Kabah, Sayil, Labna

            Another three-site day for the UC Explorers: Kabah, Sayil and Labna were our destinations for the day, and what a long day it was. All three were impeccable examples of the three different Puuc styles: early, colonette and mosaic. They were also all smaller sites which made for quick visits and honestly, easy confusion. All within a small radius of one another, the travel was light and the study enjoyable; it is only now as I sit and try to discern the three am I finding myself blending the three together and reaching for my field notebook.

            Kabah, our first site, was named by a priest. It means something along the lines of:  “lord of the strong and powerful hand”. There is a 22 kilometer sacbeh (roadway) that connects Kabah to Uxmal which starts with an early Puuc arch standing alone. There were two complexes inside the site, both of which boasted Puuc styled buildings. The Palace of the Masks was an excellent example of the mosaic style; it has also been called “Mayan Baroque” according to Hugo which makes perfect sense. Think of a Baroque cathedral in Europe – you never know where to look first, it is way too busy with all the angels and carvings and demons and Latin sayings. The Palace Group was a good example of the other two styles. There was a building with a roof comb and colonette style molding, and another with little decoration at all in early Puuc.

            Our second sight was Sayil, “place of the ants”. Again, a sacbeh connected this site to the distant city of Mirador. We find 9 carved stela here and 7 plain altars, none of which have long count dates on them. The ninth stela was a group favorite for a pretty perverse reason; a giant phallus was carved into it. We actually took a photo-of-the-day with it collectively, which in retrospect was probably a bit sacrilegious. Sorry, Kukulkan.

            Third and final site was a quick one called Labna. It was hot, and we were tired, and so we got through it in record-time. There were really only three structures of interest there: a palace, a Mirador and an arch. The palace was built in phases and so exhibited all three Puuc styles simultaneously. El Mirador was an early classic structure seated atop a mound of rubble with a giant roof comb atop it. The arch we saw actually used to be the most famous icon of the Maya until Chichen became a World Wonder. It was beautiful, with cloud scrolls, witz flowers and lattice work carved into it. It led to a courtyard which had housed residences in its day but now barely hosted a structure with an “iPod glyph” which of course, we named ourselves.

            As you can see, the sites were all very similar and I hope you forgive me for the sparse entry. The take-home message here was that sites within a close proximity generally resemble each other and are generally constructed around the same time as well.

Cansadamente –

Dana