Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
written records. Archeologists have long described the ensuing 130-year period of
domination by Caracol and Calakmul as a “
hiatus
” in which no inscribed
monuments were erected at Tikal; it has recently been shown, however, that work on
Temple V started at this time.
5
Tikal strikes back
Towards the end of the seventh century, in any case, Caracol's stranglehold weakened,
and Tikal started to recover its lost power. Under the formidable leadership of
Heavenly
Standard-bearer
(Hasaw Chan K'awil)
, who reigned from 682 to 723 AD, the main
ceremonial areas were reclaimed. By 695 AD, Tikal was powerful enough to launch an
attack against Calakmul, capturing and executing its king,
Fiery Claw/Jaguar Paw
(Ich'ak K'ak)
, and severely weakening the alliance against Tikal. The next year, Heavenly
Standard-bearer repeated his astonishing coup by capturing
Split Earth
, the new king of
Calakmul, and Tikal regained its status among the most important of Petén cities.
Heavenly Standard-bearer's leadership gave birth to a revitalized and powerful ruling
dynasty: in the century after his death, all of Tikal's five main temples reached their
final form, and his son,
Divine Sunset Lord
(Yik'in Chan K'awil)
, who ascended the
throne in 734 AD, had his father's body entombed in the magnificent
Temple I
.
Temples and monuments were still under construction until at least 869 AD, the last
recorded date in Tikal, inscribed on Stela 24.
Return to the jungle
While the precise reason for Tikal's
downfall
remains a mystery, it's certain that around
900 AD, almost the entire lowland Maya civilization collapsed, and that by the end of
the tenth century, Tikal had been abandoned. Afterwards, the site was used from time
to time by other groups, who worshipped here and repositioned many of the stelae, but
it was never formally occupied again.
The site
Tikal is absolutely vast, and you can only see it on foot. Trying to walk around the
entire site in a few hours is like scurrying around a major city in a single morning; it
can be done, but it's likely to exhaust you before you exhaust it. However, even if you
only make it to the
Great Plaza
, and spend an hour relaxing atop a temple, you won't
be disappointed.
Home to the five main temples, the central area forms by far the most impressive
section, and should be your priority. Around it, on all sides, lies dense jungle,
criss-crossed by tracks and footpaths, and punctuated by further pyramids and ruins,
some submerged beneath vegetation, others scraped clean and open to view. There's no
set route that you're obliged to follow; if you have time, it's fun to circle the perimeter
and only reach the prime ruins once you've grown used to the engulfing wilderness. On
the lesser paths, you can easily find yourself hiking for ten or twenty minutes at a time
without encountering another person, with the howler monkeys crashing through the
trees alongside.
Complex Q and Complex R
Most visitors to Tikal choose to follow the least strenuous route into the site proper,
which means forking slightly to the right when the main footpath reaches its first
intersection, marked by a large map. A little further along, roughly ten minutes' walk
from the ticket booth, the unevocatively named
Complex Q
and
Complex R
date from
the reign of Hasaw Chan K'awil.
These are two of the seven sets of twin pyramids built to mark the passing of a
katun
,
a period of twenty 360-day years. Only one pyramid, in Complex Q, has been
restored, with the stelae and altars re-erected in front of it. The carvings on the copy of
