Notes from Honduras 3

The big to-do about Copan is the sculpture. Take this stele, for example:

Elaborate. Flamboyant. The carving is very deep, and in some places nearly fully round. The height of this style was during the reign of 18 Rabbit from 695-738 AD. Art was very important to 18 Rabbit, and the best artists in the Mayan realm were drawn to Copan.

What is on the other side of the stele? Super cool Mayan writing, of course!

Here is a closer look. (Notice the remnants of red paint. Everything would have been plastered and painted in bright colors.)

Those are not simply pictographs. It is an entire writing system. Some of the glyphs represent words, and some of them represent syllables. Others represent place names and gods. To complicate matters, different symbols can be used to represent the same syllable. I think it's fascinating. You can learn more here. And doesn't it LOOK cool? I love the way different languages LOOK.

Another stele:

Here is another view of the same stele:

Isn't that writing awesome?

A close-up:

More writing, this would have been on the outside of a temple:

Here is writing incorporating the Mayan number system:

Enough with the Mayan writing (for now anyway). Here are sculptures of men performing a very sacred ceremony. (The key is that little loin cloth.)

You'll have to ask Greg for details of the ceremony. (He courageously suffered through this book.) It's interesting, but not for the faint of heart. "It" being the book, the ceremony, and just hearing about the ceremony.

The last picture from the museum that I will share is this guy:

What a warrior! (I love his shield!) Oh, and check out that fashion forward footwear.

After the museum, we stepped into a cafe for baleadas and Fanta. (Why does Fanta taste better in other countries? Can anyone explain this to me?)

Then we drove up the road to the village of Copan Ruinas, our destination for the night.

Can you spot the stray dog in the picture? Actually, there were far fewer stray dogs than I had expected. (Perhaps the jaguars pick them off?)

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Here is the number one most surprising thing about Honduras. They have a helmet law! That people obey!! Holy cow, there isn't even a helmet law in Ohio! (Or here, but that would be expected.) Like many other places in the world, you'll still see an entire family on a motorcycle--but they're all wearing helmets! Isn't that great?! This truly endured Honduras to my heart. (Yes, I know I'm a weirdo: "Sure, Honduras, I liked your food and your jungle and your ruins, but what I really loved is your helmet law!")