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to one of the most advanced pre-Hispanic civilizations
in the new world, Uxmal today is a monument to Mayan
engineering, social organization, and architecture.
Uxmal started small as a provincial village. As it
grew in size, it grew in political power. This success,
unfortunately, also made it a target. Uxmal was sacked
and rebuilt at least three times. One of those times
was in 674. By 688 the city was abandoned by the Yucatan
Mayans, but reestablished around 987 under the leadership
of Ah Suytok Tutul Xiu, a man from non-Yucatan Mexico.
The most prominent feature of the site is the Pyramid
of the Seer, also known as the Pyramid of the Magician
(Pirámide del Adivino). This ancient pyramid rises
more than 90-feet above the city reminding all within
its view of its religious power. It base is 227-feet
by 162-feet. There is a legend that the pyramid was
built in one night by an enchanted dwarf. To this
day it is still sometimes called the House of the
Dwarf (Casa del Enano). When the pyramid was built
(900-1000) the city's entire existance revolved around
a group of people who were thought to be the gods'
representatives on Earth. The citizens' desire to
be like these people so they could be close to their
gods is evident in how they built their homes, markets,
and other buildings. The proper term is "flourishing
puuc," which describes buildings festooned with religious
icon, reliefs, and carvings to the point that the
ornamentation and grand scale of the buildings ended
up limiting the useable space inside. The central
figure in this worship was the rain god Chac (or Chaac)
whom the citizens of Uxmal depended on to fill thier
cisterns and reservoirs. Building continued until
about 1100ad when the city began to lose political
power due to the influence of other cultures moving
into the area. Around 1450 the League of Mayapán,
the equivalent of a Mayan United Nations, collapsed
and the city was abandoned.