The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1903-08-26
RUINS OF A BURNED CITY.
Remarkable Discoveries Made in the
State Of CoahuiIa Mexico.

State or COahClIa Mexico.
Dr. Nicolas Leon, the archaeologiSt
and ethnologist Of the National
Museum of Mexico, has returned to
the City OF Mexico after stay Of two
weeks in the State of CoaGuila, where
be made a number Of important in
Eestigations, CT the remarkable finds
Of the remains >f cities and animals
of antediluy1an times. In giving an
account of<the trip for the first time
the doctor SAID:
'sThe discoveries that have been
made at Pardoe, in Coahuila, are the
most extraordinary Of their kind that
have been made in Mexico and very
possibly anywhere in the world. The
excavations that have been made so
far show that large city was burned
not far from the present town OF Par
adon by an immense amount OF earth,
. which was evidently washed down
from the mountains by food. How
long ago the catastrophe occurred
cannot as yet be determined.
Portions Of buildings so far un-
earthed show that the city-at least
the largest Of the cities that was COW
cred by the debris Of the flood, there
being at least three cities destroyed
was very extensive. The indications
are that there were many massive
structures in the fallen city and that
. they were Of class Of architecture
5 not to be found elsewhere in Mexico.
According to the estimates of the
scientists under whose directions the
excavations are now being made the
city in question had population Of
at least $4,000.
1.-THE destruction which was
wrought by the flood was complete.
All the inhabitants of the cities were
killed, as well as all the animals.
Skeletons of the human inhabitants OF
the cities and OF the animals are
strewn all through the debris, from
q depth Of three feet from the surface
to a deptL Of sixty feet, showing that
all the debris was deposited almost at
once. Measurement show that the
debris is on an average sixty feet deep
where the largest Of the cities stood.
'sMost remarkable Of the minor
finds that have been made at Paradon
is that of the remains Of elephants.
Never before in the history Of Mexico
has it been aScertained positively that
elephant were ever in the service OF
the ancient inhabitants. The remain
OF the elephants that have been found
at Paradon show plainly that the IN
habitants of the buried cities made
elephants work for them. Elephants
were as much in evidence. IN the
streets of the cities as horses. Upon
many Of the tuSks that have been
found were rings Of silver. Most OF
the susks encountered so far have an
average length, for grown elephants,
Of three feet and an average diameter
at the roots Of six inches. Judging
from the remains Of the elephant SO
far unearthed the animals were about
ten feet high, from sixteen to eigh-
teen feet in length, differing very lit
tie from those at present in existence.
''The food which destroyed the
ancient cities did not have any con-
nection whatever with the deluge, as
far as what can be learned by ScientI-
fc Investigation is concerned. Ihe
Coahuila food was confined entirely to
the district il which the cities that
were destroyed stood. The flood re-
suited from an immense cloudburst,
perhaps the most extraordinary that
the world has ever known, from the.
bursting Of some great natural re
seryoir in the mountains or from some
cause as yet inexplicable. The sugges-
tion which has been made by some in-
vestigation that the cities were de-
stroyed by landslides does not hold
good, according to the Government
biologists at work on the subject.