Platform of Venus - Tracking the Morning Star

Photo: Gary Todd from Xinzheng, China, CC0 (cropped)

A stop on Chichen Itza Self-Guided Tour, a free self-guided tour.

This low square platform, with a staircase on each of its four sides, sits directly north of El Castillo. Look at the stair railings: they end in big serpent heads. On the carved side panels, look for star-like symbols that represent Venus, the brightest object in the sky after the sun and moon.

Venus mattered enormously to Maya astronomers. They tracked its appearances on the horizon through a cycle of about 584 days and noticed that five of those cycles equal almost exactly eight solar years. Pages of the Dresden Codex, one of the few Maya books to survive, are given over to Venus tables that predict its movements.

In central Mexican legend, the feathered serpent god became linked with Venus as the morning star - one more thread tying this city's art to wider Mesoamerica. Excavators also found carved stone cones here whose purpose is still unknown.

Before you move on, walk around the platform and look for the Venus symbols on its carved panels.

Getting here: Cross the open plaza east from the Tzompantli toward El Castillo; this low platform sits on the plaza just north of the pyramid.

Did you know?: Because five Venus cycles match eight solar years, Venus repeats the same pattern in the sky on nearly the same calendar dates every eight years.

Photo op: Frame a serpent-head railing in the foreground with El Castillo rising behind it.

More on Wikipedia: Venus · Dresden Codex · Quetzalcoatl

Platform of Venus - Tracking the Morning Star

Stops on this tour