The Ruins at Tula
Near the present-day town of Tula (about 50 miles north of Mexico City) lie the remains of Tollán, the capital city of the Toltec empire that thrived from 900 AD to 1170. Tollán is generally believed to have been the next large city to arise in central Mexico after the fall of Teotihuacán.
The ruins at Tula share many architectural, artistic and religious influences with the Maya city of Chichén Itzá, some 700 miles away (by land) on Mexico's Yucatán peninsula. For years, scholars believed that the warlike Toltec had invaded distant Chichén Itzá and imposed their own culture. Today, however, most archaeologists believe that Toltec Tollán was one of many cities with whom the advanced Chichén Itzá traded and the common influences flowed from Chichén Itzá to Tollán. Whichever the direction of the cultural flow, visitors to both sites today will see many common features, including Chichén Itzá's Temple of the Warriors (which is similar to Tollán's Temple of Tlahuizcalpantecuhtli), ceremonial ball courts and representations of Chac-Mool, the intermediary between humans and the gods, who is depicted at both sites in a reclining posture with a dish balanced on his stomach that is believed to have once received the still-beating hearts of sacrificial victims.
