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41.0. Uxmal
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41.0. Uxmal 727 and the population of Uxmal declined. After the Spanish conquest, during which the Xiu allied themselves with the Spaniards, colonial documents suggest that Uxmal was still an inhabited place of some importance into the 1550s. However , Uxmal was soon after largely abandoned. While much work has been done at Uxmal to consolidate and restore buildings, little serious excavation and research has been done. Most of the architecture visible today was built during the Late Classic period. Some of the more noteworthy buildings include the Governor’s Palace, Pyramid of the Magician (Adivino), Nunnery Quadrangle, and the ballcourt.Anumberofotherstemple-pyramids,quadrangles, and other monuments, some of significant size, and in varying states of preservation, are also at Uxmal. A further suggestion of possible war or battle is found in the remains of a wall which encircled most of the central ceremonial center. A large raised stone causeway links Uxmal with the site of Kabah, some 18 km to the south. T H E C A R N E G I E M A Y A The site of Uxmal, located in the Puuc hills of the Yucatán peninsula, has attracted many visitors since the time of the Mexican Independence, including Jean Frederic Waldeck in 1838, and John Lloyd Stephens and Frederick Catherwood in early 1840s. Désiré Charnay took a series of photographs of the site in the 1860, and three years later Empress Carlota of Mexico visited Uxmal. Sylvanus G. Morley made a map of the site in 1909 which included some previously overlooked buildings. The Mexican government consolidated some of the structures in 1927, and in 1930 Frans Blom made plaster casts of the façade of the Nunnery Quadrangle. These were later displayed at the 1933 World’s Fair in Chicago . Further repair and consolidation was undertaken by José Erosa Peniche for the Mexican government in 1936. The Maya chronicles say that Uxmal was founded about 500 AD by Hun Uitzil Chac Tutul Xiu. For generations Uxmal was ruled over by the Xiu lineage. It was for a while in alliance with Chichén Itzá, and after about 1200 AD no new major construction was made at the site, possibly related to the fall of Chichén Itzá and the shift of power in Yucatán to Mayapán. The Xiu moved their capital to Maní, 728 UXMAL 41.1. SYLVANUS G. MORLEY Yucatán: Uxmal YB 41:250–253, 1942 Dr. Morley returned to Yucatán by way of Mexico City in September 1941. While in Mexico City he delivered a lecture at the University Club, for the benefit of British war relief, on the archaeological investigations of the Institution during the past 25 years, and repeated the lecture in Spanish before the Sociedad Científica de Antonio Alzate. During Dr. Morley’s field work at Uxmal in the early part of 1941, a preliminary examination of the GreatSouthPyramid,ahigh,tree-coveredmoundsouthwestoftheHouseoftheGovernor ,revealedasectionof a collapsed corbelled vault on the north or front side. Thisconfirmedanimpression,formedmanyyearsago, that near the summit of this pyramid there had originally beenrangesofroomsoneachofthefoursides.Dr. Morley devoted three weeks to excavations on all four sides of the pyramid, near the top, in order to establish the nature of the construction that had stood there. The Great South Pyramid, the highest and largest at Uxmal, measures 96 m north and south by 80 m east and west, and is 27.5 m high from the north base to the summit. It is built on a slope which rises from north to south, so that its base at the south is 4 m higher than at thefront.Twodefinitearchitecturalperiodswerenoted, and it is quite possible that the pyramid may contain still older constructions. The earliest building now visible consisted of a single range of at least four rooms, with long axes running east and west and doorways in their north walls. These were later incorporated into thenorthwestcornerofthepyramid,theirexteriorback walls being covered by its masonry fill. The pyramid proper was of 11 terraces, 10 at the back because of the southward rise of the terrain. The terraces, 1.4 m in vertical height, have battered faces. They are built of very roughly dressed stone like that of the substructure of the House of the Dwarf, and were finished with a heavy coat of plaster. There were no recessed panels or other decoration on the faces of these terraces. A centrally placed stairway on the north side, 23.5 m wide, projecting from the base of...