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Maya Sites
3 of 427 entries in Sacred Sites. Click any to see everything it connects to.
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Sites significant to Maya religion, spanning the era of the Classic Maya city states through to practices that survive in modified form among Maya communities today. Unlike some of the pre-Columbian traditions in this section, Maya religious practice was never fully broken, and elements of it continue alongside Christianity in parts of Mexico and Central America.
Facts
Overview
What Defines This GroupingPyramid-temples, plazas, ballcourts and cenotes of the Maya cities, at which ritual, astronomy and kingship met. Many are aligned to solar, lunar or Venus events, and the inscriptions record the rites of named rulers on dated days - which makes these among the few ancient sacred sites whose ceremonies can be tied to a calendar. 2 Peoples and Traditions Covered"The Maya" is not one people. Some thirty Mayan languages are spoken today by several million people across Mexico, Guatemala, Belize and Honduras; the ancient cities belonged to rival kingdoms that fought each other, and descendant communities continue to make offerings at some of these places. 2 Contested Use
Contested or Appropriated Modern UseThe 2012 "end of the Maya calendar" phenomenon, and ceremonies staged for visitors at these sites, are modern constructions rather than Maya practice. The Long Count period it turned on marks the completion of a cycle, not an ending, and the atlas records such claims as claims about the sites, not as readings of them. 3 Learn More
Sacred Sites of the Maya
This group holds the sacred sites of the Maya civilisation, the pyramid-temples, plazas and sacred cenotes of the Maya cities of Mesoamerica, where ritual, astronomy and kingship met. Maya sacred architecture was aligned to the movements of the sun, moon and planets.
The browser will find the temple-pyramids and ceremonial centres of the Maya world. The entries describe each site's religious function and history, noting the continuity of some sacred places in living Maya tradition.
Cross-Tradition Connections
Belongs to Tradition
Sites grouped for the Maya tradition.
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