Copán
Encyclopedia
Copán is an archaeological site of the Maya civilization
located in the Copán Department of western Honduras
, not far from the border with Guatemala
. It was the capital city of a major Classic period
kingdom from the 5th to 9th centuries AD. The city was located in the extreme southeast of the Mesoamerica
n cultural region, on the frontier with the Isthmo-Colombian
cultural region, and was almost surrounded by non-Maya peoples
. In this fertile valley now lies a city of about 3000, a small airport, and a winding road.
Copán was occupied for more than two thousand years, from the Early Preclassic
period right through to the Postclassic
. The city developed a distinctive sculptural style within the tradition of the lowland Maya, perhaps to emphasize the Maya ethnicity of the city's rulers.
The city has a historical record that spans the greater part of the Classic period and has been reconstructed in detail by archaeologists and epigraphers. Copán, probably called Oxwitik by the Maya, was a powerful city ruling a vast kingdom within the southern Maya area
. The city suffered a major political disaster in AD 738 when Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil
, one of the greatest kings in Copán's dynastic history, was captured and executed by his former vassal, the king of Quiriguá
. This unexpected defeat resulted in a 17-year hiatus at the city, during which time Copán may have been subject to Quiriguá in a reversal of fortunes.
A significant portion of the eastern side of the acropolis has been eroded away by the Copán River, although the river has since been diverted in order to protect the site from further damage.
Copán is located in western Honduras close to the border with Guatemala. Copán lies within the municipality
of Copán Ruinas
in the department of Copán. It is situated in a fertile valley among foothills at 700 metres (2,296.6 ft) above mean sea level
. The ruins of the site core of the city are located 1.6 kilometre (0.994196378639691 mi) from the modern village of Copán Ruinas
, which is itself built on the site of a major complex dating to the Classic period.
In the Preclassic period the floor of the Copán Valley was undulating, swampy and prone to seasonal flooding. In the Early Classic, the inhabitants flattened the valley floor and undertook construction projects to protect the architecture of the city from the effects of flooding.
Copán had a major influence on regional centres across western and central Honduras, stimulating the introduction of Mesoamerican characteristics to local elites.
in 738, when the long-ruling king Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil
was captured and beheaded by Quirigua's ruler K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat (Cauac Sky). Although this was a major setback, Copán's rulers began to build monumental structures again within a few decades.
The area of Copán continued to be occupied after the last major ceremonial structures and royal monuments were erected, but the population declined in the 8th and 9th centuries from perhaps over 20,000 in the city to less than 5,000. The ceremonial center was long abandoned and the surrounding valley home to only a few farming hamlets at the time of the arrival of the Spanish
in the 16th century.
. This AD 159 date is mentioned in several texts and is linked to a figure known as "Foliated Ajaw
". This same person is mentioned on the carved skull of a peccary
recovered from Tomb 1, where he is said to perform an action with a stela in AD 376.
The city was refounded by K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo'
, establishing it as the capital of a new Maya kingdom. This coup was apparently organized and launched from Tikal. Texts record the arrival of a warrior named K'uk' Mo' Ajaw who was installed upon the throne of the city in AD 426 and given a new royal name, K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' and the ochk'in kaloomte "Lord of the West" title used a generation earlier by Siyaj K'ak', a general from the great metropolis of Teotihuacan
who had decisively intervened in the politics of the central Petén. K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' was probably from Tikal and was likely to have been sponsored by Siyaj Chan K'awill II, the 16th ruler in the dynastic succession of Tikal. K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' may have legitimized his claim to rulership by marrying into the old Copán royal family, evidenced from the remains of his presumed widow. Bone analysis of her remains indicates that she was local to Copán. After the establishment of the new kingdom of Copán, the city remained closely allied with Tikal. The hieroglyphic text on Copán Altar Q
describes the lord being elevated to kingship with the receipt of his royal scepter. The ceremonies involved in the founding of the Copán dynasty also included the installation of a subordinate king at Quiriguá
.
A text from Tikal mentions K'uk' Mo' and has been dated to AD 406, twenty years before K'uk' Mo' Ajaw founded the new dynasty at Copán. Both names are likely to refer to the same individual originally from Tikal. Although none of the hieroglyphic texts that mention the founding of the new Copán dynasty describe how K'uk' Mo' arrived at the city, indirect evidence suggests that he conquered the city by military means. On Altar Q he is depicted as a Teotihuacano warrior with goggle eyes and a war serpent shield. When he arrived at Copán he initiated the construction of various structures, including one temple in the talud-tablero
style typical of Teotihuacan and another with inset corners and apron moldings that are characteristic of Tikal. These strong links with both the Maya and Central Mexican cultures suggest that he was at least a Mexicanized Maya or possibly even from Teotihuacan. The dynasty founded by king K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' ruled the city for four centuries and included sixteen kings plus a probable pretender who would have been seventeenth in line. Several monuments have survived that were dedicated by K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' and by his heir.
K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' died between AD 435 and AD 437. In 1995 a tomb underneath the talud-tablero Hunal temple was discovered by a team of archaeologists led by Robert Sharer
and David Sedat. The tomb contained the skeleton of an elderly man with rich offerings and evidence of battle wounds. The remains have been identified as those of K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' due to their location underneath a sequence of seven buildings erected in his honor. Bone analysis has identified the remains as being those of someone foreign to Copán itself.
K'inich Popol Hol inherited the throne of Copán from K'inich ax K'uk' Mo', who was his father. He undertook major construction projects with the redesign of the core of Copán. Popol Hol is not the original name of this king but rather a nickname based on the appearance of his Teotihuacan-linked name glyph. K'inich Popol Hol oversaw the construction of the first version of the Mesoamerican ballcourt
at the city, which was decorated with images of the Scarlet Macaw
, a bird that features prominently in Maya mythology
. His greatest construction activity was in the area of his father's palace, now underlying Structure 10L-16, which he demolished after entombing his father there. He then built three successive buildings on top of the tomb in rapid succession.
B'alam Nehn (often referred to as Waterlily Jaguar) was the first king to actually record his position in the dynastic succession, declaring that he was seventh in line from K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo'. Stela 15 records that he was already ruling Copán by AD 504. B'alam Nehn is the only king of Copán to be mentioned in a hieroglyphic text from outside of the southeastern Maya region. His name appears in a text on Stela 16 from Caracol
, a site in Belize
. The stela dates to AD 534 but the text itself is not well understood. B'alam Nehn undertook major construction projects in the Acropolis, building over an early palace with a number of important structures.
Wil Ohl K'inich, the eighth ruler, is another king known only by his appearance on Altar Q. He was succeeded by Ruler 9 in AD 551, his accession being described on the Hieroglyphic Stairway. He is also depicted on Altar Q but ruled for a very short period of less than two years.
The 10th ruler is nicknamed Moon Jaguar by Mayanists. He was a son of B'alam Nehn, the 7th ruler. He was enthroned in May 553. His surviving monuments were found in the modern village of Copán Ruinas, which was a major complex during the Classic period. The most famous construction dating to his reign is the elaborate Rosalila phase of Temple 16, discovered entombed intact under later phases of the temple during archaeological tunneling work.
Smoke Imix was crowned 16 days after the death of K'ak' Chan Yopaat. He is thought to have been the longest reigning king of Copán, ruling from 628 to 695. He is believed to have been born in AD 612 to have become king at the age of 15. Archaeologists have recovered little evidence of activity for the first 26 years of his reign but in AD 652 there was a sudden explosion of monument production, with two stelae being erected in the Great Plaza and a further four in important locations across the Copán Valley. These monuments all celebrated a katun-ending. He also erected a stela at the Santa Rita
site 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) away and is mentioned on Altar L at Quiriguá in relation to the same event in 652. It is thought that he was trying to stamp his authority throughout the whole valley after the end of some earlier restriction to his freedom to rule as he wished.
After this sudden spate of activity, Smoke Imix continued to rule until almost the end of the 7th century, he dedicated another 9 known monuments and made important changes to the architecture of Copán, including the construction of Structure 2 which closes the northern side of the Great Plaza and a new version of Temple 26, nicknamed Chorcha. Smoke Imix ruled Copán for 67 years and died on 15 June 695 at the age of 79, an age that was so distinguished that it is used to identify him in place of his name on Altar Q. His tomb had already been prepared in the Chorcha phase of Temple 26 and he was buried just 2 days after his death.
Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil
was crowned as the 13th king in the Copán dynasty in July 695. He oversaw both the apogee of Copán's achievements and also one of the city's most catastrophic political disasters. During his reign, the sculptural style of the city evolved into the full in-the-round sculpture characteristic of Copán. In AD 718, Copán attacked and defeated the unidentified site of Xkuy, recording its burning on an unusual stone cylinder. In AD 724 Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil installed K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat as a vassal
on the throne of Quiriguá
. Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil was confident enough in his power to rank his city among the four most powerful states in the Maya region, together with Tikal, Calakmul
and Palenque
, as recorded on Stela A. In contrast to his predecessor, Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil concentrated his monuments in the site core of the Copán; his first was Stela J, dated to AD 702 and erected at the eastern entrance to the city.
He continued to erect a further 7 high-quality stelae until AD 736, monuments that are considered masterpieces of Classic Maya sculpture with such mastery of detail that they represent the highest pinnacle of Maya artistic achievement. The stelae depict king Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil ritually posed and bearing the attributes of a variety of deities, including B'olon K'awiil, K'uy Nik Ajaw and Mo' Witz Ajaw. The king also carried out major construction works, including a new version of Temple 26 that now bore the first version of the Hieroglyphic Stairway, plus two temples that have now been lost to the erosion of the Copán River. He also encased the Rosalila phase of Temple 16 within a new phase of construction. He remodelled the ballcourt, then demolished it and built a new one in its place.
Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil had only recently dedicated the new ballcourt in AD 738 when a completely unexpected disaster befell the city. Twelve years earlier he had installed K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat on the throne of Quiriguá as his vassal. By 734 the king of Quiriguá had shown he was no longer an obedient subordinate when he began to refer to himself as k'ul ajaw
, "holy lord", rather than simply as a subordinate lord ajaw. K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat appears to have taken advantage of wider political rivalries and allied himself with Calakmul
, the sworn enemy of Tikal. Copán itself was firmly allied with Tikal and Calakmul used its alliance with Quiriguá to undermine Tikal's key ally in the south.
Although the exact details are unknown, in April 738 K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat captured Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil and burned two of Copán's patron deities. Six days later Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil was decapitated in Quiriguá. This coup does not seem to have physically affected either Copán or Quiriguá; there is no evidence that either city was attacked at this time and the victor seems not to have received any detectable tribute. All of this seems to imply that K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat managed to somehow ambush Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil, rather than to have defeated him in outright battle. It has been suggested that Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil was attempting to attack another site to secure captives for sacrifice in order to dedicate the new ballcourt when he was ambushed by K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat and his Quiriguá warriors.
In the Late Classic, alliance with Calakmul was frequently associated with the promise of military support. The fact that Copán, a much more powerful city than Quiriguá, failed to retaliate against its former vassal implies that it feared the military intervention of Calakmul. Calakmul itself was far enough away from Quiriguá that K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat was not afraid of falling directly under its power as a full vassal state, even though it is likely that Calakmul sent warriors to help in the defeat of Copán. The alliance instead seems to have been one of mutual advantage: Calakmul managed to weaken a powerful ally of Tikal while Quiriguá gained its independence. The disaster for Copán had long-lasting consequences; major construction ceased and no new monuments were raised for the next 17 years.
trade route to Quiriguá. The fall in Copán's income and corresponding increase at Quiriguá is evident from the massive commissioning of new monuments and architecture at the latter city and Copán may even have been subject to its former vassal. K'ak' Joplaj Chan K'awiil died in January 749.
The next ruler was K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil, a son of K'ak' Joplaj Chan K'awiil. The early period of his rulership fell within Copán's hiatus but later on he began a programme of renewal in an effort to recover from the city's earlier disaster. He built a new version of Temple 26, with the Hieroglyphic Stairway being reinstalled on the new stairway and doubled in length. Five life-size statues of seated rulers were installed seated upon the stairway. K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil died in the early 760s and is likely to have been interred in Temple 11, although the tomb has not yet been excavated.
Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat was the next ruler, 16th in the dynasty founded by K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo', although he appears not to have been a direct descendent of his predecessor. He took the throne in June 763 and may have been only 9 years old. He produced no monumental stelae and instead dedicated hieroglyphic texts incorporated into the city's architecture and smaller altars. Texts make an obscure reference to his father but his mother was a noblewoman from distant Palenque
in Mexico. He built the platform of Temple 11 over the tomb of the previous king in AD 769 and added a two-storey superstructure that was finished in AD 773. Around AD 776, he completed the final version of Temple 16 over the tomb of the founder. At the base of the temple, he placed the famous Altar Q, which shows each of the 16 rulers of the city from K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' through to Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat himself, with a hieroglyphic text on top describing the founding of the dynasty. By the latter 8th century, the nobility had become more powerful, raising palaces with hieroglyphic benches that were as richly constructed as those of the king himself. At the same time, local satellites were displaying their own local power, as demonstrated by the ruler of Los Higos erecting his own stela in AD 781. Towards the end of Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat's reign, the city of Copán was struggling with overpopulation and a lack of local resources, with a distinct fall in living standards among the populace. Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat was able to celebrate his second K'atun in AD 802 with his own monument, but the king's participation in the K'atun ending ceremony of AD 810 was marked at Quiriguá, not at Copán itself. By this time the city's population was over 20,000 and it had long needed to import basic necessities from outside.
The troubled times enveloping Copán at this time are evident from the funerary tomb of Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat, which bears sculptures of the king performing war dances with spear and shield in hand. The sculpted column from the temple shrine has a hieroglyphic text reading "toppling of the Foundation House" that may refer to the fall of the Copán dynasty. Shortage and disease afflicted the massively overpopulated valley of Copán when its last known king, Ukit Took', came to the throne on 6 February 822. He commissioned Altar L in the style of Altar Q but the monument was never finished — one face shows the enthronement of the king and a second face was started but two others were completely blank. The long line of kings at the once great city had come to an end. Before the end, even the nobility had been struck by disease, perhaps because epidemics among the malnourished masses spread to the elite. With the end of political authority at the city the population collapsed to a fraction of what it had been at its height. In the Postclassic period the valley was occupied by villagers who robbed the stone from the monumental architecture of the city in order to build their simple house platforms.
. French explorer Jean-Frédéric Waldeck
visited the site in the early 19th century and spent a month there drawing the ruins. Colonel Juan Galindo
lead an expedition to the ruins in 1834 on behalf of the government of Guatemala and wrote articles about the site for English, French and North American publications. John Lloyd Stephens
and Frederick Catherwood
visited Copán and included a description, map and detailed drawings in Stephens' Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatán, published in 1841. The site was later visited by British archaeologist Alfred Maudslay
. Several expeditions sponsored by the Peabody Museum of Harvard University worked at Copán during the 20th century. The Carnegie Institution also sponsored work at the site, in conjunction with the government of Honduras.
The Copán buildings suffered significantly from forces of nature in the centuries between the site's abandonment and the rediscovery of the ruins. After the abandonment of the city the Copán River gradually changed course, with a meander
destroying the eastern portion of the acropolis (revealing in the process its archaeological stratigraphy in a large vertical cut
) and apparently washing away various subsidiary architectural groups, including at least one courtyard and 10 buildings from Group 10L–2. The cut is an important archaeological feature at the site, with the natural erosion having created an enormous cross-section of the acropolis. This erosion cut away a large portion of the eastern part of the acropolis and revealed a vertical cross-section that measures 37 metres (121.4 ft) high at its tallest point and 300 metres (984.3 ft) long. The Carnegie Institution
redirected the river to save the archaeological site, although several buildings recorded in the 19th century had already been destroyed, plus an unknown amount of the acropolis that was eroded before it could be recorded. In order to avoid further destruction of the acropolis, the Carnegie Institution diverted the river southwards in the 1930s; the dry former riverbed was finally filled in at the same time as consolidation of the cut in 1990s. Structures 10L–19, 20, 20A and 21 were all destroyed by the Copán River as it eroded the site away, but had been recorded by investigators in the 19th century.
Copán was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1980, and UNESCO approved funding of US$95,825 between 1982 and 1999 for various works at the site. Looting remains a serious threat to Copán. A tomb was looted in 1998 as it was being excavated by archaeologists.
, most of which were placed along processional ways in the central plaza of the city and the adjoining acropolis
, a large complex of overlapping step-pyramids, plazas, and palaces. The site has a large court for playing the Mesoamerican ballgame
. In two parallel buildings framing a carefully dimensioned rectangle lies the court.
The site is divided into various groups, with the Main Group and the Cemetery Group in the site core linked by a sacbe
to the Sepulturas Group to the northeast. Central Copán had a density of 1449 structures per square kilometer (1449 /sqkm), in the area of greater Copán as a whole this density fell to 143 /sqkm over a surveyed area of 24.6 square kilometres (9.5 sq mi).
The Main Group represents the core of the ancient city and covers an area of 600 by 300 m (1,968.5 by 984.3 ft). The main features are the Acropolis, which is a raised royal complex on the south side, and a group of smaller structures and linked plazas to the north, including the Hieroglyphic Stairway and the ballcourt
. The Monument Plaza contains the greatest concentration of sculpted monuments at the site.
The Acropolis was the royal complex at the heart of Copán. It consists of two plazas which have been named the West Court and the East Court. They are both enclosed by elevated structures. Archaeologists have excavated extensive tunnels under the Acropolis, revealing how the royal complex at the heart of Copán developed over the centuries and uncovering several hieroglyphic texts that date back to the Early Classic and verify details of the early dynastic rulers of the city who were recorded on Altar Q hundreds of years later. The deepest of these tunnels have revealed that the first monumental structures underlying the Acropolis date archaeologically to the early 5th century AD, when K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' established the royal dynasty. These early buildings were built of stone and adobe
and were themselves built upon earlier earth and cobble structures dating to the predynastic period. The two styles of building overlap somewhat, with some of the earthen structures being expanded during the first hundred years or so of the dynastic history of the city. The early dynastic masonry buildings of the Acropolis included several with the Early Classic apron-molding style of Tikal and one built in the talud-tablero
style associated with Teotihuacan, although at the time the talud-tablero form was in use at both Tikal and Kaminaljuyu
as well as in Central Mexico.
Structure 10L-4 is a platform with four stairways situated by the Monument Plaza.
Structure 10L-11 is on west side of the Acropolis. It encloses the south side of the Court of the Hieroglyphic Stairway and is accessed from it by a wide monumental stairway. This structure appears to have been the royal palace of Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat, the 16th ruler in the dynastic succession and the last known king of Copán. Structure 10L-11 was built on top of several earlier structures, one of which probably contains the tomb of his predecessor K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil. A small tunnel descends into the interior of the structure, possibly to the tomb, but it has not yet been excavated by archaeologists. Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat built a new temple platform over his predecessor's tomb in AD 769. On top of this he placed a two-storey superstructure with a sculpted roof depicting the mythological cosmos. At each of its northern corners was a large sculpted Pawatun (a group of deities that supported the heavens). This superstructure had four doorways with panels of hieroglyphs sculpted directly onto the walls of the building. A step inside the structure once depicted the king's accession to the throne, overseen by deities and ancestors.
Structure 10L-16 (Temple 16) is a temple pyramid that is the highest part of the Acropolis, it is located between the East and West Courts at the heart of the ancient city. The temple faces onto the West Court within the Acropolis and is dedicated to K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo', the dynastic founder. The temple was placed on top of the original palace and tomb of the king. It is the final version of a number of temples built one on top of the other, as was common practice in Mesoamerica. The earliest version of this temple is nicknamed Hunal, it was built in the talud-tablero style of architecture that was typical of Teotihuacan, with traces of brightly colored murals on the surviving traces of the interior walls. The king was buried in a vaulted crypt that was cut into the floor of the Hunal phase of the building, accompanied by rich offerings of jade
. K'inich Popol Hol, son of the founder, demolished the palace of his father and built a platform on top of his tomb, named Yehnal by archaeologists. It was built in a distinctively Petén Maya style and bore large masks of K'inich Tajal Wayib', the sun god, which were painted red. This platform was encased within another much larger platform within a decade of its construction. This larger platform has been named Margarita and had stucco panels flanking its access stairway that bore entwined images of quaetzals
and macaws, which both form a part of K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo's name. The Margarita phase contained a tomb with the richly accompanied burial of an elderly woman nicknamed the "Lady in Red". It is likely that she was the widow of K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' and the mother of K'inich Popol Hol. The upper chamber of the Margarita phase temple was converted to receive offerings and the unusual Xukpi stone, a dedicatory monument used in one of the earlier phases, was reused in this later phase.
One of the best preserved phases of Temple 16 is the Rosalila, built over the remains of five previous versions of the temple. Archaeologist Ricardo Agurcia discovered the almost intact shrine while tunneling underneath the final version of the temple. Rosalila is notable for its excellent state of preservation, including the entire building from the base platform up to the roof comb
, including its highly elaborate painted stucco decoration. Rosalila features K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' placed at the centre of a mythological tableau, combining the founder of the dynasty with the sky deity Itzamna
in avian form. The mythological imagery also includes anthropomorphic
mountains, skeletons and crocodiles. Vents in the exterior were designed so smoke from incense being burned inside the shrine would interact with the stucco sculpture of the exterior. The temple had a hieroglyphic stone step with a dedicatory inscription. The stone step is less well preserved than the rest of the building, but a date in AD 571 has been deciphered. Due to the deforestation of the Copán valley, the Rosalila building was the last structure at the site to use such elaborate stucco decoration — vast quantities of firewood could no longer be spared to reduce limestone to plaster. A life-size copy of the Rosalila building has been built at the Copán site museum.
Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil encased the Rosalila phase under a new version of the building in the early 8th century AD. An offering was made as part of the rites to terminate the old phase and included a collection of eccentric flint
s worked into the profiles of humans and gods, which were wrapped in blue-dyed textiles.
Structure 10L-18 is on the southeastern side of the Acropolis and has been damaged by the erosion caused by the Copán River, having lost its eastern side. Stairs on the south side of the structure lead down to a vaulted tomb that was looted in ancient times and was probably that of Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat. It was apparently plundered soon after the collapse of the Copán kingdom. Unusually for Copán, the summit shrine had four sculpted panels depicting the king performing war dances with spear and shield, emphasizing the rising tensions as the dynasty came to its end.
Temples 10L-20 and 10L-21 were probably both built by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil. They were lost to the Copán River in the early 20th century.
Structure 10L-22 is a large building on the north side of the East Court, in the Acropolis, and faces onto it. It dates to the reign of Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil and is the best preserved of the buildings from his rule. The superstructure of the building has an interior doorway with an elaborate sculpted frame and decorated with masks of the mountain god Witz. The outer doorway is framed by the giant mask of a deity, and has stylistic similarities with the Chenes regional style of distant Yucatán
. The temple was built to celebrate the completion of the king's first K'atun in power, in AD 715, and has a hieroglyphic step with a first-person phrase "I completed my K'atun". The building symbolically represents the mountain where maize was created.
Structure 10L-25 is in the East Court of the Acropolis. It covers a rich royal tomb nicknamed Sub-Jaguar by archaeologists. It is presumed to be the tomb of either Ruler 7 (B'alam Nehn), Ruler 8 or Ruler 9, who all ruled in the first half of the 6th century AD.
Structure 10L-26 is a temple that projects northwards from the Acropolis and is immediately to the north of Structure 10L-22. The structure was built by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil and K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil, the 13th and 15th rulers in the dynastic succession. The 10 metres (32.8 ft) wide Hieroglyphic Stairway ascends the building on the west side from the courtyard below. The earliest version of the temple, nicknamed Yax, was built during the reign of K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo', the dynastic founder, and has architectural features (such as inset corners) that are characteristic of Tikal and the central Petén region. The next phase of the building was built by Yax K'uk' Mo's son K'inich Popol Hol and is nicknamed Motmot. This phase of the structure was more elaborate and was decorated with stucco. Set under the building was the Motmot capstone, covering a tomb with the unusual Teotihuacan-style burial of a woman, accompanied by a wide variety of offerings that included animal bones, mercury
, jade and quartz
, along with three severed human heads, all of which were male. Ku Ix built a new phase of the building over Motmot, nicknamed Papagayo.
Smoke Imix demolished the Papagayo phase and ritually interred the broken remains of its sculpted monuments, accompanied by stone macaw heads from an early version of the ballcourt. He then built a pyramid over the earlier phases, nicknamed Mascarón by archaeologists. It in turn was developed into the Chorcha pyramid with the addition of a long superstructure with seven doorways at the front and back. Before a new building was built over the top, the upper sanctuary was demolished and a tomb was inserted into the floor and covered with 11 large stone slabs. The tomb contained the remains of an adult male and a sacrificed child. The adult's badly decayed skeleton was wrapped in a mat and accompanied by offerings of fine jade
, including ear ornaments and a necklace of sculpted figurines. The burial was accompanied by offerings of 44 ceramic vessels, jaguar
pelts, spondylus
shells, 10 paintpots and one or more hieroglyphic books, now decayed. There were also 12 ceramic incense burners with lids modeled into human figurines, thought to represent Smoke Imix and his 11 dynastic predecessors. The Chorcha building was dedicated to the long-lived 7th century king Smoke Imix and it is therefore likely that the remains interred in the building are his. Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil had sealed the Chorcha phase under a new version of the temple, nicknamed Esmeralda, by AD 710. The new phase bore the first version of the Hieroglyphic Stairway, which contains a lengthy dynastic history. K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil built over the Esmeralda phase in the mid-8th century. He removed the Hieroglyphic Stairway from the earlier building and reinstalled it into his own version, while doubling the length of its text and adding five life-size statues of rulers dressed in the garb of Teotihuacano warriors, each seated on a step of the stairway. At the base of the stairway, he also raised Stela M, with his own image. The summit shrine of the temple bore a hieroglyphic text composed of full-figure hieroglyphs, each placed beside a similar glyph in faux-Mexican style, giving the appearance of a bilingual text.
The Hieroglyphic Stairway climbs the west side of Structure 10L-26. It is 10 metres (32.8 ft) and has a total of 62 steps. Stela M and its associated altar are at its base and a large sculpted figure is located in the centre of every 12th step. These figures are believed to represent the most important rulers in the dynastic history of the site. The stairway takes its name from the 2200 glyphs that together form the longest known Maya hieroglyphic text. The text itself is still being reconstructed, having been scrambled by the collapse of the glyphic blocks when the façade of the temple collapsed. The staircase measures 21 metres (68.9 ft) long and was first built by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in AD 710, being reinstalled and expanded in the following phase of the temple by K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil in AD 755.
The Ballcourt is immediately north of the Court of the Hieroglyphic Stairway and is to the south of the Monument Plaza. It was remodeled by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil, who then demolished it and built a third version ,which was one of the largest from the Classic period. It was dedicated to the great macaw deity and the buildings flanking the playing area carried 16 mosaic sculptures of the birds. The completion date of the ballcourt is inscribed with a hieroglyphic text upon the sloping playing area and is given as 6 January 738.
The Monument Plaza or Great Plaza is on the north side of the Main Group.
The group has a very long occupational history, with one house having been dated as far back as the Early Preclassic. By the Middle Preclassic, large platforms were being built from cobbles
and several rich burials were made. By AD 800, the complex consisted of about 50 buildings arranged around 7 major courtyards. At this time, the most important building was the House of the Bakabs, the palace of a powerful nobleman from the time of Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat. The building has a high-quality sculpted exterior and a carved hieroglyphic bench inside. A portion of the group was a subdistrict occupied by non-Maya inhabitants from Central Honduras who were involved in the trade network that brought in goods from that region.
The Cemetery Group is immediately south of the Main Group and includes a number of small structures and plazas.
is the most famous monument at Copán. It was dedicated by king Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat in AD 776 and has each of the first 16 kings of the Copán dynasty carved around its side. Each figure is depicted seated on his name glyph. A hieroglyphic text is inscribed on the upper surface, relating the founding of the dynasty in AD 426–427. On one side, it shows the dynastic founder K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' transferring power to Yax Pasaj. Interestingly, Tatiana Proskouriakoff first discovered the inscription on the West Side of Altar Q that tells us the date of the inauguration of Yax Pasaj. This portrayal of political succession tells us much about Early Classic Maya culture.
The Motmot Capstone is an inscribed stone that was placed over a tomb under Structure 10L-26. Its face was finely sculpted with portraits of the first two kings of the Copán dynasty, K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' and K'inich Popol Hol, facing towards each other with a double column of hieroglyphs between them, all contained within a quatrefoil frame. The frame and the hieroglyphic names of mythological locations underneath the feet of the two kings place them in a supernatural realm. The capstone bears two calendrical dates, in AD 435 and AD 441. The second of these is probably the date that the capstone was dedicated.
The Xukpi Stone is a dedicatory monument from one of the earlier phases of the 10L-16 temple constructed to honor K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo'. It bears the date of AD 437 and the names both K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' and K'inich Popol Hol, together with a possible mention of the Teotihuacan general Siyaj K'ak'. The monument has not been completely deciphered and its style and phrasing are unusual. Originally it was used as a sculpted bench or step and the date on the monument is associated with the dedication of a funerary temple or a tomb, probably the tomb of K'inich' Yax K'uk' Mo' himself, which was discovered underneath the same structure.
Stela 2 was erected in the Great Plaza by Smoke Imix in AD 652.
Stela 3 is another stela erected by Smoke Imix in the Great Plaza in AD 652.
Stela 4 was erected by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in the early 8th century AD.
Stela 7 dates to the reign of K'ak' Chan Yopaat, and was erected to celebrate the K'atun-ending ceremony of AD 613. It was found in the western complex now underneath the modern village of Copán Ruinas. It bears a long hieroglyphic text that has been only partially deciphered.
Stela 9 was found in the modern village of Copán Ruinas, where it had been erected on the site of a major Classic period complex 1.6 kilometre (0.994196378639691 mi) outside of the site core. It was dedicated by Moon Jaguar and dates to AD 564.
Stela 10 was erected outside of the site core by Smoke Imix in AD 652.
Stela 11 was originally an interior column from Temple 18, the funerary shrine of Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat. When it was found, it was broken in two parts at the base of the temple. It portrays the king as the elderly Maya maize god
and has imagery that seems to deliberately parallel the tomb lid of the Palenque king K'inich Janaab' Pakal, probably because of Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat's close family ties to that city. The text of the column formed part of a longer text carved onto the interior walls of the temple and may describe the downfall of the Copán dynasty.
Stela 12 was erected outside of the site core by Smoke Imix in AD 652.
Stela 13 was erected outside the site core by Smoke Imix in AD 652.
Stela 15 is dated to AD 524, during the reign of B'alam Nehn. Its sculpture consists entirely of hieroglyphic text, which mentions that king B'alam Nehn was ruling the city by AD 504.
Stela 17 dates to AD 554, during the reign of Moon Jaguar. It originally stood in the nearby village of Copán Ruinas, which was a major complex in the Classic period.
Stela 18 is a fragment of a monument bearing the name of K'inich Popol Hol. It was erected in the inner chamber of the 10L-26 temple.
Stela 19 is a monument erected outside of the site core by Smoke Imix in AD 652.
Stela 63 was dedicated by K'inich Popol Hol. Its sculpture consists purely of finely carved hieroglyphic texts and it is possible that it was originally commissioned by K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' with additional texts added to the sides of the monument by his son. The text contains the same date in AD 435 that appears on the Motmot Capstone. Stela 63 was deliberately broken, together with its hieroglyphic step, during the ritual demolishing of the Papagayo phase of Temple 26. The remains of the monuments were then interred in the building before the next phase was built.
Stela A was erected in 731 by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil. It places his rulership among the four most powerful kingdoms in the Maya region, alongside Palenque, Tikal and Calakmul.
Stela B was erected by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in the early 8th century AD.
Stela C was erected by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in the early 8th century AD.
Stela D was erected by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in the early 8th century AD.
Stela F was erected by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in the early 8th century AD.
Stela H was erected by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in the early 8th century AD.
Stela J was erected by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in AD 702 and was his first monument. It stood at the eastern entrance to the city and is unusual in being topped by a sculpted stone roof, converting the monument into a symbolic house. It bears a hieroglyphic text that is woven into a criss-cross mat design to form a convoluted puzzle that must be read in precisely the right order to be understood.
Stela M bears a portrait of K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil. It was raised at the foot of the Hieroglyphic Stairway of Temple 26 in AD 756.
Stela N was dedicated by K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil in AD 761 and placed at the foot of the steps to Temple 11, which is believed to contain his burial.
Stela P was originally erected in an unknown location and was later moved to the West Court of the Acropolis. It bears a long hieroglyphic text that has not yet been fully deciphered. It dates from the reign of king K'ak' Chan Yopaat and was dedicated in AD 623.
Maya civilization
The Maya is a Mesoamerican civilization, noted for the only known fully developed written language of the pre-Columbian Americas, as well as for its art, architecture, and mathematical and astronomical systems. Initially established during the Pre-Classic period The Maya is a Mesoamerican...
located in the Copán Department of western Honduras
Honduras
Honduras is a republic in Central America. It was previously known as Spanish Honduras to differentiate it from British Honduras, which became the modern-day state of Belize...
, not far from the border with Guatemala
Guatemala
Guatemala is a country in Central America bordered by Mexico to the north and west, the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, Belize to the northeast, the Caribbean to the east, and Honduras and El Salvador to the southeast...
. It was the capital city of a major Classic period
Mesoamerican chronology
Mesoamerican chronology divides the history of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica into several periods: the Paleo-Indian , the Archaic , the Preclassic , the Classic , and the Postclassic...
kingdom from the 5th to 9th centuries AD. The city was located in the extreme southeast of the Mesoamerica
Mesoamerica
Mesoamerica is a region and culture area in the Americas, extending approximately from central Mexico to Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica, within which a number of pre-Columbian societies flourished before the Spanish colonization of the Americas in the 15th and...
n cultural region, on the frontier with the Isthmo-Colombian
Isthmo-Colombian
The Isthmo-Colombian area is defined as a cultural area encompassing those territories occupied by speakers of the Chibchan languages at the time of European contact...
cultural region, and was almost surrounded by non-Maya peoples
Maya peoples
The Maya people constitute a diverse range of the Native American people of southern Mexico and northern Central America. The overarching term "Maya" is a collective designation to include the peoples of the region who share some degree of cultural and linguistic heritage; however, the term...
. In this fertile valley now lies a city of about 3000, a small airport, and a winding road.
Copán was occupied for more than two thousand years, from the Early Preclassic
Mesoamerican chronology
Mesoamerican chronology divides the history of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica into several periods: the Paleo-Indian , the Archaic , the Preclassic , the Classic , and the Postclassic...
period right through to the Postclassic
Mesoamerican chronology
Mesoamerican chronology divides the history of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica into several periods: the Paleo-Indian , the Archaic , the Preclassic , the Classic , and the Postclassic...
. The city developed a distinctive sculptural style within the tradition of the lowland Maya, perhaps to emphasize the Maya ethnicity of the city's rulers.
The city has a historical record that spans the greater part of the Classic period and has been reconstructed in detail by archaeologists and epigraphers. Copán, probably called Oxwitik by the Maya, was a powerful city ruling a vast kingdom within the southern Maya area
Southern Maya area
The Southern Maya Area is a part of Mesoamerica, long believed important to the rise of Maya civilization. It lies within a broad arc or cantilevered rectangle from Chiapa de Corzo, in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, in the northwest due south to Izapa and Paso de la Amada, from Chiapa de Corzo...
. The city suffered a major political disaster in AD 738 when Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil
Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil
Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil , was a ruler of the powerful Maya polity associated with the site of Copán in modern Honduras . He ruled from January 2, 695, to May 3, 738...
, one of the greatest kings in Copán's dynastic history, was captured and executed by his former vassal, the king of Quiriguá
Quiriguá
Quiriguá is an ancient Maya archaeological site in the department of Izabal in south-eastern Guatemala. It is a medium-sized site covering approximately along the lower Motagua River, with the ceremonial center about from the north bank. During the Maya Classic Period , Quiriguá was situated at...
. This unexpected defeat resulted in a 17-year hiatus at the city, during which time Copán may have been subject to Quiriguá in a reversal of fortunes.
A significant portion of the eastern side of the acropolis has been eroded away by the Copán River, although the river has since been diverted in order to protect the site from further damage.
Location
Municipalities of Honduras
The 18 departments of Honduras are divided into 299 municipalities . Municipalities have elected mayors , as opposed to the appointed governors of departments. For statistical purposes, the municipalities are further subdivided into 3731 aldeas, and those into 27969 caserios...
of Copán Ruinas
Copán Ruinas
Copán Ruinas is a municipality in the Honduran department of Copán. The town, located close to the Guatemalan border, is a major gateway for tourists traveling to the Pre-Columbian ruins of Copán...
in the department of Copán. It is situated in a fertile valley among foothills at 700 metres (2,296.6 ft) above mean sea level
Above mean sea level
The term above mean sea level refers to the elevation or altitude of any object, relative to the average sea level datum. AMSL is used extensively in radio by engineers to determine the coverage area a station will be able to reach...
. The ruins of the site core of the city are located 1.6 kilometre (0.994196378639691 mi) from the modern village of Copán Ruinas
Copán Ruinas
Copán Ruinas is a municipality in the Honduran department of Copán. The town, located close to the Guatemalan border, is a major gateway for tourists traveling to the Pre-Columbian ruins of Copán...
, which is itself built on the site of a major complex dating to the Classic period.
In the Preclassic period the floor of the Copán Valley was undulating, swampy and prone to seasonal flooding. In the Early Classic, the inhabitants flattened the valley floor and undertook construction projects to protect the architecture of the city from the effects of flooding.
Copán had a major influence on regional centres across western and central Honduras, stimulating the introduction of Mesoamerican characteristics to local elites.
Population
At the peak of its power in the Late Classic the kingdom of Copán had a population of at least 20,000 and covered an area of over 250 square kilometre. The greater Copán area consisting of the populated areas of the valley covered about a quarter of the size of the city of Tikal. It is estimated that the peak population in central Copán was between 6000 to 9000 in an area of 0.6 square kilometre (0.231661295155521 sq mi), with a further 9000 to 12000 inhabitants occupying the periphery—an area of 23.4 square kilometres (9 sq mi). Additionally, there was an estimated rural population of 3000 to 4000 in a 476 square kilometres (183.8 sq mi) area of the Copán Valley, giving an estimated total population of 18,000 to 25,000 people in the Copán Valley during the Late Classic period.History
Little is known of the rulers of Copán before the founding of a new dynasty with its origins at Tikal in the early 5th century AD, although the city's origins can be traced back to the Preclassic period. After this, Copán became one of the more powerful Maya city states and was a regional power in the southern Maya region, although it suffered a catastrophic defeat at the hands of its former vassal state QuiriguaQuiriguá
Quiriguá is an ancient Maya archaeological site in the department of Izabal in south-eastern Guatemala. It is a medium-sized site covering approximately along the lower Motagua River, with the ceremonial center about from the north bank. During the Maya Classic Period , Quiriguá was situated at...
in 738, when the long-ruling king Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil
Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil
Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil , was a ruler of the powerful Maya polity associated with the site of Copán in modern Honduras . He ruled from January 2, 695, to May 3, 738...
was captured and beheaded by Quirigua's ruler K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat (Cauac Sky). Although this was a major setback, Copán's rulers began to build monumental structures again within a few decades.
The area of Copán continued to be occupied after the last major ceremonial structures and royal monuments were erected, but the population declined in the 8th and 9th centuries from perhaps over 20,000 in the city to less than 5,000. The ceremonial center was long abandoned and the surrounding valley home to only a few farming hamlets at the time of the arrival of the Spanish
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
in the 16th century.
Rulers
References to the predynastic rulers of Copán are found in later texts but none of these texts predate the refounding of Copán in AD 426.| Name (or nickname) | Ruled | Dynastic succession no. | Alternative Names |
|---|---|---|---|
| K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo is named in Maya inscriptions as the founder and first ruler of the pre-Columbian Maya civilization polity centered at Copán, a major Maya site located in the southeastern Maya lowlands region in present-day Honduras... |
426-c.437 | 1 | Great-Sun First Quetzal Macaw |
| K'inich Popol Hol | c. 437 | 2 | Great-Sun |
| name unknown | c. 455 | 3 | Ruler 3 |
| Ku Ix | c. 465 | 4 | K'altuun Hix, Tuun K'ab' Hix |
| name unknown | c. 476 | 5 | Ruler 5 |
| Muyal Jol | c. 485 | 6 | Ruler 6 |
| B'alam Nehn | 504–544 | 7 | Jaguar Mirror; Waterlily-Jaguar |
| Wil Ohl K'inich | 532–551 | 8 | Ruler 8; Head on Earth |
| Sak-Lu | 551–553 | 9 | Ruler 9 |
| Tzi-B'alam | 553–578 | 10 | Moon Jaguar |
| K'ak' Chan Yopaat | 578–628 | 11 | B'utz' Chan; Smoke Serpent |
| Chan Imix K'awiil | 628–695 | 12 | Smoke Jaguar |
| Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil , was a ruler of the powerful Maya polity associated with the site of Copán in modern Honduras . He ruled from January 2, 695, to May 3, 738... |
695–738 | 13 | 18 Rabbit |
| K'ak' Joplaj Chan K'awiil | 738–749 | 14 | Smoke Monkey |
| K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil | 749–763 | 15 | Smoke Shell; Smoke Squirrel |
| Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat, also known as Yax Pasaj Chan Yoaat, Yax Pac and Yax Pasah, was ruler of the Maya kingdom of Xupki from 763 to 810 or later. This is on the site of the city of Copán in western Honduras. He is the king who made Altar Q.He was the sixteenth and last king in line, whose name... |
763–after 810 | 16 | Yax Pac |
| Ukit Took | 822 | 17? | – |
Predynastic history
The fertile Copán River valley was long a site of agriculture before the first known stone architecture was built in the region about the 9th century BC. The city was important before its refounding by a foreign elite; mentions of the predynastic history of Copán are found in later texts but none of these predates the refounding of the city in AD 426. There is an inscription that refers to the year 321 BC but no text explains the significance of this date. An event at Copán is linked to another event that happened 208 days before in AD 159 at an unknown location that is also mentioned on a stela from Tikal, suggesting that it is a location somewhere in the Petén Basin, possibly the great Preclassic Maya city of El MiradorEl Mirador
El Mirador is a large pre-Columbian Mayan settlement, located in the north of the modern department of El Petén, Guatemala.-Discovery:El Mirador was first discovered in 1926, and was photographed from the air in 1930, but the remote site deep in the jungle had little more attention paid to it until...
. This AD 159 date is mentioned in several texts and is linked to a figure known as "Foliated Ajaw
Ajaw
Ajaw is a political rulership title attested from the epigraphic inscriptions of the pre-Columbian Maya civilization, with a meaning variously interpreted as "lord", "ruler", "king" or "leader". It denoted any of the leading class of nobles in a particular polity and was not limited to a single...
". This same person is mentioned on the carved skull of a peccary
Peccary
A peccary is a medium-sized mammal of the family Tayassuidae, or New World Pigs. Peccaries are members of the artiodactyl suborder Suina, as are the pig family and possibly the hippopotamus family...
recovered from Tomb 1, where he is said to perform an action with a stela in AD 376.
K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' and K'inich Popol Hol
K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo'
K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo is named in Maya inscriptions as the founder and first ruler of the pre-Columbian Maya civilization polity centered at Copán, a major Maya site located in the southeastern Maya lowlands region in present-day Honduras...
, establishing it as the capital of a new Maya kingdom. This coup was apparently organized and launched from Tikal. Texts record the arrival of a warrior named K'uk' Mo' Ajaw who was installed upon the throne of the city in AD 426 and given a new royal name, K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' and the ochk'in kaloomte "Lord of the West" title used a generation earlier by Siyaj K'ak', a general from the great metropolis of Teotihuacan
Teotihuacan
Teotihuacan – also written Teotihuacán, with a Spanish orthographic accent on the last syllable – is an enormous archaeological site in the Basin of Mexico, just 30 miles northeast of Mexico City, containing some of the largest pyramidal structures built in the pre-Columbian Americas...
who had decisively intervened in the politics of the central Petén. K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' was probably from Tikal and was likely to have been sponsored by Siyaj Chan K'awill II, the 16th ruler in the dynastic succession of Tikal. K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' may have legitimized his claim to rulership by marrying into the old Copán royal family, evidenced from the remains of his presumed widow. Bone analysis of her remains indicates that she was local to Copán. After the establishment of the new kingdom of Copán, the city remained closely allied with Tikal. The hieroglyphic text on Copán Altar Q
Copán Altar Q
Altar Q is the designation given to one of the most notable of the rectangular sculpted stone blocks recovered at the Mesoamerican archaeological site of Copán, present-day Honduras....
describes the lord being elevated to kingship with the receipt of his royal scepter. The ceremonies involved in the founding of the Copán dynasty also included the installation of a subordinate king at Quiriguá
Quiriguá
Quiriguá is an ancient Maya archaeological site in the department of Izabal in south-eastern Guatemala. It is a medium-sized site covering approximately along the lower Motagua River, with the ceremonial center about from the north bank. During the Maya Classic Period , Quiriguá was situated at...
.
A text from Tikal mentions K'uk' Mo' and has been dated to AD 406, twenty years before K'uk' Mo' Ajaw founded the new dynasty at Copán. Both names are likely to refer to the same individual originally from Tikal. Although none of the hieroglyphic texts that mention the founding of the new Copán dynasty describe how K'uk' Mo' arrived at the city, indirect evidence suggests that he conquered the city by military means. On Altar Q he is depicted as a Teotihuacano warrior with goggle eyes and a war serpent shield. When he arrived at Copán he initiated the construction of various structures, including one temple in the talud-tablero
Talud-tablero
Talud-tablero is an architectural style. It consists of a platform structure, or the tablero, on top of an inward-sloping surface or panel, the talud. It may also be referred to as the slope-and-panel style.-Cultural significance:...
style typical of Teotihuacan and another with inset corners and apron moldings that are characteristic of Tikal. These strong links with both the Maya and Central Mexican cultures suggest that he was at least a Mexicanized Maya or possibly even from Teotihuacan. The dynasty founded by king K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' ruled the city for four centuries and included sixteen kings plus a probable pretender who would have been seventeenth in line. Several monuments have survived that were dedicated by K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' and by his heir.
K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' died between AD 435 and AD 437. In 1995 a tomb underneath the talud-tablero Hunal temple was discovered by a team of archaeologists led by Robert Sharer
Robert Sharer
Robert J. Sharer is an American archaeologist, academic and Mayanist researcher. He known for his archaeological investigations at a number of pre-Columbian Mesoamerican sites conducted over a career spanning four decades, and for his archaeological reports, theorizing, and writings in his field...
and David Sedat. The tomb contained the skeleton of an elderly man with rich offerings and evidence of battle wounds. The remains have been identified as those of K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' due to their location underneath a sequence of seven buildings erected in his honor. Bone analysis has identified the remains as being those of someone foreign to Copán itself.
K'inich Popol Hol inherited the throne of Copán from K'inich ax K'uk' Mo', who was his father. He undertook major construction projects with the redesign of the core of Copán. Popol Hol is not the original name of this king but rather a nickname based on the appearance of his Teotihuacan-linked name glyph. K'inich Popol Hol oversaw the construction of the first version of the Mesoamerican ballcourt
Mesoamerican ballcourt
A Mesoamerican ballcourt is a large masonry structure of a type used in Mesoamerica for over 2,700 years to play the Mesoamerican ballgame, particularly the hip-ball version of the ballgame. Over 1,300 ballcourts have been identified, 60% in the last 20 years alone...
at the city, which was decorated with images of the Scarlet Macaw
Scarlet Macaw
The Scarlet Macaw is a large, colorful macaw. It is native to humid evergreen forests in the American tropics. Range extends from extreme south-eastern Mexico to Amazonian Peru, Bolivia and Brazil in lowlands up to up to...
, a bird that features prominently in Maya mythology
Maya mythology
Mayan mythology is part of Mesoamerican mythology and comprises all of the Mayan tales in which personified forces of nature, deities, and the heroes interacting with these play the main roles...
. His greatest construction activity was in the area of his father's palace, now underlying Structure 10L-16, which he demolished after entombing his father there. He then built three successive buildings on top of the tomb in rapid succession.
Other early dynastic rulers
Very little is known about Rulers 3 to 6 in the dynastic succession, although it is known from a fragment of a broken monument reused as construction fill in a later building that one of them was a son of Popol Hol. Ruler 3 is depicted on the 8th century Altar Q but his name glyph has broken away. Ku Ix was the 4th ruler in the succession. He rebuilt temple 10L-26 in the Acropolis, erecting a stela there and a hieroglyphic step at its base. Although this king is also mentioned on a few other fragments of sculpture, no dates accompany his name. The next two kings in the dynastic sequence are only known from their sculptures on Altar Q.B'alam Nehn (often referred to as Waterlily Jaguar) was the first king to actually record his position in the dynastic succession, declaring that he was seventh in line from K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo'. Stela 15 records that he was already ruling Copán by AD 504. B'alam Nehn is the only king of Copán to be mentioned in a hieroglyphic text from outside of the southeastern Maya region. His name appears in a text on Stela 16 from Caracol
Caracol
Caracol is the name given to a large ancient Maya archaeological site, located in what is now the Cayo District of Belize. It is situated approximately 40 kilometres south of Xunantunich and the town of San Ignacio Cayo, and 15 kilometers away from the Macal River. It rests on the Vaca Plateau at...
, a site in Belize
Belize
Belize is a constitutional monarchy and the northernmost country in Central America. Belize has a diverse society, comprising many cultures and languages. Even though Kriol and Spanish are spoken among the population, Belize is the only country in Central America where English is the official...
. The stela dates to AD 534 but the text itself is not well understood. B'alam Nehn undertook major construction projects in the Acropolis, building over an early palace with a number of important structures.
Wil Ohl K'inich, the eighth ruler, is another king known only by his appearance on Altar Q. He was succeeded by Ruler 9 in AD 551, his accession being described on the Hieroglyphic Stairway. He is also depicted on Altar Q but ruled for a very short period of less than two years.
The 10th ruler is nicknamed Moon Jaguar by Mayanists. He was a son of B'alam Nehn, the 7th ruler. He was enthroned in May 553. His surviving monuments were found in the modern village of Copán Ruinas, which was a major complex during the Classic period. The most famous construction dating to his reign is the elaborate Rosalila phase of Temple 16, discovered entombed intact under later phases of the temple during archaeological tunneling work.
K'ak' Chan Yopaat and Smoke Imix
K'ak' Chan Yopaat was the eleventh dynastic ruler at Copán. He was crowned as king in AD 578, 24 days after the death of Moon Jaguar. At the time of his rule Copán was undergoing an unprecedented rise in population, with residential land use spreading to all available land in the entire Copán Valley. The two surviving stelae of K'ak' Chan Yopaat contain long hard-to-decipher hieroglyphic texts and are the oldest monuments at the site to survive without being either broken or buried. He had a long reign, ruling at Copán for 49 years, and he died on 5 February 628. His name is recorded on four stelae erected by his successors, one of which describes a rite performed with relics from his tomb in AD 730, almost a hundred years after his death.Smoke Imix was crowned 16 days after the death of K'ak' Chan Yopaat. He is thought to have been the longest reigning king of Copán, ruling from 628 to 695. He is believed to have been born in AD 612 to have become king at the age of 15. Archaeologists have recovered little evidence of activity for the first 26 years of his reign but in AD 652 there was a sudden explosion of monument production, with two stelae being erected in the Great Plaza and a further four in important locations across the Copán Valley. These monuments all celebrated a katun-ending. He also erected a stela at the Santa Rita
Santa Rita, Copán
Santa Rita is a municipality in the Honduran department of Copán.- Santa Rita Copan links :*...
site 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) away and is mentioned on Altar L at Quiriguá in relation to the same event in 652. It is thought that he was trying to stamp his authority throughout the whole valley after the end of some earlier restriction to his freedom to rule as he wished.
After this sudden spate of activity, Smoke Imix continued to rule until almost the end of the 7th century, he dedicated another 9 known monuments and made important changes to the architecture of Copán, including the construction of Structure 2 which closes the northern side of the Great Plaza and a new version of Temple 26, nicknamed Chorcha. Smoke Imix ruled Copán for 67 years and died on 15 June 695 at the age of 79, an age that was so distinguished that it is used to identify him in place of his name on Altar Q. His tomb had already been prepared in the Chorcha phase of Temple 26 and he was buried just 2 days after his death.
Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil
Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil
Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil , was a ruler of the powerful Maya polity associated with the site of Copán in modern Honduras . He ruled from January 2, 695, to May 3, 738...
was crowned as the 13th king in the Copán dynasty in July 695. He oversaw both the apogee of Copán's achievements and also one of the city's most catastrophic political disasters. During his reign, the sculptural style of the city evolved into the full in-the-round sculpture characteristic of Copán. In AD 718, Copán attacked and defeated the unidentified site of Xkuy, recording its burning on an unusual stone cylinder. In AD 724 Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil installed K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat as a vassal
Vassal
A vassal or feudatory is a person who has entered into a mutual obligation to a lord or monarch in the context of the feudal system in medieval Europe. The obligations often included military support and mutual protection, in exchange for certain privileges, usually including the grant of land held...
on the throne of Quiriguá
Quiriguá
Quiriguá is an ancient Maya archaeological site in the department of Izabal in south-eastern Guatemala. It is a medium-sized site covering approximately along the lower Motagua River, with the ceremonial center about from the north bank. During the Maya Classic Period , Quiriguá was situated at...
. Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil was confident enough in his power to rank his city among the four most powerful states in the Maya region, together with Tikal, Calakmul
Calakmul
Calakmul is a Maya archaeological site in the Mexican state of Campeche, deep in the jungles of the greater Petén Basin region. It is from the Guatemalan border. Calakmul was one of the largest and most powerful ancient cities ever uncovered in the Maya lowlands...
and Palenque
Palenque
Palenque was a Maya city state in southern Mexico that flourished in the 7th century. The Palenque ruins date back to 100 BC to its fall around 800 AD...
, as recorded on Stela A. In contrast to his predecessor, Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil concentrated his monuments in the site core of the Copán; his first was Stela J, dated to AD 702 and erected at the eastern entrance to the city.
He continued to erect a further 7 high-quality stelae until AD 736, monuments that are considered masterpieces of Classic Maya sculpture with such mastery of detail that they represent the highest pinnacle of Maya artistic achievement. The stelae depict king Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil ritually posed and bearing the attributes of a variety of deities, including B'olon K'awiil, K'uy Nik Ajaw and Mo' Witz Ajaw. The king also carried out major construction works, including a new version of Temple 26 that now bore the first version of the Hieroglyphic Stairway, plus two temples that have now been lost to the erosion of the Copán River. He also encased the Rosalila phase of Temple 16 within a new phase of construction. He remodelled the ballcourt, then demolished it and built a new one in its place.
Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil had only recently dedicated the new ballcourt in AD 738 when a completely unexpected disaster befell the city. Twelve years earlier he had installed K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat on the throne of Quiriguá as his vassal. By 734 the king of Quiriguá had shown he was no longer an obedient subordinate when he began to refer to himself as k'ul ajaw
Ajaw
Ajaw is a political rulership title attested from the epigraphic inscriptions of the pre-Columbian Maya civilization, with a meaning variously interpreted as "lord", "ruler", "king" or "leader". It denoted any of the leading class of nobles in a particular polity and was not limited to a single...
, "holy lord", rather than simply as a subordinate lord ajaw. K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat appears to have taken advantage of wider political rivalries and allied himself with Calakmul
Calakmul
Calakmul is a Maya archaeological site in the Mexican state of Campeche, deep in the jungles of the greater Petén Basin region. It is from the Guatemalan border. Calakmul was one of the largest and most powerful ancient cities ever uncovered in the Maya lowlands...
, the sworn enemy of Tikal. Copán itself was firmly allied with Tikal and Calakmul used its alliance with Quiriguá to undermine Tikal's key ally in the south.
Although the exact details are unknown, in April 738 K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat captured Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil and burned two of Copán's patron deities. Six days later Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil was decapitated in Quiriguá. This coup does not seem to have physically affected either Copán or Quiriguá; there is no evidence that either city was attacked at this time and the victor seems not to have received any detectable tribute. All of this seems to imply that K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat managed to somehow ambush Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil, rather than to have defeated him in outright battle. It has been suggested that Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil was attempting to attack another site to secure captives for sacrifice in order to dedicate the new ballcourt when he was ambushed by K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat and his Quiriguá warriors.
In the Late Classic, alliance with Calakmul was frequently associated with the promise of military support. The fact that Copán, a much more powerful city than Quiriguá, failed to retaliate against its former vassal implies that it feared the military intervention of Calakmul. Calakmul itself was far enough away from Quiriguá that K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat was not afraid of falling directly under its power as a full vassal state, even though it is likely that Calakmul sent warriors to help in the defeat of Copán. The alliance instead seems to have been one of mutual advantage: Calakmul managed to weaken a powerful ally of Tikal while Quiriguá gained its independence. The disaster for Copán had long-lasting consequences; major construction ceased and no new monuments were raised for the next 17 years.
Later rulers
K'ak' Joplaj Chan K'awiil was installed as the 14th dynastic ruler of Copán on 7 June 738, 39 days after the execution of Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil. Little is known of his reign due to the lack of monuments raised after Quiriguá's surprise victory. Copán's defeat had wider implications due to the fracturing of the city's domain and the loss of the key Motagua RiverMotagua River
The Motagua River is a long river in Guatemala. It rises in the western highlands of Guatemala where it is also called Río Grande, and runs in an easterly direction to the Gulf of Honduras. The final few kilometres of the river form part of the Guatemala/Honduras border...
trade route to Quiriguá. The fall in Copán's income and corresponding increase at Quiriguá is evident from the massive commissioning of new monuments and architecture at the latter city and Copán may even have been subject to its former vassal. K'ak' Joplaj Chan K'awiil died in January 749.
The next ruler was K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil, a son of K'ak' Joplaj Chan K'awiil. The early period of his rulership fell within Copán's hiatus but later on he began a programme of renewal in an effort to recover from the city's earlier disaster. He built a new version of Temple 26, with the Hieroglyphic Stairway being reinstalled on the new stairway and doubled in length. Five life-size statues of seated rulers were installed seated upon the stairway. K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil died in the early 760s and is likely to have been interred in Temple 11, although the tomb has not yet been excavated.
Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat was the next ruler, 16th in the dynasty founded by K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo', although he appears not to have been a direct descendent of his predecessor. He took the throne in June 763 and may have been only 9 years old. He produced no monumental stelae and instead dedicated hieroglyphic texts incorporated into the city's architecture and smaller altars. Texts make an obscure reference to his father but his mother was a noblewoman from distant Palenque
Palenque
Palenque was a Maya city state in southern Mexico that flourished in the 7th century. The Palenque ruins date back to 100 BC to its fall around 800 AD...
in Mexico. He built the platform of Temple 11 over the tomb of the previous king in AD 769 and added a two-storey superstructure that was finished in AD 773. Around AD 776, he completed the final version of Temple 16 over the tomb of the founder. At the base of the temple, he placed the famous Altar Q, which shows each of the 16 rulers of the city from K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' through to Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat himself, with a hieroglyphic text on top describing the founding of the dynasty. By the latter 8th century, the nobility had become more powerful, raising palaces with hieroglyphic benches that were as richly constructed as those of the king himself. At the same time, local satellites were displaying their own local power, as demonstrated by the ruler of Los Higos erecting his own stela in AD 781. Towards the end of Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat's reign, the city of Copán was struggling with overpopulation and a lack of local resources, with a distinct fall in living standards among the populace. Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat was able to celebrate his second K'atun in AD 802 with his own monument, but the king's participation in the K'atun ending ceremony of AD 810 was marked at Quiriguá, not at Copán itself. By this time the city's population was over 20,000 and it had long needed to import basic necessities from outside.
The troubled times enveloping Copán at this time are evident from the funerary tomb of Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat, which bears sculptures of the king performing war dances with spear and shield in hand. The sculpted column from the temple shrine has a hieroglyphic text reading "toppling of the Foundation House" that may refer to the fall of the Copán dynasty. Shortage and disease afflicted the massively overpopulated valley of Copán when its last known king, Ukit Took', came to the throne on 6 February 822. He commissioned Altar L in the style of Altar Q but the monument was never finished — one face shows the enthronement of the king and a second face was started but two others were completely blank. The long line of kings at the once great city had come to an end. Before the end, even the nobility had been struck by disease, perhaps because epidemics among the malnourished masses spread to the elite. With the end of political authority at the city the population collapsed to a fraction of what it had been at its height. In the Postclassic period the valley was occupied by villagers who robbed the stone from the monumental architecture of the city in order to build their simple house platforms.
Modern history
The first mention of Copán was in an early colonial period letter dated 8 March 1576. The letter was written by Diego García de Palacio, a member of the Royal Audience of Guatemala, to king Philip II of SpainPhilip II of Spain
Philip II was King of Spain, Portugal, Naples, Sicily, and, while married to Mary I, King of England and Ireland. He was lord of the Seventeen Provinces from 1556 until 1581, holding various titles for the individual territories such as duke or count....
. French explorer Jean-Frédéric Waldeck
Jean-Frédéric Waldeck
Jean-Frédéric Maximilien de Waldeck was a French antiquarian, cartographer, artist and explorer.-Biography:...
visited the site in the early 19th century and spent a month there drawing the ruins. Colonel Juan Galindo
Juan Galindo
Juan Galindo was a Central American explorer and army officer. He fought for Central American independence from Spain and led the charge that took the fortress at Omoa, the last Spanish stronghold in Central America....
lead an expedition to the ruins in 1834 on behalf of the government of Guatemala and wrote articles about the site for English, French and North American publications. John Lloyd Stephens
John Lloyd Stephens
John Lloyd Stephens was an American explorer, writer, and diplomat. Stephens was a pivotal figure in the rediscovery of Maya civilization throughout Middle America and in the planning of the Panama railroad....
and Frederick Catherwood
Frederick Catherwood
Frederick Catherwood was an English artist and architect, best remembered for his meticulously detailed drawings of the ruins of the Maya civilization. He explored Mesoamerica in the mid 19th century with writer John Lloyd Stephens...
visited Copán and included a description, map and detailed drawings in Stephens' Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatán, published in 1841. The site was later visited by British archaeologist Alfred Maudslay
Alfred Maudslay
Alfred Percival Maudslay was a British colonial diplomat, explorer and archaeologist. He was one of the first Europeans to study Mayan ruins....
. Several expeditions sponsored by the Peabody Museum of Harvard University worked at Copán during the 20th century. The Carnegie Institution also sponsored work at the site, in conjunction with the government of Honduras.
The Copán buildings suffered significantly from forces of nature in the centuries between the site's abandonment and the rediscovery of the ruins. After the abandonment of the city the Copán River gradually changed course, with a meander
Meander
A meander in general is a bend in a sinuous watercourse. A meander is formed when the moving water in a stream erodes the outer banks and widens its valley. A stream of any volume may assume a meandering course, alternately eroding sediments from the outside of a bend and depositing them on the...
destroying the eastern portion of the acropolis (revealing in the process its archaeological stratigraphy in a large vertical cut
Cut (archaeology)
In Archaeology and archeological stratification a cut or truncation is a context that represents a moment in time when other archaeological deposits were removed for the creation of some feature such as a ditch or pit...
) and apparently washing away various subsidiary architectural groups, including at least one courtyard and 10 buildings from Group 10L–2. The cut is an important archaeological feature at the site, with the natural erosion having created an enormous cross-section of the acropolis. This erosion cut away a large portion of the eastern part of the acropolis and revealed a vertical cross-section that measures 37 metres (121.4 ft) high at its tallest point and 300 metres (984.3 ft) long. The Carnegie Institution
Carnegie Institution for Science
The Carnegie Institution for Science is an organization in the United States established to support scientific research....
redirected the river to save the archaeological site, although several buildings recorded in the 19th century had already been destroyed, plus an unknown amount of the acropolis that was eroded before it could be recorded. In order to avoid further destruction of the acropolis, the Carnegie Institution diverted the river southwards in the 1930s; the dry former riverbed was finally filled in at the same time as consolidation of the cut in 1990s. Structures 10L–19, 20, 20A and 21 were all destroyed by the Copán River as it eroded the site away, but had been recorded by investigators in the 19th century.
Copán was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1980, and UNESCO approved funding of US$95,825 between 1982 and 1999 for various works at the site. Looting remains a serious threat to Copán. A tomb was looted in 1998 as it was being excavated by archaeologists.
Site description
The Copán site is known for a series of portrait stelaeMaya stelae
Maya stelae are monuments that were fashioned by the Maya civilization of ancient Mesoamerica. They consist of tall sculpted stone shafts and are often associated with low circular stones referred to as altars, although their actual function is uncertain. Many stelae were sculpted in low relief,...
, most of which were placed along processional ways in the central plaza of the city and the adjoining acropolis
Acropolis
Acropolis means "high city" in Greek, literally city on the extremity and is usually translated into English as Citadel . For purposes of defense, early people naturally chose elevated ground to build a new settlement, frequently a hill with precipitous sides...
, a large complex of overlapping step-pyramids, plazas, and palaces. The site has a large court for playing the Mesoamerican ballgame
Mesoamerican ballgame
The Mesoamerican ballgame or Tlatchtli in Náhuatl was a sport with ritual associations played since 1,000 B.C. by the pre-Columbian peoples of Ancient Mexico and Central America...
. In two parallel buildings framing a carefully dimensioned rectangle lies the court.
The site is divided into various groups, with the Main Group and the Cemetery Group in the site core linked by a sacbe
Sacbe
right|thumb|Sacbe at Dzibilchaltun in the Yucatánthumb|right|Arch at the end of the sacbé, Kabah, YucatánSacbe, plural Sacbeob, or "white ways" are raised paved roads built by the Maya civilization of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica...
to the Sepulturas Group to the northeast. Central Copán had a density of 1449 structures per square kilometer (1449 /sqkm), in the area of greater Copán as a whole this density fell to 143 /sqkm over a surveyed area of 24.6 square kilometres (9.5 sq mi).
Main Group
Mesoamerican ballcourt
A Mesoamerican ballcourt is a large masonry structure of a type used in Mesoamerica for over 2,700 years to play the Mesoamerican ballgame, particularly the hip-ball version of the ballgame. Over 1,300 ballcourts have been identified, 60% in the last 20 years alone...
. The Monument Plaza contains the greatest concentration of sculpted monuments at the site.
The Acropolis was the royal complex at the heart of Copán. It consists of two plazas which have been named the West Court and the East Court. They are both enclosed by elevated structures. Archaeologists have excavated extensive tunnels under the Acropolis, revealing how the royal complex at the heart of Copán developed over the centuries and uncovering several hieroglyphic texts that date back to the Early Classic and verify details of the early dynastic rulers of the city who were recorded on Altar Q hundreds of years later. The deepest of these tunnels have revealed that the first monumental structures underlying the Acropolis date archaeologically to the early 5th century AD, when K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' established the royal dynasty. These early buildings were built of stone and adobe
Adobe
Adobe is a natural building material made from sand, clay, water, and some kind of fibrous or organic material , which the builders shape into bricks using frames and dry in the sun. Adobe buildings are similar to cob and mudbrick buildings. Adobe structures are extremely durable, and account for...
and were themselves built upon earlier earth and cobble structures dating to the predynastic period. The two styles of building overlap somewhat, with some of the earthen structures being expanded during the first hundred years or so of the dynastic history of the city. The early dynastic masonry buildings of the Acropolis included several with the Early Classic apron-molding style of Tikal and one built in the talud-tablero
Talud-tablero
Talud-tablero is an architectural style. It consists of a platform structure, or the tablero, on top of an inward-sloping surface or panel, the talud. It may also be referred to as the slope-and-panel style.-Cultural significance:...
style associated with Teotihuacan, although at the time the talud-tablero form was in use at both Tikal and Kaminaljuyu
Kaminaljuyu
Kaminaljuyu is a Pre-Columbian site of the Maya civilization that was primarily occupied from 1500 BC to AD 1200. Kaminaljuyu has been described as one of the greatest of all archaeological sites in the New World by Michael Coe, although its remains today - a few mounds only - are far less...
as well as in Central Mexico.
Structure 10L-4 is a platform with four stairways situated by the Monument Plaza.
Structure 10L-11 is on west side of the Acropolis. It encloses the south side of the Court of the Hieroglyphic Stairway and is accessed from it by a wide monumental stairway. This structure appears to have been the royal palace of Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat, the 16th ruler in the dynastic succession and the last known king of Copán. Structure 10L-11 was built on top of several earlier structures, one of which probably contains the tomb of his predecessor K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil. A small tunnel descends into the interior of the structure, possibly to the tomb, but it has not yet been excavated by archaeologists. Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat built a new temple platform over his predecessor's tomb in AD 769. On top of this he placed a two-storey superstructure with a sculpted roof depicting the mythological cosmos. At each of its northern corners was a large sculpted Pawatun (a group of deities that supported the heavens). This superstructure had four doorways with panels of hieroglyphs sculpted directly onto the walls of the building. A step inside the structure once depicted the king's accession to the throne, overseen by deities and ancestors.
| Phase | King | Date |
|---|---|---|
| Hunal | K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' | early 5th c. AD |
| Yehnal | K'inich Popol Hol | mid 5th c. AD |
| Margarita | K'inich Popol Hol | mid 5th c. AD |
| Rosalila | Moon Jaguar | mid 6th c.AD |
| Purpura | Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil | early 7th c.AD |
Structure 10L-16 (Temple 16) is a temple pyramid that is the highest part of the Acropolis, it is located between the East and West Courts at the heart of the ancient city. The temple faces onto the West Court within the Acropolis and is dedicated to K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo', the dynastic founder. The temple was placed on top of the original palace and tomb of the king. It is the final version of a number of temples built one on top of the other, as was common practice in Mesoamerica. The earliest version of this temple is nicknamed Hunal, it was built in the talud-tablero style of architecture that was typical of Teotihuacan, with traces of brightly colored murals on the surviving traces of the interior walls. The king was buried in a vaulted crypt that was cut into the floor of the Hunal phase of the building, accompanied by rich offerings of jade
Jade use in Mesoamerica
Jade use in Mesoamerica was largely influenced by the conceptualization of the material as a rare and valued commodity among pre-Columbian Mesoamerican cultures, such as the Olmec, the Maya, and the various groups in the Valley of Mexico. The only source from which the indigenous cultures could...
. K'inich Popol Hol, son of the founder, demolished the palace of his father and built a platform on top of his tomb, named Yehnal by archaeologists. It was built in a distinctively Petén Maya style and bore large masks of K'inich Tajal Wayib', the sun god, which were painted red. This platform was encased within another much larger platform within a decade of its construction. This larger platform has been named Margarita and had stucco panels flanking its access stairway that bore entwined images of quaetzals
Resplendent Quetzal
The Resplendent Quetzal, Pharomachrus mocinno, is a bird in the trogon family. It is found from southern Mexico to western Panama . It is well known for its colorful plumage. There are two subspecies, P. m. mocinno and P. m...
and macaws, which both form a part of K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo's name. The Margarita phase contained a tomb with the richly accompanied burial of an elderly woman nicknamed the "Lady in Red". It is likely that she was the widow of K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' and the mother of K'inich Popol Hol. The upper chamber of the Margarita phase temple was converted to receive offerings and the unusual Xukpi stone, a dedicatory monument used in one of the earlier phases, was reused in this later phase.
One of the best preserved phases of Temple 16 is the Rosalila, built over the remains of five previous versions of the temple. Archaeologist Ricardo Agurcia discovered the almost intact shrine while tunneling underneath the final version of the temple. Rosalila is notable for its excellent state of preservation, including the entire building from the base platform up to the roof comb
Roof comb
Roof comb is the structure that tops a pyramid in monumental Mesoamerican architecture. Examination of the decorations and iconography of Maya civilization roof-combs indicates that each icon had specific sacred meanings.-External links:...
, including its highly elaborate painted stucco decoration. Rosalila features K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' placed at the centre of a mythological tableau, combining the founder of the dynasty with the sky deity Itzamna
Itzamna
In Yucatec Maya mythology, Itzamna was the name of an upper god and creator deity thought to be residing in the sky. Little is known about him, but scattered references are present in early-colonial Spanish reports and dictionaries. Twentieth-century Lacandon lore includes tales about a creator...
in avian form. The mythological imagery also includes anthropomorphic
Anthropomorphism
Anthropomorphism is any attribution of human characteristics to animals, non-living things, phenomena, material states, objects or abstract concepts, such as organizations, governments, spirits or deities. The term was coined in the mid 1700s...
mountains, skeletons and crocodiles. Vents in the exterior were designed so smoke from incense being burned inside the shrine would interact with the stucco sculpture of the exterior. The temple had a hieroglyphic stone step with a dedicatory inscription. The stone step is less well preserved than the rest of the building, but a date in AD 571 has been deciphered. Due to the deforestation of the Copán valley, the Rosalila building was the last structure at the site to use such elaborate stucco decoration — vast quantities of firewood could no longer be spared to reduce limestone to plaster. A life-size copy of the Rosalila building has been built at the Copán site museum.
Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil encased the Rosalila phase under a new version of the building in the early 8th century AD. An offering was made as part of the rites to terminate the old phase and included a collection of eccentric flint
Flint
Flint is a hard, sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as a variety of chert. It occurs chiefly as nodules and masses in sedimentary rocks, such as chalks and limestones. Inside the nodule, flint is usually dark grey, black, green, white, or brown in colour, and...
s worked into the profiles of humans and gods, which were wrapped in blue-dyed textiles.
Structure 10L-18 is on the southeastern side of the Acropolis and has been damaged by the erosion caused by the Copán River, having lost its eastern side. Stairs on the south side of the structure lead down to a vaulted tomb that was looted in ancient times and was probably that of Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat. It was apparently plundered soon after the collapse of the Copán kingdom. Unusually for Copán, the summit shrine had four sculpted panels depicting the king performing war dances with spear and shield, emphasizing the rising tensions as the dynasty came to its end.
Temples 10L-20 and 10L-21 were probably both built by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil. They were lost to the Copán River in the early 20th century.
Structure 10L-22 is a large building on the north side of the East Court, in the Acropolis, and faces onto it. It dates to the reign of Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil and is the best preserved of the buildings from his rule. The superstructure of the building has an interior doorway with an elaborate sculpted frame and decorated with masks of the mountain god Witz. The outer doorway is framed by the giant mask of a deity, and has stylistic similarities with the Chenes regional style of distant Yucatán
Yucatán
Yucatán officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Yucatán is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 106 municipalities and its capital city is Mérida....
. The temple was built to celebrate the completion of the king's first K'atun in power, in AD 715, and has a hieroglyphic step with a first-person phrase "I completed my K'atun". The building symbolically represents the mountain where maize was created.
Structure 10L-25 is in the East Court of the Acropolis. It covers a rich royal tomb nicknamed Sub-Jaguar by archaeologists. It is presumed to be the tomb of either Ruler 7 (B'alam Nehn), Ruler 8 or Ruler 9, who all ruled in the first half of the 6th century AD.
| Phase | King | Date |
|---|---|---|
| Yax | K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' | early 5th c. AD |
| Motmot | K'inich Popol Hol | mid 5th c. AD |
| Papagayo | Ku Ix | mid 5th c. AD |
| Mascarón | Smoke Imix | 7th c. AD |
| Chorcha | Smoke Imix | 7th c. AD |
| Esmeralda | Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil | early 8th c. AD |
| N/A | K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil | mid 8th c. AD |
Structure 10L-26 is a temple that projects northwards from the Acropolis and is immediately to the north of Structure 10L-22. The structure was built by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil and K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil, the 13th and 15th rulers in the dynastic succession. The 10 metres (32.8 ft) wide Hieroglyphic Stairway ascends the building on the west side from the courtyard below. The earliest version of the temple, nicknamed Yax, was built during the reign of K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo', the dynastic founder, and has architectural features (such as inset corners) that are characteristic of Tikal and the central Petén region. The next phase of the building was built by Yax K'uk' Mo's son K'inich Popol Hol and is nicknamed Motmot. This phase of the structure was more elaborate and was decorated with stucco. Set under the building was the Motmot capstone, covering a tomb with the unusual Teotihuacan-style burial of a woman, accompanied by a wide variety of offerings that included animal bones, mercury
Mercury (element)
Mercury is a chemical element with the symbol Hg and atomic number 80. It is also known as quicksilver or hydrargyrum...
, jade and quartz
Quartz
Quartz is the second-most-abundant mineral in the Earth's continental crust, after feldspar. It is made up of a continuous framework of SiO4 silicon–oxygen tetrahedra, with each oxygen being shared between two tetrahedra, giving an overall formula SiO2. There are many different varieties of quartz,...
, along with three severed human heads, all of which were male. Ku Ix built a new phase of the building over Motmot, nicknamed Papagayo.
Smoke Imix demolished the Papagayo phase and ritually interred the broken remains of its sculpted monuments, accompanied by stone macaw heads from an early version of the ballcourt. He then built a pyramid over the earlier phases, nicknamed Mascarón by archaeologists. It in turn was developed into the Chorcha pyramid with the addition of a long superstructure with seven doorways at the front and back. Before a new building was built over the top, the upper sanctuary was demolished and a tomb was inserted into the floor and covered with 11 large stone slabs. The tomb contained the remains of an adult male and a sacrificed child. The adult's badly decayed skeleton was wrapped in a mat and accompanied by offerings of fine jade
Jade
Jade is an ornamental stone.The term jade is applied to two different metamorphic rocks that are made up of different silicate minerals:...
, including ear ornaments and a necklace of sculpted figurines. The burial was accompanied by offerings of 44 ceramic vessels, jaguar
Jaguar
The jaguar is a big cat, a feline in the Panthera genus, and is the only Panthera species found in the Americas. The jaguar is the third-largest feline after the tiger and the lion, and the largest in the Western Hemisphere. The jaguar's present range extends from Southern United States and Mexico...
pelts, spondylus
Spondylus
Spondylus is a genus of bivalve molluscs, the only genus in the family Spondylidae. As well as being the systematic or scientific name, Spondylus is also the most often used common name for these animals, though they are also known as thorny oysters or spiny oysters.There are many species of...
shells, 10 paintpots and one or more hieroglyphic books, now decayed. There were also 12 ceramic incense burners with lids modeled into human figurines, thought to represent Smoke Imix and his 11 dynastic predecessors. The Chorcha building was dedicated to the long-lived 7th century king Smoke Imix and it is therefore likely that the remains interred in the building are his. Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil had sealed the Chorcha phase under a new version of the temple, nicknamed Esmeralda, by AD 710. The new phase bore the first version of the Hieroglyphic Stairway, which contains a lengthy dynastic history. K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil built over the Esmeralda phase in the mid-8th century. He removed the Hieroglyphic Stairway from the earlier building and reinstalled it into his own version, while doubling the length of its text and adding five life-size statues of rulers dressed in the garb of Teotihuacano warriors, each seated on a step of the stairway. At the base of the stairway, he also raised Stela M, with his own image. The summit shrine of the temple bore a hieroglyphic text composed of full-figure hieroglyphs, each placed beside a similar glyph in faux-Mexican style, giving the appearance of a bilingual text.
The Hieroglyphic Stairway climbs the west side of Structure 10L-26. It is 10 metres (32.8 ft) and has a total of 62 steps. Stela M and its associated altar are at its base and a large sculpted figure is located in the centre of every 12th step. These figures are believed to represent the most important rulers in the dynastic history of the site. The stairway takes its name from the 2200 glyphs that together form the longest known Maya hieroglyphic text. The text itself is still being reconstructed, having been scrambled by the collapse of the glyphic blocks when the façade of the temple collapsed. The staircase measures 21 metres (68.9 ft) long and was first built by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in AD 710, being reinstalled and expanded in the following phase of the temple by K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil in AD 755.
The Ballcourt is immediately north of the Court of the Hieroglyphic Stairway and is to the south of the Monument Plaza. It was remodeled by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil, who then demolished it and built a third version ,which was one of the largest from the Classic period. It was dedicated to the great macaw deity and the buildings flanking the playing area carried 16 mosaic sculptures of the birds. The completion date of the ballcourt is inscribed with a hieroglyphic text upon the sloping playing area and is given as 6 January 738.
The Monument Plaza or Great Plaza is on the north side of the Main Group.
Sepulturas Group
The Sepulturas Group is linked by a sacbe or causeway that runs southwest to the Monument Plaza in the Main Group. The Sepulturas Group consists of a number of restored structures, mostly elite residences that feature stone benches, some of which have carved decorations, and a number of tombs.The group has a very long occupational history, with one house having been dated as far back as the Early Preclassic. By the Middle Preclassic, large platforms were being built from cobbles
Cobblestone architecture
Cobblestone architecture refers to the use of cobblestones embedded in mortar as method for erecting walls on houses and commercial buildings.-History:Evidence of the use of cobblestones in building has been found in the ruins of Hierakonpolis...
and several rich burials were made. By AD 800, the complex consisted of about 50 buildings arranged around 7 major courtyards. At this time, the most important building was the House of the Bakabs, the palace of a powerful nobleman from the time of Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat. The building has a high-quality sculpted exterior and a carved hieroglyphic bench inside. A portion of the group was a subdistrict occupied by non-Maya inhabitants from Central Honduras who were involved in the trade network that brought in goods from that region.
Other Groups
The North Group is a Late Classic compound. Archaeologists have excavated fallen façades that bear hieroglyphic inscriptions and sculpted decoration.The Cemetery Group is immediately south of the Main Group and includes a number of small structures and plazas.
Monuments
Altar QCopán Altar Q
Altar Q is the designation given to one of the most notable of the rectangular sculpted stone blocks recovered at the Mesoamerican archaeological site of Copán, present-day Honduras....
is the most famous monument at Copán. It was dedicated by king Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat in AD 776 and has each of the first 16 kings of the Copán dynasty carved around its side. Each figure is depicted seated on his name glyph. A hieroglyphic text is inscribed on the upper surface, relating the founding of the dynasty in AD 426–427. On one side, it shows the dynastic founder K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' transferring power to Yax Pasaj. Interestingly, Tatiana Proskouriakoff first discovered the inscription on the West Side of Altar Q that tells us the date of the inauguration of Yax Pasaj. This portrayal of political succession tells us much about Early Classic Maya culture.
The Motmot Capstone is an inscribed stone that was placed over a tomb under Structure 10L-26. Its face was finely sculpted with portraits of the first two kings of the Copán dynasty, K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' and K'inich Popol Hol, facing towards each other with a double column of hieroglyphs between them, all contained within a quatrefoil frame. The frame and the hieroglyphic names of mythological locations underneath the feet of the two kings place them in a supernatural realm. The capstone bears two calendrical dates, in AD 435 and AD 441. The second of these is probably the date that the capstone was dedicated.
The Xukpi Stone is a dedicatory monument from one of the earlier phases of the 10L-16 temple constructed to honor K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo'. It bears the date of AD 437 and the names both K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' and K'inich Popol Hol, together with a possible mention of the Teotihuacan general Siyaj K'ak'. The monument has not been completely deciphered and its style and phrasing are unusual. Originally it was used as a sculpted bench or step and the date on the monument is associated with the dedication of a funerary temple or a tomb, probably the tomb of K'inich' Yax K'uk' Mo' himself, which was discovered underneath the same structure.
Stela 2 was erected in the Great Plaza by Smoke Imix in AD 652.
Stela 3 is another stela erected by Smoke Imix in the Great Plaza in AD 652.
Stela 4 was erected by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in the early 8th century AD.
Stela 7 dates to the reign of K'ak' Chan Yopaat, and was erected to celebrate the K'atun-ending ceremony of AD 613. It was found in the western complex now underneath the modern village of Copán Ruinas. It bears a long hieroglyphic text that has been only partially deciphered.
Stela 9 was found in the modern village of Copán Ruinas, where it had been erected on the site of a major Classic period complex 1.6 kilometre (0.994196378639691 mi) outside of the site core. It was dedicated by Moon Jaguar and dates to AD 564.
Stela 10 was erected outside of the site core by Smoke Imix in AD 652.
Stela 11 was originally an interior column from Temple 18, the funerary shrine of Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat. When it was found, it was broken in two parts at the base of the temple. It portrays the king as the elderly Maya maize god
Maya maize god
Like other Mesoamerican peoples, the traditional Mayas recognize in their staple crop, the maize, a vital force with which they strongly identify. This is clearly shown by their mythological traditions. According to the 16th-century Popol Vuh, the Hero Twins have maize plants for alter egos and man...
and has imagery that seems to deliberately parallel the tomb lid of the Palenque king K'inich Janaab' Pakal, probably because of Yax Pasaj Chan Yopaat's close family ties to that city. The text of the column formed part of a longer text carved onto the interior walls of the temple and may describe the downfall of the Copán dynasty.
Stela 12 was erected outside of the site core by Smoke Imix in AD 652.
Stela 13 was erected outside the site core by Smoke Imix in AD 652.
Stela 15 is dated to AD 524, during the reign of B'alam Nehn. Its sculpture consists entirely of hieroglyphic text, which mentions that king B'alam Nehn was ruling the city by AD 504.
Stela 17 dates to AD 554, during the reign of Moon Jaguar. It originally stood in the nearby village of Copán Ruinas, which was a major complex in the Classic period.
Stela 18 is a fragment of a monument bearing the name of K'inich Popol Hol. It was erected in the inner chamber of the 10L-26 temple.
Stela 19 is a monument erected outside of the site core by Smoke Imix in AD 652.
Stela 63 was dedicated by K'inich Popol Hol. Its sculpture consists purely of finely carved hieroglyphic texts and it is possible that it was originally commissioned by K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo' with additional texts added to the sides of the monument by his son. The text contains the same date in AD 435 that appears on the Motmot Capstone. Stela 63 was deliberately broken, together with its hieroglyphic step, during the ritual demolishing of the Papagayo phase of Temple 26. The remains of the monuments were then interred in the building before the next phase was built.
Stela A was erected in 731 by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil. It places his rulership among the four most powerful kingdoms in the Maya region, alongside Palenque, Tikal and Calakmul.
Stela B was erected by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in the early 8th century AD.
Stela C was erected by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in the early 8th century AD.
Stela D was erected by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in the early 8th century AD.
Stela F was erected by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in the early 8th century AD.
Stela H was erected by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in the early 8th century AD.
Stela J was erected by Uaxaclajuun Ub'aah K'awiil in AD 702 and was his first monument. It stood at the eastern entrance to the city and is unusual in being topped by a sculpted stone roof, converting the monument into a symbolic house. It bears a hieroglyphic text that is woven into a criss-cross mat design to form a convoluted puzzle that must be read in precisely the right order to be understood.
Stela M bears a portrait of K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil. It was raised at the foot of the Hieroglyphic Stairway of Temple 26 in AD 756.
Stela N was dedicated by K'ak' Yipyaj Chan K'awiil in AD 761 and placed at the foot of the steps to Temple 11, which is believed to contain his burial.
Stela P was originally erected in an unknown location and was later moved to the West Court of the Acropolis. It bears a long hieroglyphic text that has not yet been fully deciphered. It dates from the reign of king K'ak' Chan Yopaat and was dedicated in AD 623.
See also
- El PuenteEl PuenteEl Puente, or the Parque Arqueológico El Puente , is a Maya archaeological site in the department of Copán in Honduras. Once an independent Maya city, the city of El Puente became a tributary to the nearby city of Copán between the 6th and 9th centuries AD...
- List of archaeoastronomical sites sorted by country
- List of megalithic sites
External links
- "Lost King of the Maya" companion site to PBS's "Nova" television documentary on Copán
- "Hieroglyphs and History at Copán" article by Mayanist epigrapher David StuartDavid Stuart (Mayanist)David Stuart is a Mayanist scholar and professor of Mesoamerican art and writing at the University of Texas at Austin.-Early life:He is the son of Mayanist scholars George Stuart and Gene S. Stuart...
at the Peabody Museum - Copan Sculpture Museum: Ancient Maya Artistry in Stucco and Stone. Barbara Fash. Published by the Peabody Museum Press. Paperback 2011
- PAPAC, Proyecto Arqueologico para la Planificacion de la Antigua Copan (Copan Urban Planning Project), academic-sponsored project for preservation and documentation of the site