Teotihuacan

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Journal Entry: September 29

We climbed the two massive pyramids which was quite an undertaking! We saw beautiful views in all directions. Our guide, Ignacio, told us that the base measurements of each side of the Pyramid of the Sun have the exact same lengths as the Great Pyramid of Cheops in Egypt. Quite an amazing thing when you think about it. It would be a great idea if one of you did some research to confirm this (I think he said that they measured 230 meters on each side.) First we visited the Temple to Queztalc\243atl, the feathered serpent god, then we walked down the Avenue of the Dead that runs the length of the city. Why did they call it that? The Aztecs (or Mexicas) found a row of skeletons going down the length of each side of the “Calle de los Muertos” when they arrived. That might sound very strange, but since they did not bury their dead very deeply in the ground, archeologists believe that erosion must have uncovered the bodies. It was the Mexicas who named all of these buildings because the Teotihuacanos did not leave any written record of their names.

We then climbed up and down the massive Pyramid of the Sun and continued north up the Calle de los Muertos, to its end at the Pyramid of the Moon. It is smaller but is just as high as the Pyramid of the Sun because it was built higher up the slope. The Pyramid of the Moon was built to honor the Moon Goddess, the Sun Pyramid built to honor the Sun God, who was male. Our guide pointed out that even though the Sun Pyramid was bigger, the pyramid to the Moon Goddess stood just as tall and had a much more important location at the top of the city. Hmmmm?

See picture of part of Temple of Quetzalcoatl and our guide Ignacio below.