|
At the heart of Chichen Itza, a stepped pyramid served as temple to the “feathered serpent” god Kukulcan. The solar alignments and architectural details give clues about the function of this temple. It served as a center for sacrifice and preaching.
The chronology of Chichen Itza is hazy. But it has been fairly well established that this religious center is Mayan and that it was heavily influenced by a Toltec transition at the end of a Mayan civilization. It follows design patterns found in earlier sites. The pyramid we see today was built in 800 A.D., over an existing pyramid that began construction as early as a thousand years previous. Additionally, the discovery of a large pond underneath the site provides understanding about its original purpose.
|
Values In Design
Sacred Water
| Water sources were of highest importance for Mayan buildings. They revered natural sinkholes that collect groundwater, known as cenotes,. The arrangement of the Chichen Itza site begins with its cenotes. A sacred pool to the north led to a central pool, where El Castillo now stands. Additional small pools can be found beyond to the south.
The cenote under El Castillo is around 114 ft long and 65 ft deep, and it flows north-south along the same circulation path of the general Chichen Itza site. A 16 ft think layer of limestone provided the foundation for the original pyramid over this cenote. |
 |
Diego de Landa said that the Northern cenote served as a location for sacrifice: “Into this pool they have had at that time, the custom to throw into it live men as a sacrifice to the gods in times of drought, and they hold that these men do not die although they are never more seen. They threw in also many things made of precious stones and other things which they prized.” The Chichen Itza entrance was marked by this enormous site for ritual sacrifice.
The cenote pools were created as part of the comet event that wiped out the dinosaurs millions of years ago. Chichen Izta sits at the edge of the Chicxulub crater, which is believed to be the site where the comet hit the earth and caused mass extinction. This adds an interesting dimension to the Mayan belief that these pools held some connection to the afterlife.
Transition Between Nations
Mayan states were collapsing along the Yucatan peninsula around 800 A.D., between the classic to post-classic Mayan era. Shortly after the fall of Chichen Itza, the Tomecs moved in from quite a long distance away in central Mexico, and brought with them their traditional architecture and customs. They built up the site we see today. The Itza people moved in to the site hundreds of years later.
Besides this, evidence of other civilizations in South America are found at the site, such as gold artifacts used for sacrifice in the cenotes. So, this site was evidently quite busy transitioning between groups of people. It is unclear whether these were military conquests, religious pilgrimages, or people moving into a deserted city.
Later, the conquering Spanish used Chichen Itza as a center for their conquest. They placed a cannon on top of the large pyramid, which is where it gets its name El Castillo, the castle. The dramatic edifice in the midst of flat terrain made it ideal as a place for lookout, and its central location on the peninsula made it of strategic importance for the Spanish.
Unite City Composition
Chichen Itza uses the same strategy of arrangement as Palenque to the south. It is difficult to tell which site arrangement came first; probably Palenque. The circulation and axial relationships are almost exactly the same.
While the ritual Palace is the center of Palenque, the El Castillo pyramid is the center of Chichen Itza. It looms before the visitor as it is approached from the Northern cenote. Groups of buildings were arranged in a pinwheel fashion around the temple pyramid. On top of this circular arrangement, a rectangular grid loosely provides a formal relationship.
Chichen Itza Site Circulation |
Chichen Itza Site Grid |
Palenque Site Circulation |
Palenque Site Grid |
Palenque’s Temple of Inscriptions and Chichen Itza’s El Castillo are tilted exactly the same amount, so that they align to the solstice. It is evident that Chichen Itza derived its design from Palenque, or vice versa.
Sacrifice & Preaching
The northern cenote appears to be a place where people from afar would go to sacrifice precious objects. Sometimes even human beings were thrown in, in hopes of good fortune and weather. The El Castillo pyramid likewise served a sacrificial purpose. But how were its sacrifices different?
| To the west of El Castillo stands a gigantic ball court. Ballcourts were often used as part of the human sacrifice ritual. Yet this ball court is impractically large, and the hoop is up too high to ever be actually useful. It is evident that this ballcourt held purely ritual purposes.
Nobody actually played competitive sports here, but rather people acted out the primordial scene of struggle between good and evil. The El Castillo pyramid likely had a similar ritualistic function. |
 |
The excellent acoustics from the top temple on the pyramid and the vast plaza space around the base suggest this was a place for preaching. The leaders atop the pyramid held the sacred priesthood of the serpent and preached to the people below.
The sacred serpent begins at this upper temple, carved into the two round pillars. The carving slithers down the balustrades to the base in a way that symbolizes sacred messages being delivered to the people. The temple is situated so that the corner of the pyramid casts a shadow on the solstice that moves throughout the day in a slithering motion. The balustrade at the base ends with enormous serpent heads.
The pyramid was also the site of formal sacrifice and prayer with incense. Inside the upper temple is a Chac-mool sacrificial altar. It is the statue figure of a man reclining on the ground, holding a plate on his belly, where incense is placed for prayer. He represented the rain god and acted as intermediary between this world and the gods of heaven. This Chac-mool is typically Tolmec.
What is interesting is the much older Chac-mool in a chamber inside the older inner pyramid. Rather than the figure of a man, it is a jaguar figure that is very reminiscent of Mesopotamian beds, the lion couch found in Egyptian scenes. Both the lion couch of Tutankhamen and the jaguar Chac-mool have painted black eyes. Both made use of mirrors. The lion couch used blue and black glass, while the Chac-mool used a tezcacuitlapilli “back mirror.” The Egyptian bed was covered with gold while the Chac-mool had jade discs and was painted red (because gold was unavailable in the area). It was a seat rather than a bed, which fits more with later Egyptian royal seats which took a lion form.
Crenelations
| Like other Mayan pyramids, the El Castillo has 9 levels which represent the 9 levels of the afterlife, and 365 stairs which represent the days of the year. The stairs climb at a perfect slant, 45 degree angle. The upward progression of the pyramid tiers evidently was carefully planned out.
One interesting strategy that visually confirms this upward progression is the crenelation, seen on the vertical slant of each tier. The crenelation is a sacred symbolic device used around the world to suggest an intermediary space between the earthly and the sacred. Rudolf Arnheim explains the crenelation, a solid space followed intermittently with an empty space, establish a rhythmic “semi-transparent screen.” It is an inbetween zone of “solid body of the building and the empty airspace surrounding it.” |
|
He presents the University of San Diego library as an example of how this is design device is used in conjunction with diagonally protruding walls. This dichotomy of positive and negative space engages the ground line in a way similar to a tree. The edifice seems to continue with the same pattern down into the ground for an unknown distance. The focal point at the top is a starting point for the design force, and the expansive force downward becomes an intricate latticework. This is more thoughtfully designed than the typical Egyptian pyramid. It is a more gradated engagement of space and interaction with the unseen world.
Twin Pillars
Further evidence of the dichotomy between negative and positive space can be seen above the frieze of the upper temple. Vertical stone shafts form intermittent screens, the kind we would expect to see in Hindu architecture. These blind screens are surrounded by relief carvings of animals and fruit.
Out of this frieze slithers a curious pare of serpents. They puncture the deep opening to the temple and proceed downward as circular pillars, and then turn toward the entrance with grand toothy serpent heads. These two circular pillars are seen at various Mayan temples, such as at Tulum. The Mayans seemed to divide the apertures to their pyramid temples into 3 negative spaces by using twin circular columns.
It is also interesting to note that the walls of the upper temple continue the slant of the pyramid and then transitions to a vertical wall.
Timeline
|
800 B.C. 600 A.D. 800 A.D. 1000 A.D. 1250 A.D. 1283 A.D. 1527 A.D. |
Early construction at Chichen Itza Peak of Chichen Itza under Mayans Outer Kukulkan pyramid construction started Toltecs take control of Chichen Itza Toltecs abandon Chichen Itza Itza of Mayapan take control of Chichen Itza Spanish conquer Yucatan Peninsula |
Solar Alignments
The El Castillo pyramid is turned so that the summer solstice sunrise aligns the corner of the pyramid with the winter solstice sunset. The creates an interesting natural phenomenon that physically illustrates the sacred serpent god. On the equinox days, the corner of the pyramid casts a zig-zag shadow onto the balustrade of the stairs. This shadow moves upward to the upper temple, or downward to the ground. This suggests the sky-serpent’s movement to the sky, or down to the cenote passageway.
The 9 terraces that cast this shadow represent the 9 levels of the afterlife, which a person must traverse to achieve exaltation. It is thus significant that this illustrated serpent have 9 twists in its slithering form.
Inside the upper temple are 18 panels for the 18 months of the t’zolkin calendar year. The 52 panels around the platform represent the 52 days in the calander round.
Similar Buildings
Palenque – The similarities of Mayan sites such as Palenque with Chichen Itza suggest a purposeful design pattern. The site is arranged in a similar pinwheel arrangement around El Castillo, with a loose rectangular grid of axis alignments.
The pyramids at the sites have similar religious functions and celestial symbolism, though Palenque seems much more focused on validating kingship while El Castillo is more about prayer and sacrifice. The twin circular pillars at the upper temple’s entrance can be seen in other Mayan sites and seems to have some kind of symbolic importance.
Stonehenge – Though they are on different sides of the globe, Stonehenge and El Castillo have some interesting similarities, due to their design focus on human scale. The upper temple measures 12.5 ft to the fascia, the same height as Stonehenge’s outer circle of vertical stones. The avenue that leads from Stonehenge to the nearby river is the same width as the stairs on each side of El Castillo.
An overlap of Stonehenge and El Castillo shows that the inner horseshoe circle is roughly the same width as the upper temple. The outer blue stones are roughly the same width as the upper platform, and the Sarson circle is roughly the same width as the next tier down. The Aubrey circle roughly fits around the entire pyramid.
This is evidence that Stonehenge and El Castillo, and hundreds of other prominent ancient sites, derived from the same human proportions.
