Talk:Tohil

A fact from Tohil appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 3 February 2010 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that human sacrifices to the K'iche' Maya patron deity Tohil had their severed heads placed on a rack in front of the temple?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2010/February.

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Looted?

The section Temple of Tohil says that the exterior facing of the temple was "looted". This is a rather judgmental term, particularly as the removal apparently took place long ago (hence the intent of the actors is hard to reconstruct). Is it certain that the stone was not simply scavenged for building other structures, as was common among the Maya? --Piledhigheranddeeper (talk) 18:01, 3 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The structure is discussed in more detail in the Q'umarkaj article. In the 19th century the temple was still reasonably well preserved but was later plundered for building materials - the stone facing from many of the buildings at Q'umarkaj was plundered and used to build modern buildings in the nearby town of Santa Cruz del Quiché. This seems to have happened in the 19th and 20th centuries, I think the term "looted" is appropriate, and is certainly the term some of the sources use. Regards, Simon Burchell (talk) 18:10, 3 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]