Pok-Ta-Pok

The Maya called it Pok-ta-pok. The Aztec called it Tlachtli. In Puerto Rico it was called Batey. Though may cultures had it, and although they called it different things it was still the ball game. It is difficult to tell exactly what the Mesoamerican ball game was. Of course it was a game played with a rubber ball that weighed any where from six to ten pounds. The object of the game was to score …

…Power: Ballcourts and Political Ritual in Southern Mesoamerica. Current Anthropology, June 1996, v37 n3, Pg. 483. Harner, Michael. The Ecological Basis for Aztec Sacrifice. American Ethnologist, 1977. Miller, Mary Ellen. The Art of Mesoamerica: From Olmec to Aztec. Thames and Hudson Ltd, London. 1996. Searbrough, Vernon L. and David R. Wilcox. The Mesoamerican Ballgame. University of Arizona Press. 1991. Stern, Theodore. The Rubber-Ball Games of the Americas. Monographs of the American Ethnological Society, No. 17. J.J. Augustin Publisher, New York. 1950.