The picture is of Temple I, "Temple of the Great Jaguar", which was used by Mayan nobility and priest for ceremonies and rites. The temple(s) were originally adorned with vibrant colors, painted reliefs and religious iconagraphy. The temple rose above the forest floor in the main sector of the city so that the general population could observe the rites and ceremonies of thier time.
The ancient city of Tikal was developed during the Mayan Classical period which began around 200 A.D. and subsisted to around 900 A.D. Nestled in the dense jungles of what is now Guatemala, Tikal is the largest Mayan ruin city to date. Tikal was one of the cultural, ceremonial and administrative centers of Mayan civilization and bore the highest known pyramid structures
of it's time. During it's hieght, Tikal held at least 10,000 residents over a six square mile area. It is estimated that about 3000 different structures including temples, palaces, platforms, shrines, ball courts, plazas, water cisterns were contructed in this six mile radius. The main ceremonial area held held about 200 stone stelae (stone carvings engraved with hieroglyphs that record significant stories and dates) monuments commemorating past rulers and events.
1 comment:
It is amazing when you think about the hard work it must have taken to build these amazing structures. One way we could use this as teachers, I think, would be not just to show how advanced these civilizations were, but also how much cooperation and community work it must have taken to build these. An interesting fact I have been reading about is that most of the time we assume that these civilizations used forced labor or slaves to build these pyramids. However, do we really know how they were built? If we look more into it I think we can see them as examples of a community working in cooperation and also using what we would call advanced mathematical/engineering principles. I would like to learn more about how the Mayans lived and worked to achieve all this.
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