Xunantunich

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View over the ruins of Xunantunich
The temple "El Castillo"
Xuanantunich entrance

The Maya ruins of Xunantunich are located about 13 kilometers southwest of San Ignacio in Belize ( Central America ) on a step above the Mopan River. The name is modern and means "stone woman".

At six plazas total group over 25 temples and palace buildings. The most conspicuous building with a height of around 40 m above the site can be found on the southern edge of the excavation: the El Castillo pyramid . The reconstructed stucco frieze on the east side and the new frieze replica on the west side are remarkable at El Castillo .

On the northern edge of the central area of ​​Xunantunich there was a palace building (building A11), which was destroyed and filled with rubble stones before the settlement was abandoned. Possibly this is a sign of an abrupt change in the socio-political situation.

The complex was abandoned around the year 900 and rediscovered in modern times by Thomas Gann at the end of the 19th century (the first known photograph is from 1904). Archaeological exploration has been going on since 1930.

Burial chamber

In July 2016, researchers from Northern Arizona University under excavation leader Jaime Awe found a ten-square-meter burial chamber that contains the body of a 20 to 30-year-old man and numerous grave goods . The time of burial was estimated at 1300 years ago. What is unusual about the burial chamber is that it was built around the same time as the surrounding temples, while with the Maya, in contrast to the Egyptians, it was more common to add burial chambers to existing temple complexes.

literature

  • Joyce Kelly: An Archaeological Guide to Northern Central America: Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. Univ. of Oklahoma Pr., Norman 1996, ISBN 0-8061-2858-5 , pp. 65-72.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Jason Yaeger: Revisiting the Xunantunich Palace: The 2003 excavations . Online publication.
  2. ↑ Manorial Mayan burial chamber discovered in Belize. In: derstandard.at . August 8, 2016. Retrieved August 8, 2016 .
  3. ↑ Belize: Archaeologists discover Mayan ruler's tomb . Spiegel Online , August 7, 2016

Web links

Commons : Xunantunich  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 17 ° 5 ′ 21.8 "  N , 89 ° 8 ′ 29.5"  W.