Monday, September 4, 2017

Chichen Itza Mayan ruins


El Castillo, the main pyramid in Chichen Itza:
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The total number of steps on all four sides is 365 - number of days in the year!
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The main staircase has been carefully restored:
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And here is the unrestored back staircase:
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An example of the vaulting prowess mastered by the Mayans. The vaults weren't true semicircles, but it still required a lot of ingenuity to design them.
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I love how these columns are put together with smaller pebbles. Back then, this was purely functional. Today, you would pay dearly for this as a decorative effect!
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I can just imagine ancient Mayans standing there in the heat and carving out these skull reliefs, one by one...
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This is one side of a ball court. The sides are as high as a 3-story building. The entire ball court is large enough to fit a Boing 747 with ample room to spare.
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And a few more pictures from around Yucatan:
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