhabitants of the forests of
Brazil?
In the later chapters of this volume we endeavour to analyse the
evidence which we and others have collected on this thorny Mayan
problem. We cannot too strongly urge that the time has come to drop once
and for all the Toltec theory. We know that we are thus taking up a
position in direct opposition to four-fifths of the students and
scholars who have worked in the field; but we are as convinced that the
race which built the ruined palaces and temples of Yucatan is not a
vanished race as we are convinced that the Toltec theory is a gross
error.
And if we are obstinate as to the origin of Mayan civilisation, we fear
we must be charged, too, with gross obstinacy in the matter of deciding
the age of the ruins. We would like to believe, with those more
sanguine, that the wonderful structures have a history rivalling Memphis
or Syene. But we cannot believe it, and we hope that those who read this
volume will acquit us of coming to this very disappointing decision on
flimsy grounds. In such matters no grounds but practical ones are to be
trusted, and we claim that an expert builder's careful examination of
the ruins, after due allowance is made for the friability of the
limestone used in such a climate as Yucatan enjoys, will prove to any
open-minded inquirer that the oldest building still standing, so to
speak, intact, has not seen more than six centuries.
In the present volume it has been impossible to do more than "open the
case" for the theory we propound, viz. that America's first architects
were Buddhist immigrants from Java and Indo-China. To attempt to prove
this would require much time and money; but, alas! archæology is not
such a popular and paying science as will allow those without large
means at their disposal to follow up their theories.
We should need many months of careful study in Java, the Malay
Peninsula, Ceylon and India. If investigations there proved
satisfactory, the next step would be to follow the route we have
suggested as that taken by the migrators in a vessel as similar as
possible to those it may be presumed they employed. Along the route a
more minute study of the archæological remains on the islands of the
Caroline and Marshall groups than has yet been undertaken could be made.
Thence the voyage would be continued to the American mainland, where a
thorough investigation of the country between the coast and Copan would
probably yield valuable data. But such an expedition would require an
outlay of thousands of pounds and would occupy two or three years, much
of which would have to be spent under such hardships as only enthusiasts
could contemplate.
C. A.
F. J. T. F.
LONDON, 1908.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I PAGE
A BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF MEXICO 1