Why go
This history helps distinguish an ancient structure from the modern work that exposed and stabilized it. The site’s familiar monuments were studied by different teams, and early theories about “Toltec” newcomers are now treated more cautiously. It gives context to the restored forms visitors see today.
The full story
Augustus Le Plongeon began excavating in 1875, though his elaborate historical interpretations are no longer credible. Teoberto Maler photographed the ruins, and Alfred Percival Maudslay spent months documenting them. Edward Thompson purchased the estate containing the site in 1894 and worked there into the 1920s. From 1904 he dredged the Sacred Cenote and organized diving expeditions. In 1924 the Carnegie Institution of Washington began a long project with Mexican authorities under Sylvanus G. Morley. Its archaeologists worked on the Temple of the Warriors, El Caracol, Las Monjas, the Mercado and other structures. Mexican archaeologists restored El Castillo, the Great Ballcourt, the Tzompantli and nearby platforms. Ceramic finds from the Carnegie excavations informed a chronology for northern Yucatán. Mapping by Carnegie and later by Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) showed that the ancient city extended far beyond its best-known monuments. Researchers once treated contrasting building styles as proof of Maya and immigrant Toltec populations meeting here; the relationship between style and migration is more complex and remains debated.