Mexico, Chicen Itza - UNESCO World Heritage Site

Chichen Itza was a large pre-Columbian city built by the Maya people of the terminal classic period. The archaeological site is located in Tinum Municipality, Yucatan State, Mexico. Chichen Itza was one of the largest Maya cities and it was likely to have been one of the mythical great cities, or toluns, referred to in later Mesoamerican literature. The city may have had the most diverse population in the Maya world, a factor that could have contributed to the variety of architectural styles at the site. The ruins of Chichen Itza are federal property and the site's stewardship is maintained by Mexico's Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, or the National Institute of Anthropology and History. The land under the monuments has been privately owned until the 29th of March 2010, when it was purchased by the state of Yucatan. There are two large natural sinkholes called cenotes that could have provided plentiful water year-round at Chichen, making it attractive for settlement. Of the two cenotes, the Cenote Sagrado, or Sacred Cenote, also variously known as the Sacred Well, is the most famous. The Temple of the Warriors complex consists of a large step pyramid, fronted and flanked by rows of carved columns depicting warriors. This complex is analogous to Temple B at the Toltec capital of Tula, and indicates some form of cultural contact between the two regions. The one at Chichen Itza, however, was constructed on a larger scale. At the top of the stairway on the pyramid summit, and leading towards the entrance of the pyramid summit, is a shack mule. The Temple of Kukulkan, a Maya feathered serpent deity similar to the Aztec Quetzalcoatl, usually referred to as El Castillo, or The Castle. This step pyramid stands about 30 meters high, and consists of a series of nine square terraces, each approximately 2.57 meters high, with a six meter high temple upon the summit. The sides of the pyramid are approximately 55.3 meters, or 181 feet, at the base, and rise at an angle of 53 degrees, although that varies slightly for each side. The four faces of the pyramid have protruding stairways that rise at an angle of 45 degrees. The tallowed walls of each terrace slant at an angle of between 72 and 74 degrees. At the base of the balustrades of the northeastern staircase are carved heads of a serpent. Mesoamerican cultures periodically superimpose larger structures over older ones, and El Castillo is one such example. In the mid 1930s, the Mexican government sponsored an excavation of El Castillo. After several false starts, they discovered a staircase under the north side of the pyramid. By digging from the top, they found another temple buried below the current one. Inside the temple chamber was a shack mule statue, and a throne in the shape of a jaguar. Painted red, and with spots made of inlaid jade. The Mexican government excavated a tunnel from the base of the north staircase, up the earlier pyramid stairway, to the hidden temple, and opened it to tourists. In 2006, INAH closed the throne room to the public. Las Monjas is one of the more notable structures at Chichen Itza. It is a complex of terminal classic buildings, constructed in the Puyuc architectural style. The Spanish named this complex Las Monjas, or the nuns, or the nunnery, but it was actually a governmental palace. The Tzompantli, or skull platform, shows the clear cultural influence of the central Mexican plateau. Unlike the Tzompantli of the highlands, however, the skulls were impaled vertically, rather than horizontally, as at Tenochtitlan. The sacred cenote, or sacred well, alternatively known as the well of sacrifice, according to post-conquest sources, Maya and Spanish, pre-Columbian Maya, sacrificed objects and human beings into the cenote as a form of worship to the Maya rain god, Shak. Edward Herbert Thompson dredged the cenote sagrado from 1904 to 1910, and recovered artifacts of gold, jade, pottery, and incense, as well as human remains. A study of human remains taken from the cenote sagrado found that they had wounds consistent with human sacrifice.