AD 636 – 686
Yuknoom Ch'een the Great
In AD 636 the Kaanul dynasty splits. Yuknoom Head overthrows Waxaklajuun Ubah Chan, the heir at Dzibanche, and one branch of the lineage settles at Calakmul, which becomes the capital of the kingdom. Another branch goes on ruling at Dzibanche. Yuknoom Ch'een II, born in 600, takes the throne of Calakmul in 636 and reigns for fifty years.
Structure II at Calakmul above the forestWikimedia Commons, CHeitz, CC BY 2.0 (Estructura II from top of another structure.jpg)
He raises 18 stelae at Calakmul and probably builds the palace complexes of its core. In January 657 he defeats Tikal in a "star war" and drives its king Nuun Ujol Chaak from the city. Nuun Ujol Chaak and his rival at Dos Pilas, B'alaj Chan K'awiil, both attend a rite of the Kaanul heir Yuknoom Yich'aak K'ahk' held before 662.
Inscriptions across the lowlands name Yuknoom Ch'een as overlord. At El Perú he oversees the installation of King K'inich Bahlam and marries a Calakmul princess to him. He supervises the accession of kings of Cancuén, 245 km to the south, in 656 and 677. A daughter of his marries a lord of La Corona in 679, and in 685 one of his envoys oversees a rite at Piedras Negras on the Usumacinta.
A relief from La Corona showing Yuknoom Ch'een II as a ballplayer on a visit in 635, National Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Guatemala CityWikimedia Commons, Konjiki1, CC0 (La Corona relieve.jpg)
Yuknoom Ch'een dies in his eighties, probably early in 686, and leaves Calakmul the strongest city of the central lowlands. Many successes of his last years may belong to Yuknoom Yich'aak K'ahk', born in 649, who is crowned on 3 April 686.
Sources
- Simon Martin and Nikolai Grube, Chronicle of the Maya Kings and Queens (2000), pp. 108 to 110.
- Simon Martin, Of Snakes and Bats: Shifting Identities at Calakmul, The PARI Journal 6 (2) (2005), pp. 5 to 15.
- Stanley Guenter, Under a Falling Star: The Hiatus at Tikal (2002).
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