Tikal- The Famous City of The Ancient Maya

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Tikal was the largest urban center in the southern Maya lowlands and used to be an important city and a ceremonial centre of the ancient Maya Civilization. It is located about 19 miles (30 km) north of Lake Petén Itzá in a tropical rainforest, at the northern part of Petén region in Guatemala. Today Tikal ruins are the primary attraction site in Tikal National Park, which was designated a World Heritage Site in 1979. Like many of other Maya centers in the southern lowlands, Tikal was first occupied as a small village in the Middle Formative Period (900–300 BC) ; afterwards, in the Late Formativ e Period (300 BC–AD 100) , Tikal became an important ceremonial centre with the built structures of major pyramids and temples. Its glory days, however, came in the Late Classic Period (AD 600–900), at that time it flourish with its brilliant planning and construction of great plazas, pyramids and palaces, also the appearance of Maya hieroglyphic writing and complex systems of astronomy and time-counting. There are numerous dedicatory stela (stele) at the site, which are dated from the 3rd century AD until the end of the 9th century (the last dated stela at the site is placed at 889). Normally such stela inscribed with hieroglyphs and dates and are telling the story of a priest or other important person.
In the Early Classic Period (AD 100–600) , Tikal was an important station in the vast trading network that was established at the same time, in southern Meso-America by the central Mexican City of Teotihuacán . In the Late Classic Period after the decline of Teotihuacán, Tikal continued to prosper and probably even extended its authority and control over a large part of the southern lowlands. Tikal reached its architectural and artistic peak between 600 and 800, after which a decline set in, with depopulation and a general decline in artistic quality.
Small groups continued to live at the Tikal for about another century but by the 10th century Tikal, along with the other Maya centers of the southern lowlands, was abandoned and over grown with jungle vegetation.
The major structures in Tikal include five pyramidal temples and three large complexes (acropolis), these probably were temples and palaces for the upper class. One such complex is composed of numerous buildings beneath which have been found richly prepared burial chambers. Pyramid 1 is topped by the Temple of the Jaguar and rises to (148 feet). Just west of Pyramid 1 and facing it is Pyramid 2, standing (138 feet) above the jungle floor and supporting the Temple of the Masks. Pyramid 3 is 180 feet high. Near the Plaza of the Seven Temples stands Pyramid 5 (187 feet). Pyramid 4 (213 feet) is the highest of the Tikal monuments, which is the westernmost of the major ruins and also the site of the Temple of the Two-Headed Serpent. Pyramid 4 is one of the tallest Pre-Columbian structures in the Western Hemisphere .
The main area of Tikal covers approximately 1 square mile (2.5 square km) and with its surrounding smaller structures, that used as residences it encompassing a larger area of at least 6 square miles (15.5 square km). These residential structures, however, were rather widely separated and not arranged in streets or in close-packed formation, as in the case of Teotihuacán (the Mexican city) . It is estimated that at its peak period (c. 700) the center of Tikal had a population of about 10,000 persons and that center drew upon an outlying population of approximately 50,000.