page_title: Mesoamerican ballcourt
section_title: Rings, markers, and other features
hierarchical_section_title: Mesoamerican ballcourt / Rings, markers, and other features
caption_attribution_description: A Goal in the Ball Court at Chichén Itzá, Mexico.
context_page_description: A Mesoamerican ballcourt is a large masonry structure of a type used in Mesoamerica for over 2,700 years to play the Mesoamerican ballgame, particularly the hip-ball version of the ballgame. More than 1,300 ballcourts have been identified, 60% in the last 20 years alone. Although there is a tremendous variation in size, in general all ballcourts are the same shape: a long narrow alley flanked by two walls with horizontal, vertical, and sloping faces. Although the alleys in early ballcourts were open-ended, later ballcourts had enclosed end-zones, giving the structure an -shape when viewed from above.
  Ballcourts were also used for functions other than, or in addition to, ballgames. Ceramics from western Mexico show ballcourts being used for other sporting endeavours, including what appears to be a wrestling match. It is also known from archaeological excavations that ballcourts were the sites of sumptuous feasts, although whether these were conducted in the context of the ballgame or as another event entirely is not as yet known.
context_section_description: Stone rings, tenoned into the wall at mid-court, appeared in the Terminal Classic era. Actually sending a ball through the ring must have been a rare occurrence. The players could not use their hands or even feet to guide the ball. Moreover, the rings were only slightly larger than the ball itself and were located at no small distance from the playing alley. At Chichen Itza, for example, they were set 6 meters above the alley, while at Xochicalco they set at the top of an 11-meter-wide apron, 3 meters above the playing alley (see lead photo).
  As shown on Aztec codices, court markers were also used on many ballcourts to establish the dividing line between teams – one set into the playing alley floor at exact mid-court, the other two placed against each side wall. However, such placement is not universal. Two ancient ceramic ballcourt models recovered from western Mexico show the three markers placed length-wise along the court: one (again) at exact mid-court with the remaining pair set midway between the walls at either end of the playing alley.  The ballcourt markers at Copan are also arranged in this manner. The ballcourt at Monte Alban, meanwhile, has only one court marker, placed at the exact center of the court.
  These sunken court markers are almost invariably round and usually decorated with ballgame-related scenes or iconography. Other markers were set into ballcourt walls.  Many researchers have also proposed that above-ground, moveable objects, for example stone hachas, were also used as court markers.
  Various sculptures, stelae, and other stonework were also important components of the ballcourt. At the ballcourt at Tonina, for example, 6 sculptures of prone captives overhang the apron, a pair at mid-court and a pair at each of the ends of the cornice. Unfortunately, rings, markers and sculptures are more portable and more prone to removal or destruction than the permanent ballcourt infrastructure, and at some ballcourts these features have been lost forever.
caption: A ring at Chichen Itza. This ring was set some 6 meters (20 feet) above the playing alley, making it extremely difficult to pass the heavy ball through the hole.
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