Ek Balam and Chitzen Itza

We booked a tour with a group called Alma's LDS tours, and they were fantastic. I was worried this would be kind of a contrived spiritual experience but it was exactly what I was hoping for. They just shared knowledge of what archaeologists and natives know about these ruins and cultures and you can see the parallels for yourself. It was obvious that the true beliefs have been fractured over time but you can see where the truth in it is.

First we visited Ek Balam. This is considered on of the most sacred Mayan cities. It dates to the preclassic Mayan period. Which is sometime before 300 AD. The city is called Ek Balam because of a king who lived here later on and made the temple his palace. Originally it was called some Mayan word that historians think meant Holy Mount. 

The Mayans had a strong belief of three levels of the world. They represented this as a green tree which is found in the area. The green, meaning life. The tree is actually green, and even today the natives will often stop to pray at these trees when they find them in the jungle. They represented their world and deities in the tree. The roots of the tree were the infraworld, the trunk the telestial, and the foliage the celestial. All mayan cities are built in such a way where these three areas are represented. The inner most area is where the temple is, and it is surrounded by a wall, representing the celestial, then an outer area where there was the telestial, and then a third area outside the walls of the city representing the infra world. Ek Balam is thought to be one of the most sacred cities because the inner area is surrounded by three walls, instead of only one which you see in other sites.

Annie outside the second wall of Ek Balam. The circular building behind her is the observatory. Mayans believed round/circular things were sacred, heavenly things, so you don't see round structures touching the ground. Behind her is one of the Sacred Green Trees.

The walls used to be much higher so you couldn't see what was going on inside this area. The road was paved with crushed limestone and sea shells so it appeared very white. The steps and ramps are difficult to go straight up or down, in fact it was their belief that to show respect and humility they would never show their face or back to sacred sites so they would zig zag up and down. Also, this is kind of a serpentine movement...more on that to come.

As time went on these areas often divided the classes of people with only high classses and noble men living in the inner area. In other cities from later times, only noble people were allowed to enter the celestial area. In fact, they lived within the celestial walls. Only on five sacred days were the common people allowed to enter. But in the preclassic period, at Ek Balam all people were allowed, and was based on more on personal worthiness. People were allowed to progress from each area based on there knowledge of certain hand signs. This was passed on from father to child.

This is the entrance to Ek Balam. This is a Mayan Arch. Unlike Roman arches there is no keystone so the structure will still stand if the top breaks. Some of the wood beams here are original! The sap hardens within them making them almost petrified. Amazing that they're still here.

When they passed through the mayan arch they were marked on their heads in such a way as to show they had shown the appropriate signs, were worthy, and able to enter. You can see a grinding stone on the other side of the arch, where they crushed the marking stuff. Archaeologists think they're marked in red.

Ek Balam Pok ta Pok court

At Ek Balaam they also have a pok ta pok court. An ancient Mayan game where the seven best warriors from one tribe would play against the seven best warriors from another. The Mayan people were very short, and you can see this in the natives today, they are only 3 1/2 to 5 feet tall. Those people who were of larger stature would become the warriors. There are hundreds of pok ta pok courts across the penninsula. They would play with a 6 pound ball made of rubber and resin. The would hit it with their ankles, hips, and upper arms and shoulders. Pok ta Pok is the sound the ball makes as it hits off the sides and middle area. The six players in the middle would try to get the ball to their biggest warrior on the platform and he would try to get it in the ring. Only one goal wins. The games would often go on for eight hours or so. The captain would have his face painted as a skull to represent one of his ancestors. The WINNING team would have the honor of being sacrificed. The captain would have his head cut off, and their bodies thrown into a cenote (underground river). His head would be covered in honey and placed in the middle of the court, and his flesh would be cleared out by ants. Then his skull would be buried, and a carving made of it as his honor to be remembered. He then would be taken to the celestial realm, and had the privilege of taking one of his ancestors with him. In later times, when the Aztecs ruled the area, the loosing team would be sacrificed, as  a way of maintaining their dominance in the area. No wonder they were able to conquer, the Mayan people  had been depleting their gene pool over time by killing off their largest and best warriors. There is a room off the the side of the court, kind of like a locker room where the warriors would be blessed by the High Priest, who would be burning all kinds of incense in this small room, essentially drugging the men, and getting the pumped up to go play, and be willing to be sacrificed.

They said this is called the ka put chill (spelling?) Which means to be born again. It is a once in a life time thing for each indivual, and they are buried in water, representing new birth. Note, the circular, sacred, design. It sits at the base of the temple, or acropolis. You can see the drain in the bottom, and there is a system of stone trenches taking the water away.

This is the acropolis. The temple is in the middle, and later on additions were made to the sides where the noblemen lived.  There are rooms around the base, and a water collecting area up top which had stone trenches to each room. Running water! 

 The stairs are built in a way where the get narrower to one end, so it actually is easier to zig zag.

One of the glifs on the acropolis.

At the base of the temple are glifs on either side. Mayan is read from bottom to top, and right to left, like Hebrew. The first image in the bottom right corner is found hundreds of times on glifs around Mesoamerica. In 1985, David Stuart, a Mayan scholar, interpreted the sound of the glyph as "Ut" in the Chol language and "Utchi" in Mayan, meaning "to happen" or "to come to pass." Which just happens to appear in the Book of Mormon 1381 times.

When the spanish came, the people of this city covered their entrance to one of the areas of the temple with a wall of sand, which preserved it very well. You can see the smooth limestone plaster that the whole temple would have had covering it at one time. These are on the top to the right of this entrance, and are believed to be the guardians of the hand signs, which you must show to be able to enter.

Another statue, to the top left of the entrance. His right arm is broken off but the damage to the wall behind him suggests it may have been up near his head. The statues are small, like 4 feet tall, and they are proportional. They may have actually been fairly life sized.

On the side wall of the entrance to this preserved area, is a picture that has been well preserved. It shows a light skinned individual in the center teaching darker skinned people.  There are other images from later on where the light skinned people are the servants of the dark skinned people, and also from later of dark skinned people sacrificing light skinned people.

From the top of the Acropolis at Ek Balam

The Yucatan peninsula is very, very flat. There is no other place like it in the world. It has a limestone base, and all the rain water seeps through forming a huge network of underground rivers and lakes called Cenotes. The hills you can kind of see near the ruins to the left and right are actually more structures yet to be excavated. You can see with how flat it is, how king Noah could see an army approaching from a tower in his land. From the top of Ek Balaam you can see another ruin miles away called Coba. All these cities in the area are thought to belong to different tribes, and one thing that made the maya unique was sharing knowledge. They would meet at Coba to share their learning. There are neared and hundred of carved stones in coba thought to show their exchange of knowledge.

Almost missed this iguana! 

There are several large stones at Ek Balam called Stellas. These are often carved, and sometimes painted, and are usually left to show a history of a person or civilization. This may be similar to the large stone containing a brief history of the Jaredites that was brought to King Mosiah in the book of Omni.

After Ek Balam we stopped for lunch at this beautiful spanish hacienda. These dancers had trays with bottles and cups on their heads. After their spins the trays would often keep spinning. Pretty impressive.

Then we went to another site, called Chitzen Itza.This is one of the seven man made wonders of the world. The people of this tribe were thought to be kind of wizards or learned men. Chitzen itza a representation of the Mayan solar calendar. It has 4 sides, with 91 steps each, the last step all sides share make in 365 days for the year. The mayan calendar is a 20 base system, so each month had 20 days, and there was one period of five sacred days. These are represented by stones out the side of the steps, and 5 stones at  the top. There is another identical but smaller pyramid within Chitzen Itza. There are no supports, there is are between the outer and inner pyramid! How did they do that?! It dates more around 200 AD, while the outer temple is about 700 AD. The inner temple shows the Venus calendar, which has a shorter period, based on when Venus is visible.

When you stand back from the pyramid and clap it makes an amazing pinging sound which sounds like a bird. This is the quetzal bird from the area, thought to be most sacred. This is the temple of Kukulkan or Quetzalcoatl, both are the same God meaning feathered serpent, but different regions using different dialects. One of the sides of the pyramid has serpents heads at the bottom. Two times a year at the equinox the shadows from the corner of the pyramid will show a serpent of light descending down to earth, and then as the sun continues ascending back to the celestial. It begins March 21 but is complete 33 days later on April 6. This is the only day when all eight triangles of the serpent body are visible. The next day you can't see anything at all. It is visible for 33 days, thought to represent the age of Kukulkan when he again ascended to the celestial realm.

The left of the pyramid is where the serpents head is, you can just barely see small triangles of sunlight along the staircase wall. In March this will be more clear, and complete with 8 triangles on April 6th.

Directly to the north of the main temple at Chitzen Itza is a sacrificial platform. On it is half a flower and half a star representing earth and Venus. Only the most sacred sacrifices were done here, virgin women and children the cenote directly north has many bodies of decapitated women and children in it. No wonder they worshiped the rain God, they may not have had to so much if they stopped throwing bodies in their water sources! 

The hearts were taken to the temple and animals decided if the offering was accepted or not. If the jaguar ate the heart he took it to the infra world and the offering was not accepted. If the eagle did he took it to the celestial realm and it was accepted. Kind of interesting to think where they may have gotten confused. If God taught them no more sacrifices are needed, our sacrifice should be only a broken heart and a contrite spirit. Then maybe years later as their beliefs were corrupted, they would offer an actual sacrifice of a human "broken heart" and see if it is accepted by God.

There was a prophet from this area who figured out there were 4 cycles of 52 years. Each cycle was represented by earth, wind, water, and fire. He predicted that after so many of each cycle a period of fire would prepare for the return of kukulkan. This year, on Dec. 21 is the beginning of that last 52years cycle. The cycle preceding it was thought to have climate changes and natural disasters, and the last cycle supposedly will have lots of social changes.  So it's not the end of the world! But it is the beginning of the end...according to that guy. When the Spanish arrived it happened to be in a fire cycle, and Cortez came from the water (east side) as it was thought Kukulkan would return from. Cortez was white and had a beard s the Aztecs worshiped him as the feathered serpent god. The people from the Yukatan peninsula however were the only ones to fight the Spanish, because they had this prophecy that Kukulkan would not return until this fire cycle much later, so they did not believe Cortez was him.

Prior to this the Toltecs conquered the area. The first phase of their invasion was an infiltration led by a man known as the fake white bearded man. He claimed to be a servant of Kukulkan and wore a fake white beard like the feathered serpent God had. After deceiving many people in Chitzen Itza their warriors came and defeated them. Later this white bearded man died, which he wasn't supposed to as a servant of Kukulkan, and a civil war erupted. So  many bodies piled up and were thrown into the cenotes that their water supply was spoiled, and they were forced to abandon the city.

Behind me at the base of the pyramid is a fenced off area where they have found more ruins. The US military used some underground imaging equipment and Chitzen Itza is now thought to only be 35% excavated. What else is down there?!

There are pok ta pok courts all over the Yucatan, but this is by far the largest. There were stairs up the back so spectators could watch. Here they have the temple of the skulls where the team captains skull images are found to honor them. 20 miles from here a cenote has been found with hundreds of male remains, with their heads missing, and hearts have been removed.

And the end of this court is a building dating back to 200 AD, one of the oldest buildings yet to be found at Chitzen Itza. The steps are very high, only the high priest was to enter the temple.


In this temple there is a square block directly in the center depicting the white bearded god. Beards are very uncommon among natives, this is one of the only stones depicting a bearded man. He is facing west, since he is supposed to come from the east.

We got here at just the right time, the shadow shows the profile of the white bearded man pretty well.

There are lots of theories who this is, and who Kukulkan  or Quetzalcoatl are. This person is always spoken of as bringing power and knowledge to the people. Some people think he may be an alien, and a new theory is that he may be a time traveler. Up until ten years ago, it was illegal for a tour guide to suggest that it may possibly be Jesus Christ. There have been some recent documentaries that discuss this theory, and use the Book of Mormon as a historical document.

After Chitzen Itza we had the chance to visit a cenote. These are all over the peninsula but this is by far the prettiest we saw. If these are on your land, it's yours!

A view of the Cenote from ground level.

They blasted through the limestone to make this staircase and window

All cenotes are at sea level and a pretty even temperature of about 72 degrees.

Rob swimming in the cenote.

Annie jumping in!

This was a long day, but one of the best! Amazing and beautiful stuff. I don't really remember how many times the thought crossed my mind, this is just what I wanted in a vacation. It crossed my mind a lot!