Despite the abundant documentation these expeditions to Palenque produced
(now in many archives) no publications resulted from them and therefore
their impact must have been minimal, at least until 1822, when a translation
was published in London. Despite this, the interest in antiquities during the
eighteenth century resulted in several publications describing the ruins of
other ancient cities such as, among others, Teotihuaca ́n (1757), Xochicalco
(1777), and El Tajı ́n (1785) (Alcina Franch 1995: ch. 8; Cabello 1992b), as well
as in the inclusion of antiquities experts in the scientiWc expeditions to Peru
and Chile (1777–88) (Cabello 1989; 1991; 1992a). 10
The increasing interest in antiquities encouraged the creation of private
collections such as that formed by Jose ́Antonio de Alzate (Alcina Franch
1995: 113). TheWrst known public collection in America was that formed by
the Viceroy Antonio Bucarelli (r. 1766–70), on display at the Royal Uni-
versity of Mexico (ibid.24). Yet, the display of antiquities had implications
unknown in Europe, as scholars discovered at the end of the eighteenth
century. In 1790 two large stones were found in the main square of Mexico
City, signiWcantly located on top of the main ritual centre of the ancient Aztec
capital, Tenochtitla ́n. One of the stones was a statue representing the goddess
Coatlicue—the mother goddess in the Aztec pantheon—and the other a
circular calendar. Scholars decided to exhibit theWrst of them in the patio
of the university of Mexico City as if it were a classical statue. The reaction of
the indigenous population of humble means (i.e. those who had not received
European education and still kept many of the pre-contact traditions and
religious beliefs) was, however, very diVerent to that of European spectators
or to that of well-oVMexicans. The latter would have either ignored or
admired it. For the former, however, Coatlicue did not belong to an idealized
past but was an expression of their own religious beliefs. Consequently
worship started,Wrst overtly, then, after it was forbidden, in concealment.
As a bishop explained in 1805, the Indians had not been interested in the
statue because of love of their fatherland, but because of a clandestine
religious feeling. The decision was taken to rebury the statue, and this
situation continued until after Mexico’s independence in 1821. The statue
of Coatlicue was only brieXy unearthed during Alexander von Humboldt’s
visit to Mexico City in 1803 (Alcina Franch 1995: 120–4; Matos Moctezuma
1993: 30–3). Humboldt’s interest is extremely signiWcant in itself, as it
represented the turning point between the eighteenth-century interest in
pre-contact Latin American antiquities as the exclusive province of Latin
American and Spanish scholars, and a more widespread interest by Northern
Europeans and Americans in them thereafter.
10 As general background see http://www.expedicionmadidi.com/expediciones.php.56 Early Archaeology of Great Civilizations