Editing Mesoamerican ballgame (section)

==Origins==
[[Image:Early Mesoamerican Ballgame sites 1.svg|thumb|350px|A map showing sites where early ballcourts, balls, or figurines have been recovered]]
[[File:Chichén_Itzá_-_Juego_de_Pelota.jpg|thumb|300px|A view into the [[Mesoamerican ballcourt|ballcourt]] at [[Chichen Itza]]]]

It is not known precisely when or where the Mesoamerican ballgame originated, although it is likely that it originated earlier than 2000 BC in the low-lying tropical zones home to the [[Castilla elastica|rubber tree]].<ref>[[#Shelton|Shelton]], pp. 109–110. There is wide agreement on game originating in the tropical lowlands, likely the Gulf Coast or Pacific Coast.</ref>

One candidate for the birthplace of the ballgame is the [[Soconusco]] coastal lowlands along the Pacific Ocean.<ref>[[#Taladoire2001|Taladoire (2001)]] pp. 107–108.</ref>  Here, at [[Paso de la Amada]], archaeologists have found the oldest ballcourt yet discovered, dated to approximately 1400 BC.<ref name="See Hill 1998"/>

The other major candidate is the [[Olmec heartland]], across the [[Isthmus of Tehuantepec]] along the [[Gulf Coast of Mexico|Gulf Coast]].<ref>Miller and Taube (1993, p.42)</ref> The [[Aztecs]] referred to their [[Mesoamerican chronology|Postclassic]] contemporaries who then inhabited the region as the ''Olmeca'' (i.e. "rubber people") since the region was strongly identified with [[latex]] production.<ref>These Gulf Coast inhabitants, the [[Olmeca-Xicalanca]], are not to be confused with the [[Olmec]], the name bestowed by 20th-century archaeologists on the influential Gulf Coast civilization which had dominated that region three thousand years earlier.</ref> The earliest-known rubber balls in the world come from the sacrificial bog at [[El Manatí]], an early Olmec-associated site located in the hinterland of the [[Coatzacoalcos River]] drainage system.<ref>[[#Ortiz1999|Ortiz and Rodríguez]] (1999), pp. 228–232, 242–243.</ref>

Villagers, and archaeologists, have recovered a dozen balls ranging in diameter from 10 to 22&nbsp;cm from the freshwater spring there.  Five of these balls have been dated to the earliest-known occupational phase for the site, approximately 1700–1600 BC.<ref>[[#Ortiz1999|Ortiz and Rodríguez]] (1999), pp. 228–232, 242–243.</ref>  These rubber balls were found with other ritual offerings buried at the site, indicating that even at this early date the game had religious and ritual connotations.<ref>[[#Diehl|Diehl]], p. 27</ref><ref>[[#Uriarte|Uriarte]], p. 41, who finds that the juxtaposition at El Manatí of the deposited balls and serpentine staffs (which may have been used to strike the balls) shows that there was already a "well-developed ideological relationship between the [ball]game, power, and serpents."</ref>  A stone "yoke" of the type frequently associated with Mesoamerican ballcourts was also reported to have been found by local villagers at the site, leaving open the distinct possibility that these rubber balls were related to the ritual ballgame, and not simply an independent form of sacrificial [[votive deposit|offering]].<ref>[[#Ortiz1999|Ortiz and Rodríguez]] (1999), p. 249</ref><ref>Ortíz, "Las ofrendas de El Manatí y su posible asociación con el juego de pelota: un yugo a destiempo", pp. 55–67 in [[#Uriarte|Uriarte]]</ref>

Excavations at the nearby Olmec site of [[San Lorenzo Tenochtitlán]] have also uncovered a number of ballplayer figurines, [[Radiocarbon dating|radiocarbon-dated]] as far back as 1250–1150 BC.  A rudimentary ballcourt, dated to a later occupation at San Lorenzo, 600–400 BC, has also been identified.<ref>[[#Diehl|Diehl]], p. 32, although the identification of a ballcourt within San Lorenzo has not been universally accepted.</ref>

From the tropical lowlands, the game apparently moved into central Mexico.  Starting around 1000 BC or earlier, ballplayer figurines were interred with burials at [[Tlatilco]] and similarly styled figurines from the same period have been found at the nearby [[Tlapacoya (Mesoamerican site)|Tlapacoya]] site.<ref name=BradleyJoralemon/>  It was about this period, as well, that the so-called [[Xochipala]]-style ballplayer figurines were crafted in [[Guerrero]].  Although no ballcourts of similar age have been found in Tlatilco or Tlapacoya, it is possible that the ballgame was indeed played in these areas, but on courts with perishable boundaries or temporary court markers.<ref name=Ekholm/>

By 300 BC, evidence for the game appears throughout much of the Mesoamerican archaeological record, including ballcourts in the Central Chiapas Valley (the next oldest ballcourts discovered, after Paso de la Amada),<ref>Finca Acapulco, San Mateo, and El Vergel, along the Grijalva, have ballcourts dated between 900 and 550 BC (Agrinier, p. 175).</ref>  and in the [[Oaxaca Valley]], as well as ceramic ballgame tableaus from Western Mexico (see photo below).