WVK Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> bernard Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> WVK Quoted
> > > *"Even more than Tula, Chichén Itzá is
> the
> >> purest earthly expression of Zuyuá
> architecture, and
> >> it is an expression that harmoniously
> combines
> >> foreign and native styles. Its heart is
> the
> >> grand temple, which Landa identified as
> >> Kukulkan’s, where Puuc stylistic
> elements combine with
> >> Zuyuá effigies. Called El Castillo
> today, it is a
> >> pyramid with serpentine balustrade
> stairways
> >> on all four sides. The Ball court is the
> biggest
> >> and most impressive in Mesoamerica. The
> Temple of
> >> the Warriors sits on an exceptional
> platform
> >> with hypostyle corridors. In short, the
> city is a
> >> fitting earthly residence for the God,
> >> Kukulkan."
> >
> > Secondly, I hate unattributed
> > quotes. Who wrote the quoted passage?
>
Lopez Austin, A. and L. Lopez Lujan 2001 Mexico’s
> Indigenous Past B. Ortiz de Montellano, trans.
> Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. Page 274
> You provided it:
>
Yes and the preceding paragraph addresses your doubts that the architecture of Chichen Itza shifted radically in order to accomodate a new religious approach and rites:
> Mexico’s Indigenous Past p. 274-75
"
Zuyuá’s ideology can be seen archaeologically in Yucatán. It can be discerned in the arrangement of their buildings and their iconography, which responded to very specific ideas about the cosmos, ritual rules, and political organization. Above all, however, the architecture and iconography imitated elements found in the Tula of Central Mexico, which itself was the most prestigious terrestrial copy of the mythical Zuyuá.
The Zuyuá used architectural space in a very characteristic way. The small, dark rooms, where the rulers of the Classic contacted the gods, in an almost familiar way, and the relatively small throne rooms, were replaced by larger halls with flat roofs supported by columns, where a larger number of people participated in political decisions and in the religious ceremonies of the warrior orders. Simultaneously, the images of the feathered serpent, a mythical being part human, bird, and reptile, chac mools, and atlantes, who supported the heavens or the surface of the earth above their heads, proliferated. Military power, converted into a sacred symbol, duplicated adornments, weapons and insignias originating in the West, rows of skulls, standard bearers and images of eagles and jaguars devourers of human hearts.
Even more than Tula, Chichén Itzá is the purest earthly expression of Zuyuá architecture, and it is an expression that harmoniously combines foreign and native styles. Its heart is the grand temple, which Landa identified as Kukulkan’s, where Puuc stylistic elements combine with Zuyuá effigies. Called El Castillo today, it is a pyramid with serpentine balustrade stairways on all four sides. The Ball court is the biggest and most impressive in Mesoamerica. The Temple of the Warriors sits on an exceptional platform with hypostyle corridors. In short, the city is a fitting earthly residence for the God, Kukulkan."
Comments directly relevant to the structure of the building and the participants in rites specific to the Mercado are here in a book devoted entirely to the new religion of the post-classic.:
Lopez Austin, A. and L. Lopez Lujan 1999
Mito y Realidad de Zuyuá Mexico Fondo de Cultura Economica
p. 105-106 Either directly or indirectly the contact [between Tula and Chichen Itza] was intense. With respect to the architecture, in some cases the imitation is just a formal one that created eclectic combinations without regard to their original function or contextual logic. On the other hand,
in others the function and form are congruent. The imitation implies an organization of space that satisfies new functional requirements in ritual and administration. As an example, we will mention the building called El Mercado (Ruppert 1943). It is formed by two rectangles shaped into a T. Its front is a long, 75 meter portico with a vaulted roof supported in the front by a row of alternating pillars and columns. The portico is joined through a single central access to a large patio, provided with impluvium [sunken area to drain rainwater] without access to any other rooms. Hers (1989:157, 173-175) notes that this sort of patio is not suitable for a market because it is a partly open and exposed to the elements. Further, its warrior themed paintings and reliefs have nothing to do with commerce. It is an isolated cloister that is open in the middle, similar, in the author’s opinion to those that are seen in the architecture of Tula and of the distant Chalchihuites Culture. Hers proposes that the northern buildings—like those of Alta Vista and La Quemada—had a double function: to gather a segment of the population and to separate them from the rest of society.
In other words, these wide spaces were useful for meetings of large, but very select groups of people. This is what a political organization like the Zuyuan, in which the acts of governing involved the participation of numerous high dignitaries, would require."
BTW
Here is a video about a strong flutter echo and how an audience completely absorbs it, which is what would happen even if, which I doubt, a flutter echo would take place in a roofed mercado full of people.
Bixton academy flutter echo (strong but can’t be heard when 5000 people fill the place
[
www.youtube.com]
Bernard