Kukulkán and its Multimedia Show

⁠Kukulkán and its Multimedia Show⁠

"Quetzalcoatl," the most iconic representation of this deity, is found on several friezes of ceremonial temples. Its meaning in the Mayan language also means "feathered serpent."

The head of the "feathered serpent," constructed of stone and with its clearly ornate, caricature-like features, is known in Mayan mythology as "Quetzalcoatl." The most iconic representation of this deity is located at the base of the northern staircase of the Temple of Kukulkan, built in Chichén Itzá in the 12th century. Its meaning in the Mayan language also means "feathered serpent." In Mayan mythology, he is known as a "civilizing deity" due to having gifted the sacred solar agricultural calendar to the people of this advanced pre-Columbian culture, for whom the change of seasons was fundamental in order to know when the planting season began.

But the Mayans not only represented the head of the "feathered serpent"; the body is also integrated into the architectural design of the Temple of Kukulkan. It can even be seen snaking thanks to the pyramidal geometric shape of the astrological sanctuary. Its facades are so aligned with the solar path on the celestial dome that, precisely on each equinox, the day spring begins in the northern hemisphere of the Earth, in the west of March 20th, a kinetic effect of light and shadow can be observed, specifically on the north staircase, formed by seven inverted triangles. These triangles represent the serpentine and sinuous corporeal entity of "Quetzalcoatl," descending from the sky to the base of the temple, signaling to the Mayans that the time to sow had arrived. But "Quetzalcoatl" wasn't just the trending topic that brought everyone together to begin weeding, because the time for sowing had arrived. A specific day on their calendar also brought them together as spectators who had waited a whole year to see in real time the first figurative animated sequence of all time, with a metaphorical content that everyone understood in the same sense: "Show Time."

As if this myth of “Quetzalcoatl” were not enough, and the display of astronomical knowledge of the Mayans visually integrated with the architecture of one of their temples with the use of the hybrid of a rattlesnake with the “quetzal”, which is a sacred bird for this civilization, and whose feathers were used to adorn the clothing of kings and priests, it was also discovered that on the steps of the northeast facade of the temple an acoustic effect is created when a person applauds, then the sound of the applause propagates towards the ramp of the stands, and from there a “feedback” is generated in the form of a distorted echo, as if the “Kukulkán” temple itself as a receiver retransmitted its response to the transmitter; That is, the echo is produced as a replica of the sound of applause, only it is heard differently from the initial source, because the echo is acoustically recoded into a click similar to the call of a Central American quetzal: a high-pitched whistle or cry whose onomatopoeia is "quiau,quiau."

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