Jungle of Stone: The Extraordinary Journey of John L. Stephens and Frederick Catherwood, and the Discovery of the Lost Civilization of the Maya Paperback – Illustrated, April 11, 2017

This is a wonderful book, one that brings to life the tremendous efforts of two exceptional explorers/adventurers in the early 1800s. These men collaborated to find and document many of the major ruins left by the indigenous natives of southern Mexico and Central America.Says author William Carlsen: “Today the ancient Maya are recognized for having achieved one of the most sophisticated early civilizations on earth. Tourists by the millions, from every part of the globe, annually descend on Maya ruins in Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, and Belize.”But it was not always this way, and that is what this book is about: The story of the earliest explorations into the jungles of Mexico and Central America and the words and thoughts produced by these two explorers about what they found and what they surmised.In the Acknowledgements section of the book, Carlsen states his passion for his work: “I will hold in my heart always the extraordinary Maya people….May you forever keep your rich culture alive for the benefit of us all.”I’ve personally had the pleasure of traveling in Mexico and Central America. I’ve been to many of the places talked about in the book. But I really treasure the way “Jungle of Stone” puts the pieces together, capturing the historic details and bringing the people involved in the early explorations to life.The story starts in the early 1800s, in the Age of Discovery. This was a period when Europeans and Americans knew little about the Latin American before Columbus. The Spanish conquistadores were all about enriching themselves. They were not in the New World to learn about and/or preserve indigenous native culture. In fact, the Spanish shut off the New World south of the emerging United States for centuries.But there were rumors of ruins of ancient civilizations found by the Spanish. Popular culture speculated that the works had to be by Egyptians, the Lost Tribes of Israel or others. The general thinking was that no indigenous people in the Americas would be capable of creating sophisticated works of art.The book is all about the adventures of John Lloyd Stephens and his colleague Frederick Catherwood. Each had extensive travel experience, including in the Middle East, decades before Mark Twain would publish his book, “Innocents Abroad.” Catherwood was a professional architect by trade. Stephens was a lawyer who had made good money writing a book about his travels in Egypt, the Holy Land and Petra.They began their great adventures in Latin America in 1839. They teamed up for 13 years to explore Mayan ruins in Latin America, their first conquest being Copan in Honduras. They were stunned by what they found.They went were few white men had been before. They followed some of the same paths used earlier by Hernan Cortez. They continually faced dangers from bandits or hostile Indians. They traveled through areas of active wars. Mosquitoes, ticks, snakes, scorpions, rain, heat, mud and all kinds of other nuances and obstacles were encounter along the way. This was not an adventure for sissies.Britain was the great world power at the time. The U.S. was not yet a major world power. Stephens, as an American, dreamed of bringing Mayan treasures back to New York as the foundation of new prestigious museums that would put the U.S. on the world map. At the time, few in the world knew anything about the existence of the art and architecture of the Mayans.Cameras did not exist, so it was the detailed drawings by Catherwood that would be an essential element in a future publication of a book by Stephens. The book, Travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatan, published in 1841, was met with great success, eventually going through 12 printings and sold all over the world. Stephens’ important conclusion was that the Mayan work was original and without influence of “models or masters.”The two were off on the trail once again in 1841, this time to focus on the Yucatan Peninsula. Catherwood would be meticulous in the detail of his drawings. Bouts of malaria slowed them down, but they were prodigious in their work, the result of which was the 1843 work entitled, Incidents of Travel in Yucatan. Like Stephens earlier works, it was a great financial success.Stephens and Catherwood talked about exploring further south, where Machu Picchu would not be discovered by the West for another 67 years. But the steam engine and the railroad was all the rage at this time. Catherwood took a job working on a line in British Guyana. Stephens would work on the railroad across Panama, essentially until he worked himself to death in 1852.Further exploration of the Mayan ruins would wain, or the most part, until the early 1900s. But the foundational information documented by Stephens and Catherwood laid a foundation for all that was to come. And what a story it is, as beautifully written by Mr. Carlson in this very fine book, which I highly recommend.

I recently completed a two week bicycle trip with People Cycling on the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico. It's a trip the organizers evidently created after having read this book. We were encouraged to read the book to gain a better understanding of where we'd be cycling.This is a captivating book, full of adventures that will inspire you whether or not you end up visiting some of the fascinating Mayan ruins. Mr. Carlsen has done a great job of creating a page turner. I have immense admiration for the two explorers, Stephens and Catherwood, and a profound respect for the ancient Mayans who, for a time, lived in perhaps the most advanced civilization on the planet.

If you are interested in reading about the (European) discovery of the Mayan ruins in Guatemala, you could read the primary source, Stephens's own book. But I suggest you read this first, or instead, so that you don't get bogged down in that pompous/racist 19th-century-explorer writing style. It is really pretty exciting stuff. On top of the rest of it, Stephens and Catherwood were exploring in the middle of a revolution in Guatemala. (In fact, Stephens was on a diplomatic mission to a government that was collapsing.)The book also follows up on what happened to the explorers after their adventure. A lesson from the lives of exploreres in general seems to be that finishing a major ground-breaking expedition may lead to a degree of fame, but it doesn't always lead to health and prosperitiy.

I purchased this book in advance of a trip to the Riviera Maya in hopes of hearing an interesting story that also educated me about the Myon culture in antiquities. This book exceeded my expectations in every way.It is well written, bringing to life people and episodes from the past in a lively and entertaining fashion. It is full of interesting information about Stephens and Catherwood’s many travels.It has well referenced explanations of what we know now, and what we don’t know, about the culture of the Mayans who built these fascinating pyramids and structures so many years ago.It helped me immensely in my own meager travels to see a few of these sites, giving me the history, language and archeological framework to better appreciate what I saw. Highly recommend!

Excellent book. I have Stephen's original book, and this fill in a lot of gaps. Nicely illustrated too. Good adventure story with culture to boot.

This is a well-written story of pioneering exploration back in the 1840s--the travels of Stephens and Catherwood that rediscovered many important Maya cities, long abandoned to the jungle. What these men had to endure (heat and humidity chiefly, but the heavy rains, bugs of all types, and a lack of good maps, let alone decent trails, and sputtering civil wars and revolutions) to accomplish what they did is a classic and still amazing story of archeology. On their return to New York, author Stephens and illustrator Catherwood produced two best selling books about their adventures and discoveries. They've rarely been out of print since.Carlsen thus has good material on which to base this readable tale of what Stephens and Catherwood accomplished despite the conditions under which they had to work. He provides useful background on both men (chiefly travels in the Middle East which also led to best-selling books by Stephens), but focuses on the two trips the explorers made together and what they found. Even if you know the original books and the stories of both men, Carlsen's telling of their tale is well worth reading. If on the other hand this story is new to you, Carlsen's book is even better