CIMG8257 Beheaded player sculpture at Chichen Itza

CIMG8257 According to our tour guide, this carving represents a player who has been beheaded and sacrificed to the gods. Seven streams of blood are sprouting from his neck (I can only count 6, though) and become snakes. I see a few other puzzling details in the picture. Is that a disproportionally minuscule head hanging from his neck? And his arms seem to originate in all the wrong places.

This is one of the series of my photos from a Gulf of Mexico / Caribbean cruise I went on in November of 2007. Our ship was named Ecstasy. It sailed from Galveston TX, to Cozumel and Progresso (Mexico) and back. From Progresso we took a tour bus to an ancient archeological site, Chichen Itza, to see Mayan pyramids.

November 2007