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In the ancient Maya cities, all sorts of offertory items including sacrificial implements were also stored and buried in deposits (caches) below architectural features such as floors, stelae, and altars; in these cases, the intention may often have been a dedication to a specific religious purpose, rather than an offering to a divine recipient.
The Classic Maya used dedication rituals to sanctify their living spaces and family members by associating their physical world with supernatural concepts through religious practice. The existence of such rituals is inferred from the frequent occurrence of so-called 'dedication' or 'votive' cache deposits in an archaeological context.
In common with the rest of Mesoamerica, the Maya believed in a supernatural realm inhabited by an array of powerful deities who needed to be placated with ceremonial offerings and ritual practices. [339] At the core of Maya religious practice was the worship of deceased ancestors, who would intercede for their living descendants in dealings ...
Although Jenkins suggests that ancient Maya knowledge of this event was based on observations of the Dark Rift in the Milky Way as seen from Earth (this dark rift, it is said by some Mayan scholars, was believed by some Mayans to be one of the entrances to Xibalba), others see it as evidence of knowledge imparted via ancient contact with ...
This resulted in the erasure of Mayan religious institutions, especially those centered on human sacrifice and propitiation of the multi-deistic pantheon. Martial values and human sacrifice were a ritualistic core of Mesoamerican spirituality prior to European incursion, but quickly dissolved in the early stages of Imperial rule.
In ancient Maya cosmology, Middleworld is the Earth, or the world of men. "In ancient Maya thought, the universe was suffused with sacredness that resonated from the presence of deities. The ancestors, spirits and deities not only resided in the Upperworld and the Underworld (sometimes called Xibalba), but also shared the Middleworld, or Earth ...
The Mayan calendar’s 819-day cycle has confounded scholars for decades, but new research shows how it matches up to planetary cycles over a 45-year span
Burial practices of the Maya changed over the course of time. In the late Preclassic period , people were buried in a flexed position, later the dead were laid to rest in an extended position. In the late Classic period , the elite constructed vaulted tombs, and some rulers ordered the construction of large burial complexes.