Macobá
Macobá is a site of the Mayan culture on the eastern edge of the area occupied by the Chenes-style sites , around 26 kilometers east of the small town of Iturbide in the Mexican state of Campeche near the border with Yucatán . The site is difficult to access, currently (2012) has not been restored and is not open to tourism. It is significant due to its mixed style, which contains elements of the Rio Bec style in addition to Chenes elements .
Research history
The first, brief description of the place comes from John Lloyd Stephens in 1841. The next professional visitor was not until the mid-1980s Edward Kurjack, then head of the Atlas Arqueológico of Yucatán. A small expedition led by George Andrews led to the first and so far only major publication on Macobá.
buildings
A map of the site does not yet exist. The known buildings form a fairly close group. Andrews emphasizes that Macoba is unusual in that the buildings each have a distinctly individual design in floor plan and decor, but they show a clear relationship to the Río Bec area far to the south through the recessed fields with cross motifs Xtampak can also be found in Santa Rosa , where the brick rectangular pillars also appear.
Building I.
The building is small, it consists of a series of two rooms separated by a block of wall. They lean against a platform of unknown dimensions, to which a staircase leads. The facade of the building shows a combination of elements of different styles: The division into slightly protruding and receding parts is a typical characteristic of the Chenes style, where it is more used to visually separate components. On the two outermost, protruding parts of the facade there are recessed fields that show a cross-shaped pattern of depressions. This is unknown in the Chenes style and is one of the characteristics of the Rio Bec style, but there preferably in a continuous checkerboard pattern. In Macoba, above and below the fields, there is a row of pointed squares.
Buildings II and III
These buildings stand on a platform to which a wide staircase leads. Possibly the platform had a room on either side of the stairs, which in both cases collapsed completely. The central building on the platform has two rows of three rooms each, one of which is open to the front and the other to the rear. The front of the middle room has completely collapsed. The two side rooms have a wide entrance, which is divided by three pillars and thus has three passages. The pillars are made of well-crafted bricks and have a rectangular cross-section. On the front, like the brick door posts on the side, they have a slightly recessed rectangular field. The pillars carry a monolithic capital at the top, which has the profile of a three-part facade band. Such pillars and capitals are rare in both the Puuc and Río Bec areas. Apparently at a later point in time, the side passages were walled up with stones that were probably used for secondary purposes. At right angles to this is Building III, a small building with two mirrored rooms that has largely collapsed.
Building IV
The building has the typical layout of Chenes-style buildings: three rooms in a row and another behind the middle room. A small setback seems to have existed between the facade parts of the three rooms, also a typical sign of Chenes architecture, as can be seen particularly prominently in Xkichmook . The upper facade of the building was - as far as the surviving remains can be seen in the inner corners of the side rooms - the monumental mask of a huge reptile, as is common in the Chenes and Río Bec styles.
Building V
This building was discovered at a later date. Little is known of this building; what is remarkable is a recessed field with the same decoration as it appears in Building II.
Individual evidence
- ^ George F. Andrews, Ursula Dyckerhoff , and Hanns J. Prem : Macobá, Campeche, Mexico: a preliminary report. In: Mexicon 9, 1989, pp. 85-90.
- ^ Karl Herbert Mayer: An unpublished Maya structure at Macoba, Campeche , in: Mexicon 26, 2004, pp. 3–6.
See also
Coordinates: 19 ° 33'53 " N , 89 ° 21'13" W.