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Where the Stelae Speak Ana Leticia Vargas* 57 Voices of Mexico /April line, 1995 Where the stelae speak Ana Leticia Vargas* alakmul, the city with the questions of dynastic history, This period of almost six greatest number of stelae in evolution and development have been centuries involved three hundred years Maya territory, faithfully niost enigmatic. of "expansion of the stelae, which reflects the level of Up to the present, traces of the were dated in Maya style, perfectionC in stone sculpting achieved glyph have been found only on a accompanied by a vaulted roof with by our ancestors; this art reached its polychrome vase and a fragment of a projecting stones" and a period of highest point after 500 A.D. The stairway, but not on any of the 120 "great activity and increasing inscriptions in stone, of invaluable stelae which line the city's roadways. refinement in architecture and the arts, documentary value, relate the deeds of at the same time that large religious men who in order to survive resorted When the past reveals itself to us buildings arose in the east and west to war, matrimonial alliances, Calakmul, considered one of the great regions of the central Maya area." The conquest and even self-sacrifice. cities of the Classic era, was one of the decline of that area began in the year While, thanks to advances in inheritors of the power of El Mirador 900, when the recording of Long epigraphic studies, we now know the (Guatemala), a city to the north of the Count inscriptions stopped and all names of various rulers in the Maya central Maya area which was Tikal's organized religious activity ceased.' area, as well as the relations great rival. Calakmul, first settled in The zone was rediscovered a established between them, questions the Late Pre-Classic period, expanded relatively short time ago. It was in remain about the political-institutional and flourished between the years 317 1931 that the American biologist life of many of these settlements. and 889 A.D. (that is, between Sylvanus G. Morley, La civilización maya, Was Jaguar Claw, an important 8.14.0.0.0 and 10.3.0.0.0. according to Mexico City, Fondo de Cultura Económica, person born in Calakmul whose name the Maya calendar). (2nd cd., 7th printing), 1989, pp. 74, 77. is inscribed on stelae in various important sites, a dignitary whose ancestors carne originally from this region? Was the city of the "twin hills" (the meaning of Calak) an important political capital? Is Calakmul the "Q Site" referred to in the inscriptions in El Perú, Dos Pilas and Tikal? Due to the poor condition of these monuments, epigraphers have not yet accepted such an association. In order to be completely sure, the emblem glyph showing a serpent's head would have to be found on some of the walls and stairways of main buildings, as well as on stelae, says Ramón Carrasco. Since 1993, Carrasco has been in charge of salvage and research work in an area where * Reportcr for the National Instituto of Thirteen of Calakmul's buildings are pvramids. Anthropology and History, Media Office. Voices of Mexico /April • Atte, 1995 project's director, "goals were set of the sort of epigraphic studies projecting over-all work on a group of undertaken in Palenque, Yaxchilan, structures and the establishment of their Tikal or Copan. urban context, in order to provide a The site's main center was located vision of the public areas as a whole." 2 on a dome of approximately 15 square The Calakmul site is located in miles surrounded by bays and seasonal the Calakmul biosphere reserve, streams. In the pre-Hispanic era the city considered one of the country's largest had canals which provided water, as with approximately 1.8 million acres well as an adequate drainage system. of protected jungle. This area has the The city is characterized by the most important concentration of dispersa] of the various groups of felines in all of North America. buildings, 13 of which are pyramidal. Jaguars, ocelots, wild cats, great The monument area is located in the This bust mar represen! a Maya noble of anteaters as well as severa' species of dome's main sector, "where they built the Classic period (250-800 A.D.). monkeys and birds inhabit the reserve. both the two great pyramids which In Calakmul there are trees of precious dominate the jungle (Structures I and Cyrus Lundell revealed the existente wood, including ramonal, siricote, II) and the palace complexes, in the of this city, considered one of the chakáh, rubber trees, chico zapote, fashion of great acropolises with their largest in the Maya area. palo mulato, and cheche'? negro. buildings constructed around patios Archeological salvage works The zone, closed to tourism for and plazas." began in 1982 under the direction of the time being, is located about 250 Regarding the plan of the city, William J. Folian, a researcher from miles southeast of the capital of Carrasco points out: "The central area the University of Campeche (UAC). Campeche, in the municipalities of or plaza is made up of two sectors: He carried out a study on the city's Champotón and Holopechén. On the one containing Buildings IV, V, VI settlement pattern in order to get an Escárcega-Chetumal highway, near and VIII, the other with Buildings II idea of the size of the site, in which the town of Conhuas, one encounters and V. Building II is the great over 700 structures were found. The the turn-off connecting to a dirt road pyramid, which dominates the group most important finds of the past that leads to one of the most important at the same time as it imparts a decade —a tomb and one of the three settlements in the central Maya area, ceremonial or religious character to jade masks now preserved in the known for the abundance of its Building V, which divides the main Teniente del Rey Museum in the architecture and inscribed monuments. plaza into two parts." capital of Campeche— were Carrasco notes that the deterioration of All the buildings in the main plaza discovered in Building VII, located in the inscriptions has stood in the way have stelae or altars in front which the central complex. must have contained the dynastic In October 1992, Calakmul 2 history of Calakmul's rulers. It is in this Proyectos especiales de arqueología, became part of the Special plaza that we find the largest number Archeological Projects sponsored by Mexico City, Consejo Nacional para la Cultura y las Artes/Instituto Nacional de stelae in the site: more than 55 of the the Presidency of the Republic. As part Antropología e Historia/Fondo Nacional 120 reported up to this time. of the work program planned by the Arqueológico, 1993, pp. 10-11. Six hundred feet north of the Main YVVVVYV Plaza is another important group of VVVYVVVVYVVVVVVYVVYVVVVYVVVVVVVVYVVYVVVY buildings. Among the most outstanding In pre-Hispanic geography, Calakmul was are Building XI or the Ball Court, as well as Building XII and Building XIII, part of central Petén, a region which also which was evidently looted twice, included the cities of Nakum, Tikal and seemingly in the 1970s. Since Ramón Carrasco became Uaxactún; these settlements shared a the director of the Calakmul Biosphere Archeological Project, aimed at common history. Today it is located in the carrying out research at the Nadzcan extreme south of the state of Campeche, and Balamku sites and creating a tourist attraction south of Campeche, about 20 miles from the Guatemalan bordee work has nearly been complete(' on Buildings IV, V, VIII, XI and XIII. 59 Voices of Mexico /April • fune, 1995 The most important work during and the rooms extremely small, this time, explains Carrasco, has communication with the outside was involved establishing the sequence in through only one door; there are which the monuments were built. This neither arcades nor isolated is the first step towards determining structural supports."3 the sites' archeological chronology. It shares architectural characteristics Excavations have yielded ceramic with other Maya cities which also arose materials, cooking pots, cylindrical in the Petén region, such as Uaxactún, vases, knives, polychrome and which seems to have been one of the monochrome dishes, bone and stone oldest; Tikal, considered the largest; and remains, as well as objects made of Nakum, located in the Holmul valley, shell, jade and obsidian. In the process next to the river of the same name. several "dedicatory offerings" have also "According to Morley (l'he Calak means "twin hills." been found, which tells us that specific Inscriptions of Petén,' Appendix VI), ceremonies accompanied construction the oldest dates are written on Stelae Towards new tourist routes or modification of the buildings. 43, 28 and 29. The first of these is The location of the archaeological zone These offerings consist of large found at the great pyramid and the within the Calakmul Biosphere Reserve platters, called Aguilas Naranjas other two at Building V, which faces has contributed to the development of a (Orange Eagles); joined together in the the pyramid...." Stele 43 is dated 514 program which integrates ecological form of an urn, they were used as A.D. and the other two 623 A.D., conservation, archeological works and depositories for seashells and pieces of indicating that this is probably the socioeconomic aspects of the region. jade. Two of these (containing five oldest part of the city. In general, the This is one of the sites where varieties of seashells, small amulets in stelae represent "personages standing restoration should go hand in hand with the shape of human beings —carved over captives, with a scepter in the right nature, not against it.
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