Tikal National Park
Ruined Maya capital of towering limestone temples set in Petén rainforest, a UNESCO World Heritage site.
Tikal was one of the largest cities of the Classic Maya world, occupying a limestone ridge in the rainforest of northern Petén. Settlement began in the fourth century BC, and between roughly AD 200 and 900 the city dominated a wide region, with a population estimated in the tens of thousands. Its rulers raised six great pyramid-temples, several rising more than sixty metres, along with palaces, ball courts, causeways and hundreds of carved stelae and altars.
The ruins were reported to the Guatemalan authorities in the mid nineteenth century and excavated intensively from the 1950s onwards. Guatemala declared a national park in 1955, and in 1979 UNESCO inscribed Tikal as one of the first mixed World Heritage sites, recognising both the archaeology and the surrounding forest, home to howler monkeys, coatis and toucans. Visitors follow marked trails between the Great Plaza, the Lost World complex and Temple IV, the tallest structure on site.
Highlights
- Temple I, the Temple of the Great Jaguar, on the Great Plaza
- Temple IV, at about 65 metres the tallest structure at the site
- Mundo Perdido (Lost World) pyramid complex and its early astronomy group
- Rainforest setting with howler monkeys, coatis and toucans
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