Museo Regional de Antropologia

Today we went to the Museo Regional de Antropologia to check out some Mayan history.  We learned how to write numbers and years the way the Mayan did, but it was pretty tricky at first.  I had a kid from China helping me out with the math.  We also learned that they followed a 360 day year, called a tun, and a 20 day month, called a winal.  One day is a kin.

            Mayans believed that when a person died their sold went on a journey to the underworld where they would be reborn as a heavenly creature after killing the deities that lived there.  Dogs were sometimes killed after a person’s death because the dogs served as guides to the underworld, and caves and cenotes were thought to be entrances.  Ruling classes were buried in tombs much like the Egyptians, with food and supplies that the person may have used during their lifetime.  Lower classes were often buried under homes. 

At Chichen Itza, there is a cenote called Segrado.  It is green and not like the turquoise ones we have visited so far because the water is stagnant.  Mayan bones that are possibly from the sacrifice of children and adults were found at the bottom (my understanding so far is that there is some debate over whether the Maya actually sacrificed humans).  Some historians claimed people were sacrificed for any specific god, for example if there was a draught then someone would be sacrificed to the rain god.

It was a very interesting museum, and I was really glad they had English translations, otherwise I don’t think I would have gotten as much out of it.