Mayapan: The Last Mayan Capital Mayapan was considered the last Mayan capital, at least within Mexican territory. It was undoubtedly the final, urban center just before the Spanish conquest - what academics insist on calling, euphemistically at best, the "contact period." Description of MayapanIn his "Yucatan Before and After the Conquest," supposedly written around 1560, Bishop Diego de Landa offers a detailed description of Mayapan and explains its founding, government, alliances, principal structures, destruction and abandonment. This is a remarkable testimony from a scribe with only rudimentary knowledge of native languages, but then, Landa was never the most reliable source. After destroying available documentation he offered himself as the one remaining fountain of information on the local people and their customs. Despite his visible bias and discounting the variations in the translations of the day, misinterpretation, deliberate or otherwise, abounded.
Mayapan's fame had been reported earlier in the "Books of Chilam Balam," around 1250-1450 A.D., and was mentioned later in Spanish reports to the Viceroy. In its prime at least 4000 structures covered perhaps 150 acres, and the city center was protected by formidable walls.
History of MayapanA walled city, say the experts, means a city in trouble. In this case the fears were well founded. Mayapan's treachery against the Xiues of Uxmal led to the demise of the Triple Alliance, which in turn provoked the fall of Chichen Itza and the exile of the Itzaes. Presumably the Itzaes withdrew to their original site and, as it happens, last stronghold in Tayasal, now Flores on Lake Peten Itza in Guatemala.
A response was inevitable. Mayapan's Cocome governors, the third element in the Alliance, had become particularly malicious and tyrannical by this time. Supported by garrisons of mercenaries, the governors held out until an internal uprising led to civil war. So with reprisals from the outside and a crumbling unity within, Mayapan's days were numbered.
John Lloyd StephensThe city was burned and sacked. And its story would have ended there had it not been for John Lloyd Stephens, American adventurer and explorer who describes his visit in "Incidents of travel in the Yucatan," originally published in 1843 as a detailed complement to his earlier, two-part study of Maya deities in Yucatan, Chiapas and Central America, published in 1841.
Stephens deduced, quite rightly, that the remains of the city were to be found on the lands of a cattle ranch called San Joaquin. At no small effort he proceeded to list especially the crude sculptures of human figures, the serpents and felines, and the many "carved stones" (bas-reliefs) scattered throughout the area. He fared poorly in architecture, however, as the only structures still standing after the pre-Columbian razing of the site were the main ziggurat or pyramid, along with an unusual circular building, surely the product of Purepecha and Toltec influence from the Central Plexican Plateau where curves and angles commonly intersect.
What Little RemainsA disastrous storm in 1867 swept away the little remaining after that particular trip of Stephens, with his cohort, the British architect and artist Frederick Catherwood, during which they documented 46 sites in the area. Among them are nearby Acanceh. All are in fact only a short drive from Merida. Though recent restorations have been added to Mayapan's appeal, the architectural styles vary. The Temple of Venus is also badly named, yet there is a whole, imposing complex in "Group 2," the chapel called "Structure 7" is really lovely. Truly stunning is the "Temple of the Rain God Mask," with its twin galleries of columns in the classic Puuc style. The circular building has been dubbed the Caracol or "Snail" (spiral) and the well or cenote, Ch'en Mul, is still discernible near the main plaza but no longer holds water. The Great Pyramid, however, or Castle, was named by Landa for Kukulkarl. He suggested that this gifted and versatile deity, or deified man, had originated on the Central Plexicon Plateau as Quetzalcoatl, the Enlightened One. His extended residence in the Yucatan included a stay in Mayapan, where he was venerated for his varied talents and the wealth of his spiritual and practical contribution to the local culture. Kukuikan then withdrew, says the legend, to other continents.
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