Diego García de Palacio's relación of 1576 and the first description of Copán

The report an oidor of the Audiencia of Guatemala sent to Philip II on 8 March 1576, out of an inspection tour the crown had ordered for the redress of injustices done to the Indians. Inside it is the earliest known European description of the Maya ruins of Copán — the eagle-shaped stone, the stepped plaza its author compared to the Roman Colosseum, the sacrificial basins — by a man who says he could not find out what any of it was for.