parts in the textile and ceramic art of their respective localities. Yet, the distinction remains, that secondary embellishment, or what is often considered true architecture, is characteristic only of the Maya type.
Associated with the foregoing culture were no less worthy feats of highway and drainage construction, particularly by the two great military cultures, the Nahua and Inca. In Peru, roads were paved and graded and brooks spanned by stone culverts, many of which are still in use.[1] These were necessarily formed by huge stone slabs supported by piers. Chasms were bridged by true suspension bridges and in some cases crossed in chairs running on cables. Even a kind of pontoon bridge was in use. In Mexico, the country was less rugged, but the roads were excellent. In both regions the irrigation and aqueduct systems are famous. As all travel was by foot, and only in Peru were pack animals used, these road builders had a somewhat different problem than confronted the users of carts in the Old World.
As we proceed southward in Peru, architecture rapidly deteriorates, disappearing altogether at the River Maule. Thence toward the east in the neighborhood of the Calchaqui, we find rough stone structures of many rooms, not unlike one-story pueblos. Burial is now in urns without true mounds, but many small carved monoliths have come to notice. Once out into the guanaco area we find the simplest kind of skin tent, which in the far south becomes merely a windbreak (Fig. 72). Throughout the Amazon, on the north coast and southward as far as the Suyas, hammocks are in general use and the houses are frequently primitive. On the other hand, very large thatched structures are found, under which, as under one great shed, lives the whole community. So far, there seems to be no consistent distribution of varieties of this type, some are oval and well thatched, some square, and some mere roof shelters. In fact, the only thing essential is a hammock to keep one off the ground and a roof overhead. The whole population is rather nomadic. As we go eastward through the highlands of Venezuela, the court structures of Colombia disappear, but still the prevailing form is the rec-
- ↑ Markham, 1910. I.
