THE SACRED WELL

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 148, 15 February 1932, Page 2

THE SACRED WELL

MAYAN SACRiFICES MUTILATED YICTIMS TO APPEASE WRATH OF GOD. FLUNG INTO DEEP POOL. Reeent diggings in Uxactum, that oldest of all Maya cities, has once again called attention to the Sacred 'Well at" Chichen-Itza, where maidens were hurled into its depths as sacrifices to the great god Kukulkhan, the Feathered Serpent, to appease his wrath. Some time ago there was talk of dredging this great pool, where thousands of victims were sacrificed, loaded with ornaments of gold and precious stones. This pool, or cenote, has been thoroughly examined, hut its bottom rnpst he scores of feet deep with bones of the sacrifices, and the treasure with which these hapless victims were loaded before heing cast into the Sacred pool. Writing of the "Golden Pool of the Mayans," an explorer from Harvard University (U.S.A.) said that the investigations in which he took part showed new and surprising lights on the Mayan life of over 1000 years ago. The Feathered Serpent. The Mayan tribes who inhabited the country known at present at Guatemala and Honduras, assembled at the ancient city of Chichen-Itza for the worship of the Great God Kukulkhan, the Feathered Serpent, who was also worshipped by the Aztecs, under the name of Quetzalevalt.. Naturally, the greatest interest centred in the limestone pool or cenote where the victims of the sacrifiees found their last resting place. It was approached by a paved and graded road of which this pool was the termination. This particular pool is a huge natural hole through the limestone, 50 yards in diameter. The surface? was 60 feet below the edge, and from the surface to the mud on the_ bottom would total 70 feet. A hundred yards back from the cenote, and a few yards to one side of the paved road, was a pyramid some 50 feet high, on top of which are the remains of the Temple of Sacrifice, where the prisoners of war, together with Indian maidens, were offered to propitiate the cruel Mayan gods. On a day of religious festival, when these ancient cities were at the height of their power and civilisation, they must have presented scenes unequalled in modern times. With the gleaming white temples high in the air, on tops of pyramids, the tropic sunlight playing on the bright colours of painted walls, and gaily-feathered cloaks and head-dresses of priests, nobles, and kings, and wtih the poor, doomed prij soners dressed in harbaric splendour for the last time, huddled in a sad group, waiting the inevitable, the apcients had a situation which it would be hard to duplicate in these modern days for mixed sensations and contrasts of pleasure and sorrow. The Sacrifice. When finally the priests had offered the necessary prayers to Kukulkhan, the Feathered Serpent, and to the long-snouted Rain God, the procession i moved slow'ly along the paved road, j chanting prayers until it came to the | patch which led at right angles from ' the main road to the pyramid, on top of which was the Temple of Sacrifice. The priests- and the victims ascended the serpent-bordered columns, and passed between serpent columns into the inner shrine, where were the altars, while the people surrounded the foot of the pyramid in masses, waiting for the rites to be concluded, and chanting prayers. When the hearts had been torn from ; the bodies of the prisoners and from the breasts of the Indian maidens who I were sacrificed from time to time, the I gory-handed priests again led the proi cession along the paved way to the ! small building, the roof of which j formed a platform, where the dead 1 prisoners, their bodies covered with 1 heavy jade ornaments and brilliant feather-work, were pushed over the edge into the yellow waters, which swallowed them at once, and where they remained, and will remain until scientific dredging brings their fine ornaments again to the surface. After the prisoners, the white-robed bodies $>f the slaughtered virgins followed, splashing their way into eternity. Dr. S. G. Morley, the American archaelogist, who discovered the ruined city, has revivcd the interest in the wonderful work of these ancients. The Mayans were the first Americans to invent a system of writing, and were the first to make detailed records. Maya heiroglyphs relating to numerals and dates show that as astronomers and mathematicians they were far ahead of those of Europe and Asia. Thus, the Mayas invented the zero, and had been using the idea in their computations a thousund years before the zero we use was invented hy the thinkers in India, latei to be brought by Arahs to Europe.