Chichen Itza Before the Tourists

Is Chichen Itza authentic? Does it matter?

George Dillard
8 min readAug 1, 2023

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Chichen Itza is one of Mexico’s top tourist attractions, visited by well over a million people per year. It’s become the most iconic site on the Yucatan Peninsula both because it is the home to remarkable ruins and because it’s close enough to Cancun for a day trip.

Today, the experience of visiting the archaeological site is similar to what you’ll find at many of the world’s most famous ancient ruins. Chichen Itza is an unforgettable place, but it’s crowded with tourists — many of whom seem to have come straight from the beach — and local people trying to sell them things. Many of the tourists there are on the same package-tour circuit: take a van from the resort, hit the ruins for an hour or two, then lunch and a swim in a cenote (a sinkhole filled with water; many of them look really good on Instagram!) before getting back to the hotel for dinner.

These centuries-old ruins are now part of the Yucatan Peninsula’s tourism-industrial complex, which fuels much of the local economy.

But Chichen Itza wasn’t always like this.

Chichen Itza is, for many foreign tourists, the one Mayan ruin they visit on their otherwise beach-focused trip to the Yucatan. But, in many ways, it’s not a typical Mayan site.

First, the city flourished as much of the rest of the Mayan world was in decline. Archaeologists surmise that the peak of Mayan culture happened during the…

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George Dillard
George Dillard

Written by George Dillard

Politics, environment, education, history. Follow/contact me: https://george-dillard.com. My history Substack: https://worldhistory.substack.com.

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