Chichén Itzá
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| The Maya are probably the best-known of the classical civilizations
of Mesoamerica. Originating in the Yucatan around 2600 B.C., they rose to
prominence around A.D. 250 in present-day southern Mexico, Guatemala,
northern Belize and western Honduras. Building on the inherited inventions
and ideas of earlier civilizations such as the Olmec, the Maya developed
astronomy, calendrical systems and hieroglyphic writing. The Maya were
noted as well for elaborate and highly decorated ceremonial architecture,
including temple-pyramids, palaces and observatories, all built without
metal tools. They were also skilled farmers, clearing large sections of
tropical rain forest and, where groundwater was scarce, building sizable
underground reservoirs for the storage of rainwater. The Maya were equally
skilled as weavers and potters, and cleared routes through jungles and
swamps to foster extensive trade networks with distant
peoples.
Around 300 B.C., the Maya adopted a hierarchical system of government with rule by nobles and kings. This civilization developed into highly structured kingdoms during the Classic period, A.D. 200-900. Their society consisted of many independent states, each with a rural farming community and large urban sites built around ceremonial centers. It started to decline around A.D. 900 when - for reasons which are still largely a mystery - the southern Maya abandoned their cities. When the northern Maya were integrated into the Toltec society by A.D. 1200, the Maya dynasty finally came to a close, although some peripheral centers continued to thrive until the Spanish Conquest in the early sixteenth century. | ||
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BOOK Your Chichin Itza Tour HERE !! Includes transportation, lunch, park entry fees, local guide and more... Only 59.99 plus tax per person Wet Set Dive Travel.com 998-206-9204 The travel leaders in Pto. Morelos All photography © Cliff Wassmann |
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Deep within the jungles of Mexico and Guatemala
and extending into the limestone shelf of the Yucatan peninsula lie the
mysterious temples and pyramids of the Maya. While Europe was still in the
midst of the Dark Ages, these amazing people had mapped the heavens,
evolved the only true writing system native to the Americas and were
masters of mathematics. They invented the calendars we use today. Without
metal tools, beasts of burden or even the wheel they were able to
construct vast cities across a huge jungle landscape with an amazing
degree of architectural perfection and variety. Their legacy in stone,
which has survived in a spectacular fashion at places such as Palenque,
Tikal, Tulum, Chichén Itzá, Copan and Uxmal, lives on as do the seven
million descendants of the classic Maya
civilization
