18-Rabbit dedicated Temple 22 in the East Court in Maya longcount 9.14.3.6.8 or AD 715
"18-Rabbit's most memorable work during this period was Temple 22, a building that has long been admired as one of the finest of all Maya architectural expressions. We know now that by raising Temple 22, 18-Rabbit was re-creating a type of structure that had been built many time before by his ancestors, expressing their own special vision of Creation.
This temple's last and most ambitious manifestation was constructed with mud mortar, a kind of construction that required constant and careful maintenance to ensure that its plaster seal did not leak and weaken the walls. Once the Copánecs no longer maintained it, it deteriorated and collapsed.
Today we have only fragments of the beautiful sculptures that once decorated it—pieces found lying in the grass by the temple's feet—but they are enough to help us contemplate the building's lost beauty and significance."
Freidel, Schele, Parker, Maya Cosmos: Three Thousand Years on the Shaman's Path, p. 147-8
"18-Rabbit's master masons shaped the central door of his temple to represent the mouth and gullet of the great Witz Monster. This was meant to indicate that the interior of the temple symbolized a living cave that opened into the heart of the mountain.
To the Classic Maya, all natural openings into the earth, whether caves or cenotes (sunken waterholes), were portals to the Otherworld. Their architecture echoes this belief. Deep behind this cave door stood the sanctum where 18-Rabbit and his successor conjured up their ancestors and the gods."
Freidel, Schele, Parker, Maya Cosmos: Three Thousand Years on the Shaman's Path, p. 149-50
Proskouriakoff, Tatiana. An Album of Maya Architecture. University of Oklahoma Press. Norman and London 1963
This reconstruction shows a band of young corn god sculptures adorning the frieze, a monster mouth entrance to the Temple with fangs properly reset on the upper step, and Witz Monster mask stacks decorating the corners.
A.P. Maudslay. Biologia Centrali-Americana: Archaeology (Text), Volume V. Fascimile edition, Milpatron Publishing Corp, New York, 1974, p. 28
Maudslay begins with a description of Temple 22 as he saw it in 1890. He writes: "The outer surface of the front wall facing the Eastern Court had almost disappeared; but that it must once have been elaborately ornamented is proved by the number of headless busts and other fragments of sculptured stone lying near it in all directions."
From the Maudslay Collection, British Museum. Used with permission under the CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 non-commercial license. ©he Trustees of the British Museum.
* Location "13" in building diagram
The photo shows an eye, part of the mouth with a curled forked tongue, a serpent's superorbital plate, and an earspool. To the right is one of the young corn god sculptures fallen from the frieze.
From the Maudslay Collection, British Museum. Used with permission under the CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 non-commercial license. ©he Trustees of the British Museum.
Sorting, cataloging, and reassembling these fragments was a monumental task and remains a problem even today. This snippet from The Temple 22 Facade Reconstruction Project describes some of the difficulties of the task:
"In processing this Structure 10L-22 sculpture sample, new challenges are constantly appearing. The sheer size of the sample—now at almost 4,000 pieces of sculpture—amounts to an intimidating jigsaw puzzle. Moreover, about 10 percent of this sample is scattered in museums and private collections throughout the world.
The sculpture is also heavy and highly unwieldy; some pieces require four men to carry and each has a long projecting tenon that once secured the stone into the building. Reconstructions are tested in a large sandbox, but it is possible to work with only a few pieces at a time. Over 100 fragments have been reunited and restored, however many sculptures group together to form extremely large figures. Obviously these cannot be rejoined, nor even stored together due to a shortage of warehouse space. Finally, many pieces are extremely fragile and are not suited for constant handling. Fortunately, computer technology surmounts many of these obstacles and the 2001 field season has demonstrated the utility of new methods that address these challenges."
From The Temple 22 Façade Reconstruction Project, Copán, Honduras, FAMSI, 2001, p. 9
From the Maudslay Collection, British Museum. Used with permission under the CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 non-commercial license. ©he Trustees of the British Museum.
Maudslay misidentified these figures as singing girls, and found three in his excavation along the west wall of the building. However, he correctly assumed that identical figures were once attached to the upper parts of the outer walls and surrounded the temple. Archaeologists later identified a total of twenty of these figures, carved fully in the round and seated in cross-legged postions around the frieze of the temple.
This piece is now housed in the British Museum, and is one of four pieces that Maudslay chose to remove at the close of his work in Copan. Ian Graham, the Harvard archaeologist who wrote Maudslay's biography (and whose swash-buckling adventures documenting inscriptions for the Corpus of Maya Hieroglyphic Inscriptions are the stuff of legends), writes:
"Now it was time to consider the problem of ensuring the safety of the many small pieces of sculpture that had come to light in the clearing of rubble and in the course of excavations. THe document authorizing him to work at the ruins does not seem to have referred to this matter, since Maudslay raises it in a telegram he dispatched to the President, Luis Bográn. In a Spanish that was, perhaps, no better than could be expected, he announced the approaching termination of his work, and his intention of handing over, before he left, those pieces of sculpture into the care of the Alcalde. At the same time he hoped the President might permit him to remove certain pieces to place in the museum alongside his plaster casts. In conclusion he thanked the President for his favorable interest.
In reply came a telegram from the President, dated June 3rd [1885]. It reads (in translation) "I rejoice at the successful completion of your work. You can take away what you like. I shall have pleasure in helping you in your explorations for the benefit of science Bográn."
Ian Graham. Alfred Maudslay and the Maya: A Biography. University of Oklahoma Press, 2002, p. 140
From the Maudslay Collection, British Museum. Used with permission under the CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 non-commercial license. ©The Trustees of the British Museum.
The wooden lintel over the inner doorway had rotted away, collapsing the temple roof and the sculpture above the doorway. When he had this area cleared, Maudslay found the inner chamber "devoid of ornament. Two stone incense-burners shaped into grotesque heads and some patches of charcoal were found above the cement floor. The back wall of the house was only just traceable".
A.P. Maudslay. Biologia Centrali-Americana: Archaeology (Text), Volume V. Fascimile edition, Milpatron Publishing Corp, New York, 1974, p. 29
From the Maudslay Collection, British Museum. Used with permission under the CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 non-commercial license. ©The Trustees of the British Museum.
In addition to the two incensarios and bits of charcoal which he found in the undecorated inner temple, Maudslay also had evidence that the inner doorway was shrouded by a curtain or tapestry. He writes:
"About 4 feet above the floor in each of the two positions marked x a stone in the masonry of the wall is pierced by a hole through which a rope could be passed, and holes may also be noticed above the hieroglyphs of the step, which were probably needed for the support of curtains". One can only imagine the colorful effect of brocaded fabric complementing the painted sculptural figures surrounding the door.
A.P. Maudslay. Biologia Centrali-Americana: Archaeology (Text), Volume V. Fascimile edition, Milpatron Publishing Corp, New York, 1974, p. 28
From the Maudslay Collection, British Museum. Used with permission under the CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 non-commercial license. ©The Trustees of the British Museum.
Pál & Elizabeth Kelemen were pioneers in the field of Mesoamerican Art History. Visiting Copán in 1940, they wrote:
"A little farther on, our attention was attracted by a small structure standing at one end of a sunken court, the spectacular, so-called Structure 22. Amazingly, this building remained in fairly good condition until razed by an earthquake in 1934. Maudslay's careful notes and photographs from the 1880s were of great help when excavations were undertaken shortly afterward. It stood on its own e-shaped podium on top of the 20-foot terrace that framed the entire court.
The building was dated to the mid-eighth century, and had not been erected over an older structure. A flight of seven massive steps raised it above the level of the other buildings, their risers apparently carved with much-eroded glyphs..."
Pál & Elizabeth Kelemen, The Kelemen Journals: Incidents of Discovery of Art in the Americas, 1932–1964, p. 62-3
From the Maudslay Collection, British Museum. Used with permission under the CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 non-commercial license. ©The Trustees of the British Museum.
Pál & Elizabeth Kelemen continue:
"We entered into a narrow passage through the gaping jaws of a scaly monster with two curving stone tusks at the sides. Beyond was another carved portal, set back and shielded by the outside walls. The central chamber was raised about a foot and supported at the ends by two large skulls, each made of a single stone.
Above at either side were sculptures of large human figures. On their hunched backs, the figures supported the twisted mass of a fantastic, two-headed monster, whose writhing body formed the lintel, held in place by a thick wooden beam. In and out of the creature's convoluted body wove small, grotesque human figures, with elaborate headdresses and jewels, their arms and legs interwoven as if struggling with the elements. The high sill was also carved with skulls and glyphs, so that the entire entrance to the inner room was framed with sculptures.
It appeared that the carving was originally covered with a thin layer of plaster and brightly painted. It had been refurbished so often that some of the exquisite detail of feathers, incised decorations, tassels, and individual hands and feet were lost underneath the multiple coatings.
The work was Baroque in feeling, in its complication of design and ebullience of detail, in the dramatic dynamics of its whole concept, and in its untrammeled, monumental freedom. This profound document in stone voiced the supernatural, occult elements behind Maya religion. It was not one sculptor's interpretation of some religious tenet, but the articulation of a complete, collective imagination, expressed with such clarity that even a twentieth-century Christian could not help but be struck by the physical power and fantasy of this alien world."
Pál & Elizabeth Kelemen, The Kelemen Journals: Incidents of Discovery of Art in the Americas, 1932–1964, p. 62-3
The Planet Venus and Temple 22 at Copán is an excellent and clarifying paper on the complex astronomical and agricultural symbolism shown on the doorway. Click here for a diagram of the Venus signs which mark the right side of the cosmic monster.
The inner entrance to the temple has been reconstructed within the Copan Site Museum
"The frame of the doorway that led into this inner chamber was one of the most extraordinary architectural compositions ever conceived by the Classic Maya.
A Cosmic Monster, representing the arching body of the Milky Way in its east-west configuration, frames the door in such deep relief carving that it seems to be writhing out of the wall.
The front end of the monster takes the shape of a crocodilian head and is decorated with the symbols of Venus. Pointing west, the counterpart in the sky of this great crocodile parallels the ecliptic so that planets often travel along its belly following the path of the sun.
At the opposite end, the sun-marked plate of sacrifice that sits on the junction of the Milky Way and ecliptic rides the tail of the monster.
In the great lazy-S scrolls composing its arching, serpentlike body cavort the beings who have been conjured up by the bloodletting rituals inside the sanctum.
These particular scrolls are clouds. For the Maya, clouds of light in the night sky constitute one perception of the Milky Way.
Clouds as metaphors for the heavens still prevail among some modern Yukatek shamans. Clouds, rain-laden, celestial, or in the form of sweet incense smoke, harbor ch'ulel, the soul stuff of the living universe.
Here at Copan the beings conjured up in the clouds are spirits called way or nawal and the serpent-footed god, K'awil—all beings that the king called upon in the exercise of his power."
Freidel, Schele, Parker, Maya Cosmos: Three Thousand Years on the Shaman's Path, p. 151
Details of the Museum reconstruction and reassembly of the inner entrance
"The cloud-conjured body of the Cosmic Monster is held up by the elegantly modeled figures of two of the Pawahtunob, also called bakabob, the world bearers who hold up the four corners of the sky.
Here are the bearers of the east and the west, the path of the sun.
Below their feet rest skulls, referring to the place of death and to the gaping skeletal maw of the Vision Serpent that opens into the Otherworld.
The inscriptions along the tread between the skulls record the completion of 18-Rabbit's first k'atun of reign and also the dedication date of this temple.
The inner sanctum of Temple 22 thus recalls the original acts of establishing sacred space at the time of the Creation."
Freidel, Schele, Parker, Maya Cosmos: Three Thousand Years on the Shaman's Path, p. 152
Photo of the partially restored entrance to Temple 22 as it existed in 2004.
This project was conducted under the aegis of the Honduran Institute of Anthropology and History (IHAH) and the Copán Mosaics Project (CMP), co-directed by Barbara and William Fash of Harvard University. Additional funding provided by FAMSI and Columbia University. The project has now been completed, and a detailed report, The Temple 22 Façade Reconstruction Project, Copán, Honduras, is available as a PDF on the FAMSI website.