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Copán: Exploring the Florence of the Americas

By Chris Humphrey
Photos by J. Kevin Foltz

Being a travel writer has its perks. I've been to the Mayan ruins of Copán, in the green hill country of western Honduras, a number of times during my years traveling in Central America. But on my most recent visit, when I told the folks in charge of the site that I was writing a story on the ruins, they offered to let me in just before gates open to the public. Who was I to say no?

The elderly watchman gives me a friendly wink as he lets me through the gate at 7 a.m.: "Bueno pues, que le vaya bien" ("OK, have a good time then"). Perched above the gate, a pair of giant scarlet macaws-famed for squawking and preening at tourists during the day-eyes me with suspicion as they ruffle their feathers, still half asleep. And up the path I walk, feeling like a little kid sneaking into forbidden territory.

Copán is spectacular any time of day, but there's something especially magical about visiting early in the morning. The entrance path leads into a tunnel formed by arching tropical trees that opens out onto the Great Lawn, wreathed in a mist not yet burned off by the morning sunlight. A lone white-tailed deer ambled slowly amidst the stelae, carved stone statues depicting the ancient rulers of Copán.

The understated beauty of Copán is unique for Mayan cities, which tend to impress with their sheer size rather than their elegance. For reasons that remain a mystery, the rulers of Copán had a singularly artistic bent that set them apart from the other independent city-states of the Mayan world, which covered southern Mexico, Guatemala and northwestern Honduras at its height, roughly 400-900 A.D. The pyramids at Tikal and Chichen Itzá might be taller, but no other city comes close to the veritable art gallery at Copán, a sort of Florence of the Americas.

Off to the south side of the lawn stands the main complex-still in the shadows-a series of courts, pyramids and temples constructed over the centuries along a bend in the Copán River. Only the ball court, where the Mayan warriors played an ancient version of futból in front of the city nobility, was illuminated by the sun. Awed by the glorious surroundings, I walked through the ball court to an imposingly steep stairway lined with a dazzling array of pictographic carvings: the Hieroglyphic Staircase, the longest single piece of writing in the pre-Hispanic Americas.

When American adventurer John Lloyd Stephens first saw the staircase in 1839-after buying the entire ruins for $50 from a local farmer-he guessed that the 2,500 glyphs were in fact a written language, telling the history of the city. It took another 120 years until modern archeologists, starting with Tatiana Prosouriakoff in 1960, began decoding the glyphs and realized that he was right.

People farmed the rich soils of the Copán valley as far back as 1000 B.C., but construction of the city did not begin until around 100 A.D. The first dated carving at the site was chiseled in 426 A.D., marking the ascension of ruler Yax Kuk Mo, believed to have been a shaman who came from the central Mexican empire of Teotihuacán.

Above the Hieroglyphic Staircase is the main complex, atop of what seems to be a large hill. It's actually man-made, the result of four centuries of Mayan builders carefully burying old temples and erecting new ones on top. As I wander around amidst the temples, statues and huge trees covering the complex, the first tourists of the day begin to walk through the ruins. Picking my way down the steep sides of the main complex to a small courtyard known as the West Court, I see the same affable Honduran watchman who let me in the front gate strolling up through the woods, who introduces himself as Julián.

Don Julián points out a square-shaped stone altar at one side of the courtyard, known as Altar Q. "Aquí están todos los reyes de Copán," he says-"Here are all the kings of Copán." Carved around the side of the altar are all 16 rulers of the Copán dynasty, with the first, Yax Kuk Mo, shown passing the baton of power to the last, Yax Pac, who ruled for six decades until his death in 822 and commissioned the altar.

How did Yax Pac know that the royal dynasty would end with him? The short answer is that he didn't, at least not for sure. After all, his son did take power, although his rule ended suddenly, when some unknown tragedy engulfed the city. But Don Julian says he thinks Yax Pac knew he would be the last ruler of Copán, and the perfect symmetry of Altar Q-with four rulers on each side of the square stone-certainly has a look of finality to it. Evidence indicates that at the time the altar was made, the population of the Copán valley had reached its limit, with massive deforestation, soil erosion and rapidly declining food production. By 1000 A.D., the city and most of the valley were again covered in forest.

"After ruling the city for so long and seeing what was happening, Yax Pac must have known the end was near," ponders Don Julian, with a note of sadness in his voice. Looking at some foreign tourists nearby talking quietly, hushed by the imperious beauty of the ruins, he adds with a laugh as he walks off, "But he sure would be impressed that a thousand years later people like you are still writing stories about his old town."

For more information, please visit: www.DiscoverCentralAmerica.com.

Flying To Copán
TACA can fly you directly to the city of Tegucigalpa, Honduras from the following cities: Miami, San Pedro Sula, San Salvador and Guatemala City.

You can also travel to Tegucigalpa from other cities in North, Central and South America with connections in El Salvador and San José, Costa Rica. For more information, visit your nearest TACA office, our website at www.taca.com or call our Reservations and Telephone Sales Center in your home country. For a listing of our phone numbers, look inside your ticket jacket.