Copan (city)
Copan is an ancient Mayan city located in the Copan River valley of western Honduras, near the Guatemalan border, recognized as one of the most significant urban centers of the Classic period (approximately 120-800 CE). Covering 75 acres and once home to around 20,000 inhabitants, it was founded on December 18, 159 CE, and has been continuously inhabited since around 1100 BCE by various cultures. The city's layout is characterized by the Acropolis, an artificial hill featuring temples, ball courts, and other structures aligned along a north-south axis, typical of Mayan architecture.
Notably, Copan's artisans utilized trachyte, a type of volcanic tuff, allowing for unique three-dimensional sculptures, as seen in the elaborate stelae scattered throughout the site. The Temple of the Hieroglyphic Stairs, one of its most famous structures, includes the longest known pre-Columbian text, documenting the city's rulers and significant events in hieroglyphic writing. Despite its grandeur, Copan faced decline in the early ninth century, attributed to overpopulation, agricultural practices, and environmental degradation, leading to its abandonment. Rediscovered by Spanish explorers in the 16th century, significant reconstruction efforts in the 20th century have helped preserve its historical legacy.
Subject Terms
Copan (city)
Category: Archaeological site
Date: 160-822
Location: Western Honduras
Culture affected: Maya
Copan was the second largest Mayan city of the Classic period (c. 120-800 c.e.). Located in Western Honduras in the Copan River valley, near the Guatemalan border, Copan was on the southeastern margin of the Mayan world. The city covered 75 acres (30 hectares) and housed twenty thousand people at its height. The area in which Copan is found has been continuously inhabited since around 1100 b.c.e., originally by foraging cultures and after 900 b.c.e. by farming cultures. Dates contained on monuments at the site fix the founding of the city as December 18, 159 c.e. The city was dominated by what is called the Acropolis, an artificial hill on which several temples, ball courts, and other structures were laid out on a north-south axis, a typical plan for Mayan cities. Most of the major structures seen today were built either in the reign of the king known as Smoke-Imix-God K (628-695 c.e.) or his successor, Eighteen-Rabbit (695-738); Mayan kings were typically named for the day on the Mayan calendar on which they were born.
The art and architecture of Copan are unusual among Mayan cities. While most Mayan stonework was done in limestone, which allows for flat, sunken relief sculpture, artists at Copan worked with a volcanic tuff called trachyte, a greenish, fine-grained stone which is relatively soft when first quarried but which hardens on exposure to air. This allowed for three-dimensional sculptures, especially evident in the many stelae, or tree stones, found at the site. Copan is also notable for the Temple of the Hieroglyphic Stairs, built by the king Smoke-Shell, who reigned from 749 to approximately 760. This temple contains sixty-three steps covered with more than two thousand hieroglyphic symbols; it is the longest pre-Columbian text known in the New World. This Mayan hieroglyphic writing records the accessions and deaths of Copan’s rulers. The most accurate solar calendar produced by the Mayas is also found at Copan, dating from about 700.
Copan was abandoned in the early ninth century. Several factors are thought to have contributed to the demise of the city, including overpopulation, the appropriation of the richest cropland for building sites, and the deforestation of the hillsides surrounding the city, with the accompanying effects of erosion. There is also evidence of increased rivalry and tension between the king and the lesser nobility toward the end of the city’s history. The land surrounding Copan was so ravaged by overfarming and deforestation that only in the twentieth century has the area been extensively resettled.
Copan was discovered by Spanish explorers in the early sixteenth century; the Spaniard Diego Garcia de Palacios wrote about Copan in 1576. The site was reconstructed between 1936 and 1950 by a group jointly sponsored by the government of Honduras and the Carnegie Institute of Washington, D.C.