ld be ah-men,
meaning he who is a master builder, etc.; while men-ah or men-yah
signifies work or production of manual labor. The first part of the
Nahuatl word aman-teca, signifying artisan, artificer, seems to be a
corrupt rendering of the Maya ah-men. That Men-che, which is also known as
Lorillard City, was a centre of the highest development of
native-sculpture and art seems proven by the truly admirable and
exquisitely fine workmanship of the bas-reliefs obtained there by Mr.
Maudslay, and now exhibited at the British Museum. In execution and finish
they undoubtedly surpass any specimens of ancient American art I have ever
seen.

A search for the possible derivation of the word men leads to mehen, the
name for "sons or nephews in the male line," mehen-ob, the descendants,
mehen-tzilaan=genealogy and parentage (a word which sheds some light on
the meaning of the ancient capital Tzilan in Yucatan). Mehen is also
employed as meaning something little, small or minute.

From the above data it may be inferred that Men-che may have originally
signified "the tree or tribe of the sons or nephews in the male line," and
that these people may have so identified themselves with the arts of
building and working in precious metals and stone, etc., that their title
was used as a designation for these industries. It is certainly remarkable
that, situated at an easy distance on the same river Usumacinto, there is
the great ruined city of Palenque(66) (pronounced by the natives
Pa-lem-ke) which seems also to have originally terminated in che=tree or
tribe and to be derived from palil, pal or palal=vassal, servant, subject,
also small child. Let us see how far the monuments of Palenque justify and
support this translation of its name.

Referring the reader to Mr. Maudslay's Biologia, and to Mr. Holmes'
Archaeological Studies, Pt. II, and other well-known works on the ruins of
Palenque, I shall confine myself to a cursory examination of the four
principal isolated pyramid-temples, known, respectively, as the temples of
the Inscriptions, of the Sun, of the Cross and of the Cross No. 2.
Although the orientation of these edifices is not accurate they may be
roughly said to face the cardinal points as follows:--

The temple "of the Inscriptions" faces the north, that "of the Sun" the
east, whilst the temple "of the Cross" faces the south and that "of Cross
2," the west. Dr. Brinton has already shown that the well-known symbol on
the fa