Photo album: "Mexico, Yucatán: Chichén Itzá (1)"

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On Monday March 26th, 1973, we go on an excursion to visit the archaeological site of Chichén Itzá. This site is situated at approximately 120 km east of Mérida. Chichen means "the mouth of the well", Itzá is the name of the tribe who lived in this place. The city was founded around 445 A.D. and became one of the most important Mayan centres around 600. After a long period of decay, between 645 and 905, it knew a new activity. Near 900 a Toltec king, who bear the name of the god Quetzalcóatl, arrived from the central Mexico with his army and, with the help of some local ally, made Chichén Itzá his capital. The city was definitely abandoned around 1204. You find in this site an interesting mixture of the Mayan and Toltec styles.

We are now on the Great Ball Court.

Two teams participated in this game whose goal was to throw a ball, made of latex, through one of the two rings attached to the side walls of the court. The players could use any part of their body to throw the ball, except their hands. It is thought that, at the end of a contest, whose purpose was sacred, the players of the defeated team were beheaded.

We find in this ballgame the influence of the Toltec who were tribes of warriors.  A bas relief carving, on the walls of the Ball Court, shows players decapitated, with streams of blood springing out of the wound.

In mixing with the Maya who were of pacific nature, the Toltec created a new warrior class. Bas relief carving, on the walls of the Ball Court.

The Temple of the Jaguars, situated at the entrance of the Great Ball Court, is a totally Toltec style building.

Entrance of the Temple of the Jaguars.

A mural painting, inside the Temple of the Jaguars, depicts a battle scene.

The Wall of the Skulls, this monument is another testimonial of the warrior temperament of the Toltec.

The sacred Cénote, is the well which gave its name at Chichén Itzá. It has a diameter of 65 metres, the level of the water is 20 meters bellow the ground level, and the depth of the water is 15 metres. Presence of water in those arid countries explains the sacred character given to these wells and why inhabited centres established nearby. To appease Chaac, the god of the rain, offerings were thrown into the Cénote. Sometimes those offerings were human sacrifices.

At the time of the Maya, the young virgins who were to be thrown into the Cénote were often volunteers because they thought they were to join the gods. After the arrival of the Toltec, human sacrifices increased because prisoners of war were used as offering. Archaeological diving made in the Cénote permitted to remove thousands of objects from the bottom of the Cénote, including human skeletons showing traces of wounds well compatible with the sacrifice hypothesis.

At the other end of the sacbé(*) which connects to the sacred Cénote, we perceive the Pyramid of Kukulkán, called El Castillo (the Castle) by the former Spanish. Kukulkán is the Mayan name of the Aztec god Quetzalcóatl (the plumed serpent). (*) sacbé means white road because its stone paving was, originally, coated with limestone stucco.

El Castillo is a step pyramid 24 metres high, plus 6 metres for the temple at its top. Its 55-metre sided square base is oriented according to the cardinal points. The total number of steps of its four stairways is 365 as the number of days in a year and the number of its platforms is 9 that is half the number of months (18) in a year of the Mayan calendar.

A tunnel, excavated in the years 1930, permits to get to a small temple at the top of another older pyramid, over which the Pyramid of Kukulkán has been built.  We can see, on the photo, the entrance of this tunnel under the base of the northern stairway.

Inside this hidden temple there is a statue typical of the Mesoamerican pre-Columbian culture called Chac Mool, that can be seen on the photo, and a jaguar shaped throne.

Stepping down the tunnel, from the hidden temple.

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