Sayil

Sayil was a pre-Columbian city built by the Maya people of the Terminal Classic period. It lies in the southwest of the Mexican state of Yucatán, south of Uxmal, in the karst limestone hills of the Puuc region. Sayil, Kabah and Labna were incorporated together with Uxmal as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1996. It was built in a shallow valley among low, steep hills, 7 kilometres (4.3 mi) south of Kabah, and the region has well defined wet and dry seasons and almost no surface water because of its porous limestone bedrock.

Sayil was first settled circa AD 800, possibly by small Chontal warrior groups. It reached its greatest extent c. 900, covering approximately 5 km2 with perhaps 10,000 people in the city and another 5,000–7,000 in the surrounding area. At that peak the population reached the limits of the land's agricultural carrying capacity, with crops grown among the residential complexes and irrigated from artificial cisterns that stored seasonal rain. Decline began c. 950, and the city was abandoned by c. AD 1000, a pattern of rapid growth and decline probably typical of the Puuc region.

Badly damaged monuments suggest that Sayil was governed by a local royal dynasty, with wealth among lineages based at least partly on control of the best agricultural lands. Leadership appears to have been distinct and relatively decentralised. Smaller sites around it, such as Sodzil, Xcavil de Yaxche and Xkanabi, may have been tributary communities. Ceramics from the Palace indicate trade with the Petén region of Guatemala, and obsidian came largely from the El Chayal source in what is now southwest Guatemala.

The site is laid out along a sacbe, or causeway, running from north to south. The Great Palace at its northern end is the largest and best known building. It has a facade 85 metres long and stands on a two-terraced platform that gives the impression of three stories, with rooms arranged around each terrace. A causeway runs south to a complex 350 metres (1,150 ft) away that includes El Mirador, a badly damaged temple pyramid with a prominent crest. Further on, a small platform holds the remains of eight stelae and seven plain altars. Structure 3B1, the Temple of the Hieroglyphic Doorway, has an interior doorway decorated by a band of hieroglyphs, and Puuc-style columns recur across the site.

John Lloyd Stephens and Frederick Catherwood explored the site in 1841 and published an illustrated description in 1843, calling it Zayi. The Mexican Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia restored parts of it in the first half of the twentieth century. Jeremy Sabloff and Gair Tourtellot investigated it from 1983 to 1988, and from 1990 to 1992 Michael P. Smyth and Christopher D. Dore collected nearly 30,000 ceramic fragments across the site.

The site is located in the karst limestone hills of the Puuc region of the northern Yucatan Peninsula.

Sayil is located 7 kilometres (4.3 mi) south of the contemporary Puuc archaeological site of Kabah, 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) from in Xlapak and 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) from Labna. It was built in a shallow valley among low, steep hills.

The Puuc region that includes the site of Sayil possesses well defined wet and dry seasons and is characterised by a near absence of surface water due to the porous limestone bedrock.