Chichen Itza was a large pre-Columbian city built by the Maya people of the Terminal Classic period, its ruins located in Tinum Municipality, Yucatan, Mexico. Its most iconic structure, the Temple of Kukulkan, also called El Castillo, is a stepped pyramid about 30 meters high built in nine square terraces, its final layout dating from after 900 AD; excavations in the 1930s found a hidden earlier temple buried inside it, complete with a jaguar throne. Northwest of the pyramid stands the Great Ball Court, at 168 by 70 meters the largest and best preserved ball court in ancient Mesoamerica, its walls carved with feathered serpents and scenes of ritual sacrifice, and nearby the Temple of the Warriors rises as a stepped pyramid fronted by long rows of carved columns depicting warriors.
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A major Maya political and religious center, home to the step-pyramid El Castillo.
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