Kabah (El Palacio de los Mascarones)

Gordon Nicolson

Kabah (literally translating as ‘powerful hand’) was a dominant Maya settlement and is now an archaeological site in Mexico’s Yucatan state. Inhabited from the third century BC and, like nearby Uxmal, abandoned in circa 1200 AD, Kabah was mostly constructed from the seventh century and added to in the ninth century.

It is thought that Kabah was linked to the site of Uxmal – indeed the two are connected by a road (known as the sacbé) and, whilst it does not boast the grandeur of this larger settlement, Kabah’s ruins are interesting in their own right.

One of Kabah’s most impressive sites is El Palacio de los Mascarones (Temple/Palace of the Masks), so called for its many depictions of the rain god, Chaac: there are nearly 300 of them on the palace façade.