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Quetzalcoatl (28-D) was the governor of
the primitive Chichimecas, praised by the Toltecs of Tula as the founder god
of their lineage. These people reached their major development between 900
and 1000, when they consolidated their culture in the ceremonial centre of
Tula. But internal fights forced one part of the people to emigrate towards
the west, lead by a personage who flaunted the name of the founder god.
On the
Yucatan Peninsula a power centre of the Mayas was developed, but around the
year 987, the people from the west arrived, a group of “Itzaes” warriors,
lead by the new Quetzalcoatl, who the Mayas called Kukulkan. Both names have
the same significance “snake decorated with feathers”. The newly arrived
people dominated a small town, which had a natural well of sacered fame.
This place is called Chichen Itza and the Toltec commanders begun to
dominate the political life throughout the whole Yucatan Peninsula, included
more remote places like those in Guatemala, where they arrived to form the
town of Quiche. In the archaeological digs of the natural well of Chichen
Itza, directed by Alfred P. Mausdlay in the 1940’s, there were rescued
extraordinary jade pieces, among them the plates with details of governors
and prisoners
(28-A)
and
(28-B)
and the plate representing a warrior
(28-C)
put above a snake, the body of which is decorated with studs of
chalchihuites (jade stones).
On this
natural well there were also found other jade pieces, which belonged to the
dynasties of Mayan governors of the classic epoque of Piedras Negras and
Palenque. How the got to chichen Itza three centuries later is not known.

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