The Ball Court

No, the Mayans didn't invent basketball - this is a ball game that we still have no idea how they played. The sides of the court are stepped almost like bleachers, and the players would try to get a ball made from the rubber trees that grow here into one of the baskets located at either side of the court. It is believed that the game was played with sticks, but that is as far as anyone seems willing to speculate. The rules of the game are unknown.

The court at Lamanai is small, a much larger version can be found at Alta-Hun - where it is believed that the game was played with teams. One thing is generally agreed upon, the goal of the game was either to win, and therefor be sacrificed as the favorite of the gods and ascend into one of the thirteen levels of Mayan heaven; or to win, and not be sacrificed as the unfavored of the gods and go to one of the many layers of hell.

This may seem strange - win to die? But the Mayans believed that the only way to go to heaven was to be sacrificed to the gods, and so being sacrificed at a time when you are obviously favored was an assurance of entrance into heaven.

A very interesting thing they found here at the ball court was located in a round flat stone in the middle of the court - the stone was found to be hollow, and inside it archaeologists found liquid mercury, which would have had to come from the highlands of now Guatemala, and the purpose for which is still unknown. Some speculate that this was the way in which the winner/loser would be sacrificed after the game.