Mérida (Spanish pronunciation: [ˈmeɾiða] is the capital and largest city in Yucatan state in Mexico, as well as the largest city of the Yucatán Peninsula. The city is located in the northwest part of the state, about 35 kilometres (22 miles) off the coast of the Gulf of Mexico. The city is also the municipal seat of the Municipality of Mérida, which includes the city and the areas around it.
According to the 2015 census, the population of Mérida was 892,363, ranking 14th among the most populous Mexican cities. The Greater Mérida metropolitan area includes the municipalities of Mérida, Umán and Kanasín and had a population of 1,035,238 in the 2010 census. The municipality’s area is 858.41 km2 (331.43 sq mi). Among the four cities that share the same name around the world, it is the largest -the other three being in Spain, Venezuela, and the Philippines.
The city, like much of the state, has heavy Mayan, Spanish, French, British, Lebanese and to a lesser extent Dutch influences. Mérida has the highest percentage of indigenous population within any large city in Mexico. The Maya are approximately 60% of the population.
El Castillo, Chichen Itza
El Castillo,(Spanish pronunciation: [el kas’tiʎo], Spanish for “the castle”), also known as the Temple of Kukulcan (or sometimes Kukulkan), is a Mesoamerican step-pyramid that dominates the center of the Chichen Itza archaeological site in the Mexican state of Yucatán. The building is more formally designated by archaeologists as Chichen Itza Structure 5B18.
Built by the pre-Columbian Maya civilization sometime between the 8th and 12th centuries CE or AD, El Castillo served as a temple to the god Kukulkan, the Yucatec Maya Feathered Serpent deity closely related to the god Quetzalcoatl known to the Aztecs and other central Mexican cultures of the Postclassic period.
The pyramid consists of a series of square terraces with stairways up each of the four sides to the temple on top. Sculptures of plumed serpents run down the sides of the northern balustrade. Around the spring and autumn equinoxes, the late afternoon sun strikes off the northwest corner of the pyramid and casts a series of triangular shadows against the northwest balustrade, creating the illusion of a feathered serpent “crawling” down the pyramid. The event has been very popular and is witnessed by thousands of visitors at the spring equinox, but it is questionable whether it is a result of a purposeful design, because the light-and-shadow effect can be observed, without major changes, during several weeks around the equinoxes.[1] Each of the pyramid’s four sides has around 91 steps which, when added together and including the temple platform on top as the final “step”, may produce a total of 365 steps (the steps on the south side of the pyramid are eroded) (which is equal to the number of days of the Haab’ year).[2]
The structure is 24 m (79 ft) high, plus an additional 6 m (20 ft) for the temple. The square base measures 55.3 m (181 ft) across.
