Play Ball by ta88
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Description
First of several Ball Courts at El Tajin. They played ball games for keeps. Depending on who translates the glyphs (picto-graphic writing) either the captain of the winning (as a short cut to heaven)or losing team (as a punishment) lost his head!
Comments (2)
Chipka
Ah, yes...the win/no-win scenario these guys were so good at. Funny thing is they also invented the bouncy rubber ball! I love this capture. The fragmentary nature of it really appeals to me. You get a view of the actual court, the playing area and the places for the priests and the "witches" if North American stickball tournaments bear the similarities to the more southern ball courts that everyone says. (Among the more North American cousins of these Central and Southern American guys, "witches" were kinda like cheerleaders, only a bit more serious.) I've been to a couple of Choctaw Stickball games, and they were a lot of fun, and--presumably--very, very, very ancient. Nobody died, and the "witches" were quite busy trying to outdo the witches for the other team...it was colorful spectacle with tons of food afterward and lots of cute guys running around with no shirts on, and things like horse tails sticking out behind them from their fancy belts. Their culture-specific costumes made them look like fantastical mythical creatures (in garish shorts, and with grubby, dirty feet. Choctaws are tough; playing stickball with bare feet has to hurt!) I doubt that any of that stuff has anything to do with this image, but I love the fact that it triggered a pleasant recollection (and the memory of the unexpectedly good taste of roasted squirrel...kinda bony, but good.) I love the POV here, and the whole sense of "you are there." Thank you, also, for triggering one of the few really pleasant memories I have of summer in Mississippi among "redskins who talk like rednecks," according to a distant cousin of mine, who just so happens to have been one of those grubby-footed stickball players. I love shots like this one: a glimpse into the past, but unfortunately, it looks like you were a few hundred years too late to capture good game shots. Oh well! That's probably a good thing as photographers might also have been fodder for sacrifice.
Lashia
I love the long crop and the way the lines of the picture run well together- thanks for sharing! :-)
Selina Photography™