| that it may have been intended to represent Quetzalcoatl, the | | traditional teacher and originator of the Mexican knowledge of | | astronomy. | | | | [109] The fact of men wearing beards would be considered | | extraordinary by the American Indians. Landa states that | | “Cucul-can raised several temples, established regulations for the | | maintenance of good order, and then left Yucatan and proceeded | | towards Mexico.” | | | | [110] Apologética Historia, chapter cxxiii. | | | | [111] With respect to the ancient Indian structures it is expedient | | to give a brief consideration to those that were raised at Copan | | and Quirigua. The earliest account of the sculptures existing at | | Copan was given by Palacio in 1576. In his Report to the King of | | Spain he mentions that within the ruins was a stone cross three | | palms high, and beyond it “There was a statue more than four yards | | high, sculptured like a bishop in his pontifical robes with his | | mitre well worked and with rings in his hands.” | | | | After describing other large statues and the ruins overlooking the | | river, Palacio observes, “I enquired with all possible attention | | for any traditions from the ancient people as to what people lived | | here, and if anything was known of their ancestors, and whether | | there were any books concerning these antiquities ... They say | | that anciently there came there a great chief of the province of | | Yucatan who made these edifices, and after several years he went | | back to his country, and left them solitary and unpeopled.... It | | also appears that the style of the said edifices is like what was | | found in other places by the Spaniards who first discovered | | Yucatan and Tabasco, where figures of bishops were seen and armed | | men and crosses, and since such things have not been found in | | other regions it can be believed that those that made them were | | probably of one nation.” (Report of the Licentiate Dr. Don Diego | | Garcia de Palacio to the King of Spain, 1576.) | | | | It is recorded by Juarros that in the year 1700, Fuentes, who | | wrote the Chronicles of Guatemala, stated with respect to Copan, | | that the figures, “both male and female were of very excellent | | sculpture, which then retained the colours they had been enamelled |