Talk:El Castillo, Chichen Itza

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notice that the temple has 91 stair steps on each of the 4 sides and with the top step adds to 365 .. mayans were very good in maths and astronomy.. it is suppoused that the temple was actualy a calendar..

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Name

As "El Castillo" is a rather common nickname for large structures, perhaps this should be moved to "El Castillo, Chichen Itza" or something similar? -- Infrogmation 16:07, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, think we need a dab title here (there's also a highlands site in the Cotzumalhuapa region called El Castillo, for eg). There'd be the same problem for its alternative familiar name, Temple of K'uk'ulkan. I think your suggestion, El Castillo, Chichen Itza, should be fine, its formal designation as Chichen Itza Structure 5B18 is perhaps too obscure.--cjllw | TALK 01:57, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

OK, hv moved it to new title per your suggestion.--cjllw | TALK 03:56, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Article Needed?

Do we need this article? The same information is found in the Chichen Itza entry. Can't visitors to Wikipedia searching for El Castillo be directed to the Chichen Itza page instead of maintaining the same information in two places?CoyoteMan31 12:10, 15 June 2007 (UTC)CoyoteMan31

IMO there's sufficient expansion scope for this notable structure to sustain its own article- although yes, in practice at the moment there is considerable overlap with the main Chichen Itza article. Both articles could readily be extended, there's a lot of info on both not yet covered. Ideally, the Chichen article would give the overview on the main features and structures associated with the site, while the subarticles carry the details & specifics. I don't think it does any harm to have this one here, even if only as a sketch awaiting further work. --cjllw ʘ TALK 14:16, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

Last 'Graf

The last paragraph is incorrect: "Today 'El Castillo' is one of the most popular and recognized tourist sites of Mexico. It's most notable feature is its Sacred Cenote or Well of Sacrifice into which human sacrifices were thrown." I believe the author meant "Chichen Itza," of which El Castillo is one monument. The Sacred Cenote is not part of El Castillo. However, there is a footnote to Michael Coe's book at the end of this graf, and the information does not come from that book. It is probably an appendage from an earlier draft. I didn't want to change it because I didn't know where the footnote belonged.

While I'm at it, that Montejo dragged a cannon into the middle of the Yucatan peninsula, as mentioned in the previous paragraph, is unlikely, as anyone who has traveled through the jungle in that region would attest. From my reading of the sources, it also is not clear that El Castillo was where the Spanish set up their fort (100 men certainly wouldn't fit on it). Las Monjas (the Nunnery) would probably have been a better location, and some historians believe that was where they were quartered during the sieges that eventually drove them from Yucatan. However, I haven't done the research yet to verify it one way or the other, so I didn't change it.CoyoteMan31 19:01, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

I think you are probably right on both counts. Not sure which part the Coe citation referred to, I've a different edition than the one given so can't look up what's on the given page. We could probably remove those 2 sentences, or at least replace them with some specific attribution on tourism for the structure itself.

As for the Montejo story, there might well be different versions around, so would be good to track down a couple of different sources for comparision. For now, I've edited the sentence to make it seem less certain.

And good work BTW on the refs/cites- that was quite fine, I made a couple of minor and fussy adjustments. Cheers,--cjllw ʘ TALK 04:59, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Acoustical effect

Hi again. Thanks for explaining what is happening with this acoustic effect but it doesn't matter if that echo was engineered by Mayans on purpose or not. It still deserves to be mentioned in Wikipedia even if it's just a natural/casual effect. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mariolaudicina (talk • contribs) 20:51, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

If you don't know about the bird chirp acoustic effect you should watch and listen to this and all the related videos in Youtube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEn8MT7gX38 Official Mexican tour guides always show this effect to tourists. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mariolaudicina (talk • contribs) 20:22, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Hi. I reverted your edit once more. First of all, your edit overwrote the notes and references section, pls take more care in future.

Secondly, am well enough aware that tour guides are fond of demonstrating this effect. However, Youtube videos and tour guides—offical ones or not— are not acceptable or reliable sources. And thirdly, even if you were to cite more reliable sources, such as papers by acoustical consultant David Lubman (his 1998 investigation started this whole thing off, IIRC. His site is here), or Declerq et al. in J. Acoustical Soc. Am., they would not be sufficient to establish that there is any real intended acoustical effect planned by the structure's builders. Instead, Mayanist archaeologists regard such effects as coincidental, and the identification of the sounds as 'quetzal chirping' as pareidolia. Mayanist researchers such as Karl Taube, Sam Edgerton and Jorge Perez de Lara are on record as criticising any intentional interpretation, for a host of reasons. Not least among these, is that it has been observed that interesting acoustical effects may be heard somewhere at just about any site, Maya or not, restored or not. It's really not such a remarkable or unusual phenomena as might be thought at the first uncritical blush; like EVP you can read any interpretation into it if you try hard enough, but there really is no good cause to suspect the sounds were pre-planned by the builders.

At most, it might briefly be noted that some acoustical engineers have noted some effect, but equally that Mayanist archaeologists discount any intentional purpose behind it. --cjllw ʘ TALK 00:20, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

I've been wrestling with how to describe this phenomenon in a way acceptable for a Wikipedia article. CJLL is dead on, that Mayanists poo-poo the idea that the chirping effect is intentional. And yet ...

The acoustics at Chichen Itza are special and unusual. Sylvanus Morley loved to play records in the Great Ball Court because of its unique acoustic properties. The great conductor Leopold Stokowski spent a few days at Chichen with Morley to try to discover the Ball Court's secret. When Allen Ginsberg spent a few days at Chichen, the thing that most impressed him were the acoustics of the place. Seems to me there is some way to capture this in a Wikipedia entry, if not here, perhaps on the Chichen Itza page ... CoyoteMan31 (talk) 02:22, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Hey CoyoteMan, thanks for chiming in, and the timely reminder that the ballcourt has also been fingered as possessing some interesting acoustical properties. I too would not be averse to including mention of the supposed acoustical phenomena in the article(s), given that it's not just something proposed by random cranks and it's reasonably well known. If we were to do it, either here or at the main Chichen article, then it would have to be based on the published sources such as the couple of reasonable ones I outlined above, and not tour-guide patter. Problem is, discussion-list postings aside it may take some digging to track down useable rebuttals in print by Mayanist researchers of the "it-was-an-intentional-feature-of-the-structure" proposal. For any such mention of acoustical properties needs to be accompanied by some citation/reference to indicate archaeologists on the whole remain highly sceptical that the the structures were built to purposely produce an effect of this nature. Do you know of any we cld use..? Cheers, --cjllw ʘ TALK 08:21, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

I'll look around and see what I have. If I have anything, it is probably personal correspondence with archaeologists and other Mayanists. But I'll look. Cheers right back atcha! CoyoteMan31 (talk) 00:03, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

A hand clap in front of the steps of the Temple of the Warriors will produce a quetzal like chirp from the a a rattlesnake sound from the colonnade. 99.44.95.9 (talk) 14:39, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

Should read “A handclap in front of the steps of the Temple of the Warriors produce a quetzal like chirp from the steps, rattlesnake sound from the colonnade”. Giving voice to Quetzalcoatl

WVK

https://asa.scitation.org/doi/10.1121/1.4779169 Wayne5142 (talk) 16:53, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

Translating the Spanish Version for this entry

Calliopejen1 requested that the Spanish entry for El Castillo be translated for this one. I took a shot at it, but much of the Spanish version of this entry is cobbled together from sources that range from expert to, in my opinion, pure speculation. I translated the first third, then gave up, because I was doing as much rewriting and correcting as translating. I'm happy to send over to anyone the work I've done so far if someone else wants to attempt a translation. CoyoteMan31 (talk) 22:58, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

File:Chichen Itza 3.jpg to appear as POTD soon

Hello! This is a note to let the editors of this article know that File:Chichen Itza 3.jpg will be appearing as picture of the day on January 20, 2012. You can view and edit the POTD blurb at Template:POTD/2012-01-20. If this article needs any attention or maintenance, it would be preferable if that could be done before its appearance on the Main Page so Wikipedia doesn't look bad. :) Thanks! —howcheng {chat} 10:02, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

Picture of the day

El Castillo, found in the Chichen Itza archaeological site, is a Mesoamerican step-pyramid that is one of the most recognized and widely visited pre-Columbian structures in Mexico. Built by the Maya, it served as a temple to Kukulkan, the Yucatec Maya Feathered Serpent deity.Photo: Daniel Schwen

37°29'44" (edges) 47º19'50" (sides)

37°29'44" (edges) 47º19'50" (sides) 2001:4455:6B1:AB00:A59F:A708:60D6:D594 (talk) 14:29, 30 November 2022 (UTC)

Rename title to “Temple of Kukulcan”

Other languages in Wikipedia use a variation of “Kukulcan” in the article’s title, including Spanish. It feels weird that English Wikipedia uses a Spanish term for a Mesoamerican pyramid when even Spanish Wikipedia does not do this, using a native name instead.

Also, my personal impression is that the name “El Castillo” is much less recognizable than “Kukulcan” by the average person. The Spanish name is confusing, as there are other structures named something similar to “El Castillo” around the world, while there’s only one famous “Temple of Kukulcan”. VVVBoldrini (talk) 00:30, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

•  Comment: "El Castillo", while a Colonial era neologism, has been the common name in English for about 150 years. If it has fallen out of favor more recently, I don't object to renaming in principle, but question if just "Temple of Kukulcan" is the best alternative name. Firstly, Kukulcan or K'uk'ulkan - we'd need to decide on what spelling to use - note the en:w article is at Kukulkan. Secondly, I think again it needs to be specified that it's the one at Chichen Itza, as the worship of the Feathered Serpent God, however you spell the name, was pan-Mesoamerican, not just worshiped at Chichen. "There’s only one famous 'Temple of Kukulcan'" - I guess that depends on what you consider "famous"? For example I guess Mayapan isn't famous enough by your standards? -- Infrogmation (talk) 03:19, 1 October 2023 (UTC)
  • OK, I just did a comparative google search. 1) "Chichen Itza" Castillo = About 2,580,000 results 2)"Chichen Itza" Kukulcan = About 488,000 results. So it looks to me that the name we have the article at now is still the more common one. -- Infrogmation (talk) 03:23, 1 October 2023 (UTC)