Dr. Bob Visits Tula

Transcript:

[00:00:01.02] – Dr Bob

Hello, everyone. It's Dr. Bob. Today, I'm in Tula, and I'm at the top of what is locally called Pyramid B. The temple of Quetzalcoatl. On the top of this temple structure is a series of pillars, four of them sculpted to look like Toltec warriors. For others that appear to be other gods or other significant figures, there is one that seems to represent Quetzalcoatl, which again ties this temple in this site to Quetzalcoatl. In addition, just to the side, it's now missing, but there was a palace to Quetzalcoatl, and there remains a palace here on the other side. These temples here, both pyramid B and pyramid C, which is in worse condition, which we'll show you here in a minute, are believed to have been built by the Toltecs. As the Toltec civilization began to decline, and before the Aztecs arose, the Tula, the Toltec natives here in Tula and around the Toltecs, they then filled in that vacuum. This pyramid dates between the fall of Teotihuacan, about 800 or so AD, through about 1100 AD when the Aztecs began to rise and take power. It was a significant site. It's difficult to know just how broad this site got because there's now a community built up in this area, and so it makes excavations difficult.

[00:01:49.14] - Dr Bob

So, the assumption is that this was never a very large complex, although it very likely housed 20,000 to 40,000 people, so fairly significant by Mesoamerican standards. This temple, like the others that we visited, went through four or five possible reconstructions as it continued to grow and get larger. And of course, we see this one now. After the fall of the Toltec, we don't know exactly why they fell, but inner turmoil, climate changes, who knows? But the Aztecs then, for a while, didn't seem to care much about this site, and eventually they began to embrace it. This is Tula Grande. There is also Tula Chico, not very far away, which is the original Tula and a smaller site. There's evidence that it was destroyed by fire. So, this is a very significant site that reinforces the breadth of this Quetzalcoatl narrative that went throughout the Mesoamerican religious environment. There's a strong indication of a connection here from Tula to the temples and the symbolism in Chiti Nitsa. Even though Chita Nitza is seen as a Mayan site, and this is a Toltec site, there was at the very least some cross-pollination of religious ideas, if not even a greater cultural connection, whether through conquest or simply through trade.

[00:03:15.00] - Dr Bob

An amazing site, and we'll show you some of the other aspects of this site, which is unique in the fact that a lot of the architecture, like these large pieces, remains. It's seen as a site without a lot of artwork work without a lot of cultural significance in that way. That's hard to say because the site has been pillaged on at least two major occasions with the Aztecs and with the fall of the Toltec Empire here. So what there may have been may have been looted and taken elsewhere. It's very likely this was as rich as society as Teotihuacan or the Mayan cultures that came after. A great filler in between what happened in Teotihuacan what happened later with the Aztecs.