Title: The Civil engineer and architect's journal, scientific and railway gazette
Identifier: civilengineerarc06lond (find matches)
Year: 1839 (1830s)
Authors:
Subjects: Architecture; Civil engineering; Science
Publisher: London : (William Laxton)
Contributing Library: Northeastern University, Snell Library
Digitizing Sponsor: Northeastern University, Snell Library

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1843.) THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 133 Maria (in the manner displayed in a large section exhibited); and the tra- veller now ascends to the lantern hetween the two crusts or plates forming the inner and the outer domes. Michael Angelo adopted this contrivance in the dome of St. Peter's ; and almost all the subsequent domes are upon the same idea. The Professor pointed out these instances of analogy as sufficient to show that the architect might thus avail himself of the whole range of Nature's works; and that the universe furnished him the inexhaustible models from which his inventions might be drawn. REVIEWS. THE ANCIENT RUINS OF YUCATAN. Rambles in Yucatan. By B. M. Norman. New York : 1843. The last quarter of a century has been distinguished by the scien- tific and successful researches which have been made into the mate- rial and moral world of unrecorded ages. What the far-seeing pre- dicted, but hardly hoped would occur, what the visionary exhausted himself in vain efforts to ascertain, has now taken place ; the film, the mist which concealed and disfigured the unknown past, is giving way before the labours of men of science, and the long-hidden forms of antiquity's infancy are becoming revealed to our eyes: while the progress made is such that we can scarcely doubt of a glorious har- vest of discovery in the end. While geology and palaeozoology have shown us the rudiments of the physical world, portrayed its vegeta- tion, and pictured the creatures which inhabited it, philology and palestiology have thrown glorious light upon the early history of the human race. While geology was pursued on a false system, and theories were formed before facts were accumulated, its votaries were the derision of the world ; nor did the philologists suffer less deservedly: their wild speculations drew from Voltaire the definition that their science was one in which "la consonne y entrailpourfort pen de chose et la votjelk pour rien :" and Goldsmith sarcastically determines from the resemblance of the letters, that Cox-fu-ci-us and Noah were the same personages. This time, however, has now passed, and both geology and philology, studied upon the principles of Bacon, have become fixed sciences. From philology has sprung paleaetiology, or the science of applying philological evidence to the history of the human races, and Bopp, Pott, Raske, Prichard, Winning, and others have successfully laboured in this department. In connection with these studies is that of the early monuments of art, the elucidations of which in Egypt, in Iranistan, in India, and America, deeply engage the attention of men of science. If in the old world we are astonished at the gigantic records of ancient civilization, we were totally un- prepared to find the new continent as rich in these memorials as our own. Records of a race which seems to have "died and left uo sign," works without a name, monuments bearing the impress of the fathers of civilization in India and Egyptâthey are calculated to awaken the deepest interest, and to enlist the strongest sympathy of the artist and the scholar. Humboldt and Lord Kingsborough prepared the way in the study of Mexican antiquities, which Waldeck, Stephens, and Norman have followed out: and the result is, the opening a field of study in Yucatan, rich in architectural and artistical interest. For a copy of Mr. Norman's work, we have been indebted to the kindness of Messrs. Wiley and Putnam, and we proceed to give some account of it and its author. Mr. Norman was led to Yucatan in a chance excursion in the autumn of 1841, and commenced his re- searches with no other instrumental aid than a knife and pocket com- pass, and pencil and paper; yet, although he pretends to no scholar- ship, he has produced a work, containing minute descriptions of the ruins, with many notes derived from the works of his predecessors. He seems to have been an active and energetic observer, and to have gone about his task with all that poco-curautism for trifles, which the wanderer in Spanish countries must possess if he would make himself happy and useful. Mr. Norman's journal contains descriptions of the manners and customs of the people, as well as accounts of the ruins, which were the more especial objects of his visit. Yucatan, we need scarcely remind our readers, is a peninsula, remarkable for running from south to north, bounded on the east by the English settlement of Honduras, on the south by Guatimala, and on the south-west by Mexico, of which it was recently a province, although now independent. The west coast is known to us as the Campeachy shore, and was the scene of many an exploit in the log- wood-cutting times of the early part of the seventeenth century. The country itself presents but little to interest us in its modern state, but in the northern parts have been discovered the ruined cities of Uxmal, Kabab, Zayi, Ticul, Sisal, Chi-Chen, and Espita; and it will be observed that not more than a third of the country has been as yet imperfectly explored, while what the mountain regions of the interior may present is unknown. The inhabitants are chiefly of Indian descent, called Mayas, of whom we shall speak again hereafter. Leaving Mr. Norman to speak for himself, the first place to which he leads us is Chi-chen, of which a plan is shown below. Fig. 1.âPlan of the Ruins of Chi-Chen.
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n, temple ; b. ruins ; c, pyramid ; d, dome : e. house of the Caciques ; /. house ; g. hacienda ; It, evidences of large and splendid structures ; i, cross erected by the Indians ; o, church of the Indians. " It was on the morning of the 10th of February that I directed my steps, for the first time, toward the ruins of the ancient city of Chi- Chen.1 On arriving in the immediate neighbourhood, I was compelled to cut mv way through an almost impermeable thicket of under-brush, interlaced and bound together with strong tendrils and vines; in which labour I was assisted by my diligent aid and companion, Jose, I was finally enabled to effect a passage ; and, in the course of a few hours, found myself in the presence of the ruins which I sought. For five days did I wander up and down among these crumbling monu- ments of a city which, I hazard little in saying, must have been one of the largest the world has ever seen. I beheld before me, for a circuit of many miles in diameter, the walls of palaces and temples and pyra- mids, more or less dilapidated. The earth was strewed, as far as the eye could distinguish, with columns, some broken and some nearly perfect, which seemed to have been planted there by the genius of desolation which presided over this awful solitude. Amid these solemn memorials of departed generations, who have died and left no marks but these, there were no indications of animated existence save from the bats, the lizards, and the reptiles which now and then emerged from the crevices of the tottering walls and crumbling stones that were strewed upon the ground at their base. No marks of human footsteps, no signs of previous visitors, were discernible; nor is there good reason to believe that any person, whose testimony of the fact has been given to the world, had ever before broken the silence which reigns over these sacred tombs of a departed civilization. As I looked about me and indulged in these reflections, I felt awed into perfect silence. To speak then, had been profane. A revelation from heaven could not have impressed me more profoundly with the solemnity of its communication, than I was now impressed on finding myself the first, probably, of the present generation of civilized men walking the streets of this once mighty city, and amid ⢠Those temples, palaces, and piles stupendous, Of which the very ruins are tremendous.' For a long time I was so distracted with the multitude of objects which crowded upon my mind, that I could take no note of them in detail. It was not until some hours had elapsed, that my curiosity was sufficiently under control to enable me to examine them with any minuteness." " My first study was made at the ruins of the Temple.2 These re- mains consist, as will be seen by reference to the engraving (a, Fig. 3, & Fig. 1), of four distinct walls. 1 entered at an opening in the western angle, which I conceived to be the main entrance ; and presumed, from â ' 1 Chi-Chen signifies, mouth of a well. ' Itza.' said to he the Maya name for one of the old possessors of these ruins, is sometimes added by the natives. .... , , - 2 The names by which I have designated these ruins, are such as were suggested lo me by their peculiar construction, and the purposes fur which I supposed them to have been designed. 18

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