Our trip to the very famous ruins of Palenque was made more exciting by a lecture we attended beforehand at El Panchan, with Ed Barnhart (a specialist in Mayan archeoastronomy). He used examples of Mayan art and architecture to provide evidence for their genius in the fields of astronomy and mathematics… mentioning in particular some very recent research that he had been involved with at Palenque. For a while now archeologists have known that the ancient temples are often very precisely placed so as to align with planetary phenomena such as equinoxes, solstices and zenith passages. At different sites the sun sets exactly behind different buildings, for example, on different equinoxes or solstices, or shines through doorways or arches. One of the most famous examples of this is the pyramid El Castillo at Chichen Itza, where the shadow of the stairs creates an illusion of a snake descending or ascending the pyramid at different equinoxes. The new research at Palenque has focussed on several more light-effects that occur inside the temples. It has been discovered that in the Temple of the Sun (appropriately named, considering that these are very new observations), thin beams of light are filtered into the furthest rooms at sunset at these times of year. Light coming through the doorways is refined by various indoor walls into pencil-thin beams which come to rest finally precisely in the corners of the back rooms. This occurs in different corners at different times of the year, in different rooms. In the Temple of Inscriptions, a theory has been developed that small square windows in the foremost room of the temple were used to create a natural spotlight for the event of the presentation of the new heir to the throne. Sculptures on the front of the temple depict the royal baby being held in someone's arms, and on the date that this ceremony was conducted, a bright spot of light illuminates anyone standing in the temple doorway looking out over the plaza below, at about the height of the torso.
The ruins at Palenque were amazing as we'd expected, but the areas around the most famous buildings were so immaculately presented that it almost had the air of a themepark about it. When we left the neat lawns and white pathways behind and explored the outlying areas of the site it was more fun. There the vegetation was more dense and the buildings were less fully-restored... most had enormous trees growing out of them with a mass of roots gripping the walls like tentacles. And there are streams with numerous waterfalls flowing right through the site as well, which adds to the beauty of it all. While there we also applied for permission to view the famous tomb of king Pacal, which lies underneath the Temple of Inscriptions. You are only allowed to see it if you go to the library and get yourself a special ticket... a stern man there told us to write down our personal details on a sheet of paper and also our 'reasons' for wanting to see the tomb. Luckily our reasons were deemed good enough, and we given a time when we had to go to the temple. At this time, we descended with a few other people down a small dank stairway inside the pyramid... and at the bottom found the sarcophagus with its famous carved lid. After watching the other visitors taking flash photographs of the lid, in spite of many warnings not to, we climbed back up the slippery stairs and headed for home.
While in Merida on the Yucatan Peninsula we went to see the Ruta Puuc ruins... famous for their incredible architectural style of large arches and elaborate decorative panels. It also features surprisingly Greek-style rows of columns, and wall-decoration in the form of large masks of Gods (most often the rain god Chac who was of great importance in this arid region). We saw five sites in a gruelling 8-hour marathon, finally ending up Uxmal, the biggest and most famous site. It's dominated by a huge oval-shaped pyramid, the pyramid of the magician at the top of which is a fantastic doorway which forms the mouth of a huge Chac mask. There are several other famous buildings there, including the Governor's Palace... 100m long and considered to be one of the most beautiful buildings in ancient America (some people drop the 'ancient'). We climbed the final pyramid of the day, exhausted and very very hot, and found at the top a room with a Chac mask inside, in front of which were recent offerings of flowers. We were very curious about this... and our curiosity was rewarded later in the trip when at the site of K'umarcaaj in Guatemala we stumbled upon and were able to watch a contemporary Mayan ceremony taking place in front of the ruined temples.