Chichen Itza: Mexico's Mayan Wonder

just before we get started with the video today i do want to say that it's actually brought to you by another channel that i do called geographics each video on geographics covers some of the most interesting places in the world from history and the present day we cover lots of fascinating international locations like north korea's hotel of doom or joseph stalin's island of cannibals and if you're interested in latin america specifically which you might be given the subject of today's video we've got quite a few profiles from central and south america including tennessee the atacama desert machu picchu and more videos run about 20 minutes and take a real deep dive into the locations we cover so please do check it out if you haven't before i'm going to include a link below rarely do entire cities fall under the mega project's banner but the remains of this large-scale community which once dominated this part of mexico is really something truly special and it has gained one of the seven places on the new ones of the world list the name chichen itza is now known around the world his iconic pyramid might still lag behind its egyptian cousin in terms of fame but it isn't that far behind yet this is an area that was much more significant than any single structure though dates are notoriously vague when it comes to chichen itza and indeed with many man and incan ruins it's generally considered that the early sections are from around 400 to 500 a.d with a population peak that may have hit around 50 000 inhabitants now that might sound fairly minute compared to modern cities indeed but when you compare other major population centers on earth at around the same time this was actually really quite significant but it remains an area that shrouded in mystery we still know painfully little about these people or how they structured their society and perhaps most intriguingly we had to understand why or how this large city declined so quickly [Music] the name chichen itza roughly translates from the mayan language as at the mouth of the well of the itza chi means mouth or edge while chen means well the word it's is a little bit more complicated it's sought to represent an ethnic lineage group that rose to power in the area but can itself be translated as enchantment of the water the city of chichen itza lies on the eastern side of the yucatan peninsula in mexico almost halfway between cancun and marina the area is thick with forest and jungle but it comes with an interesting quirk in that because it is a cast region usually an area heavy with caves tunnels and sinkholes almost all of the rivers that run through it but in fact underground and this is probably a good place to start and talk about why the city was built exactly where it was the area around chichen itza contains four cenotes which are natural sinkholes that normally reveal groundwater inside most likely these would have provided the drinking water for the city but they were also used for some far more shall we say indiana jones and the temple of doom style activities but more on that a little bit later [Music] what we see today at chichen itza is sadly only a fraction of what was once there the famed pyramid now referred to as el castillo understandably dominates the attention but in its day this was a city that covered at least five square kilometers that's 1.9 square miles while it may not give the impression of the city today it was once a thriving urban area with nearly a hundred small pathways linking sites throughout this little metropolis just like our modern cities it was divided into smaller districts which were as far as we know the great northern platform the osario group and the chichen bio the old chichen to the south these districts were broadly divided by low walls and often reveal different architecture and styles which might show how the city grew over time before we move on to talk about the history though there are a couple of interesting facts about the area first of all standing amid chichen itza you might remark to yourself i mean what a wonderfully flat area to build a city well that's actually not natural i mean yes it wasn't particularly mountainous but nevertheless the almost precise flatness of the area was man-made considering the size of the area and the limited tools that would have been available at the time this probably took a very very long time the other interesting point that i do urge you to bear in mind when thinking about chichen itza was that the mayan had a love of bright colors today we see nothing but old weathered stone but had you been in the same spot over a thousand years ago you would have witnessed an explosion of color with red green blue and purple colours commonly used on all manner of buildings this is said to offer a greater sense of completeness while adding to the symbolic nature of the building chichen itza appears to have risen towards the end of the early classic period 600 a.d but may not have reached its peak until the early part of the terminal period 880. why this particular site did well is unknown but there is speculation that the rise of chichen itza may have coincided with the decline of other major populated areas in the region particularly in the southern marlowlands the cities of exana and cobra both located nearby suffered a dramatic decline around that time leading some to speculate the chichen itza or rather those living in it contributed directly to their downfall chichenitza agreed quickly and began to dominate the mayan area it became a key center for trade heavily influenced local politics as well as religion and ideology but this is where things get a little hazy most modern archaeologists agreed that chichen itza had entered a terminal decline before 1100 a.d and may have even been sacked by an invading army frustratingly we know next to nothing about why this great city was ultimately abandoned when the spanish arrived in 1527 they found a local population but it's important to state that it's not clear whether the spanish found the local mayan living in chichen itza or whether they were nearby the first attempt to divide up the land was met with no resistance although the local people soon fought back and drove the spaniards from the yucatan but it was of course just short-lived the spanish returned and by 1588 the area had been brought to heal and it was now a cattle ranch by the mid 19th century much of the site had been swallowed up by the surrounding forest but its fame rose once again with the publication of incidents of travel in yucatan by john lloyd stevens in 1843. remarkably in 1894 united states consul to yucatan edward herbert thompson purchased the whole site and conducted the most detailed examination of chichen itza so far while shipping many of the artifacts up to the united states in 1926 the mexican government seized the site while accusing thompson of theft the case eventually ended up at the mexican supreme court and in 1944 it ordered that chichen itza be returned to thompson says who subsequently sold it onto tourism pioneer fernando barbano pion the great north platform dominates the site and is home to the two most resting structures in chichen itza el castillo and the great ball court but also various platforms possibly used for sacrificial purposes as well as temples and even a steam bath but let's start with the main attraction here el castillo or to take its original name the temple of kukul khan has now become one of the most recognizable sights on the planet the step pyramid stands at 30 meters 98 feet in height and is composed of nine square terraces gradually diminishing in size placed on top of each other each measuring 2.57 meters high at the summit of the pyramid lies a small temple six meters high like the great pyramid of giza there is much to stare in ore at here considering the relatively limited technology in use at the time the structure is both remarkably well built and well proportioned while giving us a glimpse into the fascinating world of the mire and their celestial beliefs each site has a set of stairs with 91 separate steps and when we combine all four sides and the steps at the top into the temple we come to a grand total of exactly 365 steps and it gets stranger around the spring and autumn equinoxes el castillo throws up a truly remarkable sight on the northwestern corner as the sun begins to go down a series of triangular shadows appear that bear more than a striking resemblance to a snake as the sun continues to set the shadows make their way down the pyramid giving the impression of the snake slithering its way down many have debated whether it's on purpose but if it was accidental it is a remarkable coincidence others point out that the maya were remarkably accurate with their calendars except for the time they predicted the end of the world not really just a joke and that the stakes could have been used as markers for crop planting and harvesting each year the mystery around el castillo deepened when it was found that the pyramid had been built over a smaller pyramid still located inside what's more an electrical resistance survey carried out in 2015 revealed that el castillo sits over a cenote meaning a potentially deep cabin is located directly below which the maya may have attributed to the afterlife while temples often give us an impression of the grandiose nature of what life must have been like back then there is another area that feels more down to earth the great ball court archaeologists believe there were as many as 13 different courts in chichen itza dedicated to the ancient miso american ball game that must have been a huge favorite sadly we know almost nothing about the rules but the general consensus is that it must have been something similar to racquetball measuring 68 by 17 meters roughly the size of american football field the great ball court is located close to our castillo the court has two large stone platforms running parallel to each other both measuring 95 meters long and eight meters high at the foot of these walls there are what seems to be benches with sculptures depicting different teams one member of a team appears to have been decapitated and now has snakes crawling out of his bloody neck which certainly never happens in racquetball and has led some to argue that the losers of the game may have been put to death which put sporting pressure in an entirely different category south of the great northern platform is the smaller stereo group which has numerous important buildings the ontario temple a smaller step pyramid may lack the height of its neighbor el castillo but it is a remarkably well preserved structure the casa colorada is one of the best preserved structures at chichen itza and it stands on a large platform with a set of steps running up the front it is not known what exactly it was used for but inscriptions inside correspond to roughly 869 a.d last mornings that nunnery stands close by and has long been considered a residential building of some kind though whether it housed a ruler or priest we aren't sure inside it contains more rooms than any other building in chichen itza but it is clear that it's a structure that's been rebuilt or added too many times over altching lies further south and includes the initial series group the phallic temple the platform of the great turtle the temple of owls and the temple of the monkeys four kilometers southeast of the main settlement are the caves of balanche these sacred cabins are thought to be the oldest part of chichen itza where finds including pottery stairs and even idols date back over two thousand years [Music] as i mentioned earlier in this video the chichen itza site has four major cenotes sinkholes in the immediate vicinity and almost certainly some that we don't know about the most significant is thought to be the sacred sinnotti which lies north of the main city but is connected to it via a 300-meter raised pathway samsonites were no doubt used for drinking water while others carried a much more grisly purpose when the sacred cenote was dredged in the early 20th century they found gold jade pottery incense and plenty of human remains it's now thought that the sacred cenote may have been used for sacrificial purposes or at the very least for the disposal of bodies after the fact unfortunately this is again one area that we're painfully lacking in detail information large numbers of skeletons have been found in several cenotes although not all which might suggest that the mayan believed that certain cenotes were gateways to the underworld the age and sex of the skeletons varies greatly but it's noticeable how many young men are present whether these people were still alive when they were thrown into the cenotes is impossible to say but some archaeologists argue that they would have more likely been killed somewhere else and then brought to the water the artifacts found seem to suggest a great degree of wealth as many of the materials are not native to the yucatan area what's more many of the items appear to have been slightly damaged as if they too needed to be killed for lack of a better word the great chichen itza rose and fell in the space of less than 700 years but it's clear that at its peak there were few places on earth quite like it it is an area that has retained almost all of its mysteries and really we're still a world away from understanding what life was like here no doubt once a glorious sight to behold chichen itza is also a reminder that nothing lasts forever and that empires and their mighty cities rise and fall with surprising regularity so i really hope you found that video interesting if you did smash that like button below don't forget to subscribe also if you've got a suggestion for future mega projects please do leave it below and thank you for watching [Music]

Channel: Megaprojects

Views: 155,792

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Id: mWxFdfJRvKE

Length: 13min 32sec (812 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 08 2021