Identifier: scienceguide7692amer (find matches)
Title: Guide leaflet
Year: 1901 (1900s)
Authors: American Museum of Natural History
Subjects: American Museum of Natural History Natural history
Publisher: New York : The Museum
Contributing Library: American Museum of Natural History Library
Digitizing Sponsor: IMLS / LSTA / METRO

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the temple idea is thegreat Temple of the War-riors at Chichen Ttza andits various annexes. Herethe roof-comb was dis-pensed with, and rows ofelaborately carved col-umns supported a seriesof arches. This building,strongly affected by in-fluence from Mexico, isthe most important Cen-tral American exampleof a temple which afford-ed space for a congregationconfines. The essence of Maya architecture maybe seen in the evolution of the offering-platform into a pyramid surmounted byan ornamented shrine which finally,through increased knowledge of construc-tion, is developed into a temple. Parallel-ing this development is that of the asso-ciated buildings which presumably wereto house the temple staff. Without thenecessity of supporting an elaborate orna-mental crest, the rooms could be as wideas a corbel vault could conveniently Ijemade, a space of some eight to thirteenfeet, depending on the length of the tailsof the roofing stones and the height ofthe vault. But the lonu axes of the build-
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TEMPLE OE THE SEX. PALEXQTE The most evolved type of Maya building. Compare the wide roomshere with the narrow slots at Tikal (p. 22). Notice also the shrinein the bark room, and the division of the door into a colonnade ithin its ing could Ije indefinitely prolonged. Atfirst these houses seem to have been com-posed of three or four oljlong rooms fittedtogether to form a rectangle. Later,when size l)cgan to l)e more esteemed,ranks of rooms were stritng together likebeads. The highest development of this kind ofbuilding was found in Yucatan. Insteadof a plaster facade, the facing of thesehouses was of stone, which was elaboratelycarved. The general field of decorationwas between the top wall and the roof.Xow a large building of several ranks ofrooms was extremely unsatisfactory, sincethe inner rooms were deprived of lightand air. To overcome this, the idea ofcreatino- second and third stories was 30 Ll//;///r.l.V MIS/:IM GLIDE LEAFLET

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