A Mesoamerican ballcourt ( nah, tlachtli) is a large
masonry
Masonry is the building of structures from individual units, which are often laid in and bound together by mortar; the term ''masonry'' can also refer to the units themselves. The common materials of masonry construction are bricks, building ...
structure of a type used in
Mesoamerica
Mesoamerica is a historical region and cultural area in southern North America and most of Central America. It extends from approximately central Mexico through Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and northern Costa Rica ...
for over 2,700 years to play the
Mesoamerican ballgame
The Mesoamerican ballgame ( nah, ōllamalīztli, , myn, pitz) was a sport with ritual associations played since at least 1650 BC by the pre-Columbian people of Ancient Mesoamerica. The sport had different versions in different places during ...
, particularly the hip-ball version of the ballgame. More than 1,300 ballcourts have been identified, 60% in the last 20 years alone. Although there is a tremendous variation in size, in general all ballcourts are the same shape: a long narrow alley flanked by two walls with horizontal, vertical, and sloping faces. Although the alleys in early ballcourts were open-ended, later ballcourts had enclosed end-zones, giving the structure an -shape when viewed from above.
Ballcourts were also used for functions other than, or in addition to, ballgames. Ceramics from western
Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
show ballcourts being used for other sporting endeavours, including what appears to be a wrestling match. It is also known from archaeological excavations that ballcourts were the sites of sumptuous feasts, although whether these were conducted in the context of the ballgame or as another event entirely is not as yet known. The siting of the most prominent ballcourts within the sacred precincts of cities and towns, as well as the
votive deposit
A votive offering or votive deposit is one or more objects displayed or deposited, without the intention of recovery or use, in a sacred place for religious purposes. Such items are a feature of modern and ancient societies and are generally ...
s found buried there, demonstrates that the ballcourts were places of spectacle and ritual.
Distribution
Although ballcourts are found within most Mesoamerican sites, they are not equally distributed across time or geography. For example, the
Late Classic site of
El Tajin, the largest city of the ballgame-obsessed
Classic Veracruz culture
Classic Veracruz culture (or Gulf Coast Classic culture) refers to a cultural area in the north and central areas of the present-day Mexican state of Veracruz, a culture that existed from roughly 100 to 1000 CE, or during the Classic era.
...
, has at least 18 ballcourts while
Cantona, a nearby contemporaneous site, sets the record with 24. In contrast, Northern
Chiapas and the northern Maya Lowlands have relatively few, and ballcourts are conspicuously absent at some major sites, including
Teotihuacan
Teotihuacan (Spanish: ''Teotihuacán'') (; ) is an ancient Mesoamerican city located in a sub-valley of the Valley of Mexico, which is located in the State of Mexico, northeast of modern-day Mexico City. Teotihuacan is known today as t ...
,
Bonampak
Bonampak (known anciently as ''Ak'e'' or, in its immediate area as ''Usiij Witz'', 'Vulture Hill') is an ancient Maya archaeological site in the Mexican state of Chiapas. The site is approximately south of the larger site of the people Yaxchilan, ...
, and
Tortuguero.
The ballgame was initially thought to be originated in the coastal lowlands, yet a ballcourt was discovered at
Etlatongo Etlatongo is an archaeological site in Oaxaca, Mexico. Situated in the Nochixtlán Valley within the Mixteca Alta, Etlatongo encompasses both a Formative Period site, located between two rivers, and a Classic/Post-classic site, on a hill to the no ...
in the mountains of southern Mexico, dating to 1374 BCE.
It is thought that ballcourts are an indication of decentralization of political and economic power: areas with a strong centralized state, such as the
Aztec
The Aztecs () were a Mesoamerican culture that flourished in central Mexico in the post-classic period from 1300 to 1521. The Aztec people included different ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl ...
Empire, have relatively few ballcourts while areas with smaller competing polities have many. At Cantona, for example, the extraordinary number of ballcourts is likely due to the many and diverse cultures residing there under a relatively weak
state
State may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Literature
* ''State Magazine'', a monthly magazine published by the U.S. Department of State
* ''The State'' (newspaper), a daily newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, United States
* ''Our S ...
.
Image:Chichen Itza Campo del juego de pelota.JPG, Great Ballcourt at Chichen Itza
File:MesoBallcourtTeotenango.JPG, Mesoamerican ball court at Teotenango
Teotenango was an important pre-Hispanic fortified city located in the southern part of the Valley of Toluca. It was initially founded during the last stages of the Teotihuacan civilization by a group generally referred to as the “Teotenancas. ...
File:Juego de pelota.jpg, Classic -shape ball court in Cihuatan site, El Salvador
Image:Xochicalco ballcourt 2.jpg, One of the ballcourts at Xochicalco
Xochicalco () is a pre-Columbian archaeological site in Miacatlán Municipality in the western part of the Mexican state of Morelos. The name ''Xochicalco'' may be translated from Nahuatl as "in the house of Flowers". The site is located 38 ...
. Note the characteristic -shape, as well as the rings set above the apron at center court. The setting sun of the equinox shines through the ring.
Image:Monte Albán-12-05oaxaca024.jpg, Ballgame court at Monte Albán
Monte Albán is a large pre-Columbian archaeological site in the Santa Cruz Xoxocotlán Municipality in the southern Mexico, Mexican state of Oaxaca (17.043° N, 96.767°W). The site is located on a low mountainous range rising above the plain i ...
Size and shape
Ballcourts vary considerably in size. One of the smallest, at
Tikal
Tikal () (''Tik’al'' in modern Mayan orthography) is the ruin of an ancient city, which was likely to have been called Yax Mutal, found in a rainforest in Guatemala. It is one of the largest archeological sites and urban centers of the pre-C ...
site, is only one-sixth the size of the Great Ballcourt at Chichen Itza. Despite the variation in size, ballcourts' playing alleys are generally the same shape, with an average length-to-width ratio of 4-to-1, although some regional variation is found: Central Mexico, for example, has slightly longer playing alleys, and the Maya Northern Lowlands slightly wider.
The following is a comparison of the size of the playing alleys for several well-known ballcourts.
Evolution
The earliest ballcourts were doubtless temporary marked off areas of compacted soil much like those used to play the modern
ulama
In Islam, the ''ulama'' (; ar, علماء ', singular ', "scholar", literally "the learned ones", also spelled ''ulema''; feminine: ''alimah'' ingularand ''aalimath'' lural are the guardians, transmitters, and interpreters of religious ...
game, the Mesoamerican ballgame's descendant.
Paso de la Amada Paso de la Amada (from Spanish: "beloved's pass") is an archaeological site in the Mexican state of Chiapas on the Gulf of Tehuantepec, in the Mazatán part of Soconusco region of Mesoamerica. It is located in farmland between the modern town oB ...
,
Soconusco
Soconusco is a region in the southwest corner of the state of Chiapas in Mexico along its border with Guatemala. It is a narrow strip of land wedged between the Sierra Madre de Chiapas mountains and the Pacific Ocean. It is the southernmost par ...
, along the Pacific coast boasts the oldest ballcourt yet identified, dated to approximately 1400
BC. This narrow ballcourt has an flat playing alley defined by two flanking earthen mounds with "benches" running along their length.
By the Early Classic, ballcourt designs began to feature an additional pair of mounds set some distance beyond the ends of the alley as if to keep errant balls from rolling too far away. By the Terminal Classic, the end zones of many ballcourts were enclosed, creating the well-known -shape.
The evolution of the ballcourt is, of course, more complex than the foregoing suggests, and with over 1300 known ballcourts, there are exceptions to any generalization.
*Open ballcourts (i.e. without endzones) continued to be constructed into the
Terminal Classic and at smaller sites.
*Some ballcourts featured only one enclosed endzone (the so-called T-shape) while some ballcourts' endzones are of different depths.
*During the Formative period, some enclosed ballcourts were entirely rectangular, without endzones. One such court, at
La Lagunita in the Guatemala Highlands, features rounded side walls.
Walls and surfaces
Unlike the compacted earth of the playing alley, the side walls of the formal ballcourts were lined with stone blocks. These walls featured 3 or more horizontal and sloping surfaces. Vertical surfaces are less common, but they begin to replace the sloping apron during the
Classic era, and are a feature of several of the largest and best-known ballcourts, including the Great Ballcourt at
Chichen Itza and the North and South Ballcourts at
El Tajin. There the vertical surfaces were covered with elaborate reliefs showing scenes, particularly sacrificial scenes, related to the ballgame.
Orientation
Most prominent ballcourts were part of their town or city's central monumental precinct and as such they share the orientation of pyramids and other structures there. Since many Mesoamerican cities and towns were oriented to a few degrees east of north (roughly 15° east of north), it is not surprising to find that in the
Valley of Oaxaca
The Central Valleys ( es, Valles Centrales) of Oaxaca, also simply known as the Oaxaca Valley, is a geographic region located within the modern-day state of Oaxaca in southern Mexico. In an administrative context, it has been defined as comprising ...
, for example, ballcourt orientations also tend to be a few degrees east of north, or at right angles to that.
Other than this general trend, no consistent orientation of ballcourts throughout Mesoamerica has been found, although some patterns do emerge at the regional level. In the
Cotzumalhuapa region, for example, open-ended ballcourts with a north-south orientation were earlier than east-west enclosed courts.
Rings, markers, and other features
Stone rings,
tenoned into the wall at mid-court, appeared in the
Terminal Classic era. Actually sending a ball through the ring must have been a rare occurrence. The players could not use their hands or even feet to guide the ball. Moreover, the rings were only slightly larger than the ball itself and were located at no small distance from the playing alley. At Chichen Itza, for example, they were set 6 meters above the alley, while at
Xochicalco
Xochicalco () is a pre-Columbian archaeological site in Miacatlán Municipality in the western part of the Mexican state of Morelos. The name ''Xochicalco'' may be translated from Nahuatl as "in the house of Flowers". The site is located 38 ...
they set at the top of an 11-meter-wide apron, 3 meters above the playing alley (see lead photo).
As shown on
Aztec codices
Aztec codices ( nah, Mēxihcatl āmoxtli , sing. ''codex'') are Mesoamerican manuscripts made by the pre-Columbian Aztec, and their Nahuatl-speaking descendants during the colonial period in Mexico.
History
Before the start of the Sp ...
, court markers were also used on many ballcourts to establish the dividing line between teams – one set into the playing alley floor at exact mid-court, the other two placed against each side wall. However, such placement is not universal. Two ancient ceramic ballcourt models recovered from western Mexico show the three markers placed ''length-wise'' along the court: one (again) at exact mid-court with the remaining pair set midway between the walls at either end of the playing alley. The ballcourt markers at
Copan are also arranged in this manner. The ballcourt at Monte Albán, meanwhile, has only one court marker, placed at the exact center of the court.
These sunken court markers are almost invariably round and usually decorated with ballgame-related scenes or iconography. Other markers were set into ballcourt walls. Many researchers have also proposed that above-ground, moveable objects, for example stone ''
hachas'', were also used as court markers.
Various sculptures,
stela
A stele ( ),Anglicized plural steles ( ); Greek plural stelai ( ), from Greek , ''stēlē''. The Greek plural is written , ''stēlai'', but this is only rarely encountered in English. or occasionally stela (plural ''stelas'' or ''stelæ''), wh ...
e, and other stonework were also important components of the ballcourt. At the ballcourt at
Tonina, for example, 6 sculptures of prone captives overhang the apron, a pair at mid-court and a pair at each of the ends of the cornice. Unfortunately, rings, markers and sculptures are more portable and more prone to removal or destruction than the permanent ballcourt infrastructure, and at some ballcourts these features have been lost forever.
Maya stairs
Many – or even most – Maya depictions of ballgame play are shown against a backdrop of stairs. Conversely, Maya staircases will occasionally feature reliefs of ballgame scenes or ballgame-related glyphs on their
risers. The most famous of these are the Hieroglyphic Stairs at Structure 33 in
Yaxchilan
Yaxchilan () is an ancient Maya city located on the bank of the Usumacinta River in the state of Chiapas, Mexico. In the Late Classic Period Yaxchilan was one of the most powerful Maya states along the course of the Usumacinta River, with Pi ...
, where 11 of the 13 risers feature ballgame-related scenes. In these scenes, it appears as if the players were actually playing the ball ''against'' the stairs in what would seem to be a Maya version of
stoop ball
Stoop ball (also spelled "stoopball") is a game that is played by throwing a ball against a stoop (stairs leading up to a building) on the pavement in front of a building. Historically, it has been popular in Brooklyn and other inner cities. In B ...
.
The association of stairs and the ballgame is not well understood.
Linda Schele
Linda Schele (October 30, 1942 – April 18, 1998) was an American Mesoamerican archaeologist who was an expert in the field of Maya epigraphy and iconography. She played an invaluable role in the decipherment of much of the Maya hieroglyphs. Sh ...
and
Mary Miller propose that the depictions record historic events and in particular record a "form of play ... distinct from the game conducted on the courts", one that "probably followed immediately after
ardon steps adjacent to the ballcourts". Other researchers are skeptical. Marvin Cohodas, for example, proposes that the "stairs" are instead stepped platforms associated with human sacrifice, while Carolyn Tate views the Yaxchilan stair scenes as "the Underworld segment of a
cosmogram
A cosmogram depicts a cosmology in a flat geometric form. They are used for various purposes: meditational, inpirational and to depict structure -- real or imagined -- of the earth or universe.
Often, cosmograms feature a circle and a square, ...
".
[Tate, p. 97.]
Image gallery
Image:Coba Ballcourt-27527.jpg, One of two Mesoamerican ballgame courts at Cobá
Image:Tehuacalco07.JPG, The Tehuacalco Mesoamerican ball court
Image:YagulBallCourt.jpg, Yagul Ball Court
Image:Poctatok goal.jpg, poc-ta-tok field, Mexico
Notes
References
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Mesoamerican Ballcourt
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Ancient sports
Indigenous sports and games of the Americas
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