History Main / Mayincatec

* Quite a few zoos have Latin American sections that are themed around Mayan Ruins even though most of the animals on display are found in South America.

* The Mexico pavilion at Epcot is built to look like an Aztec pyramid.

* The [[TempleOfDoom Mystic Ruins]] and [[FloatingContinent Angel Island]] in the ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog'' series. The ancient Knuckles Clan are based on the ancient Mayans and some are named after Central and South American locations. Sega paid a few developers around $250,000 ''each'' to go down to Mexico and base Mystic Ruin after the Mayan temples.

* There are several examples of this in ''TabletopGame/{{Exalted}}'', as well. Firstly, the characters used to represent the language of Old Realm are pretty much directly based off of Mayan hieroglyphs. Also, the First Age was either completely loaded down with this trope, or it was mostly limited to the areas in the Southeast around Rathess, depending on your edition.
** The Dragon Kings go deeper into that aesthetic, sacrificing hearts to the Unconquered Sun, constructing geomantic temples and mastering astrology.

* Conquistadores [[GodGuise mistaken for gods]], leading to [[FalseFriend the downfall of the Mayincatec people]]. (In reality, it depended on the conquistador -- Hernán Cortez in the region of Anáhuac chose to make an alliance with the Tlaxcala people that was upheld throughout the entire colonial era, and even had the local chiefs be recognized as nobles of the Spaniard kingdom; Nuño de Guzmán in western Mexico did abuse this straight to exterminate local tribes; and Francisco Pizarro in Perú made the Inca empire a fiefdom of the Spaniard crown).
* Desiccated bodies in ceremonial outfits: unwrapped mummies. This is occasionally portrayed like AncientEgypt in the jungle rather than desert. (This only happened in the Inca empire, which grew into cold deserts that lent themselves quite well to mummification)

* Conquistadores [[GodGuise mistaken for gods]], leading to [[FalseFriend the downfall of the Mayincatec people]]. (In reality, it depended on the conquistador -- Hernán Cortez in the region of Anáhuac chose to make an alliance with the Tlaxcala people that was upheld throughout the entire colonial era, and even had the local chiefs be recognized as nobles of the Spaniard kingdom; Nuño de Guzmán in western Mexico did play this straight to exterminate local tribes; and Francisco Pizarro in Perú made the Inca empire a fiefdom of the Spaniard crown).

* Desiccated bodies in ceremonial outfits: unwrapped mummies. This is occasionally portrayed like AncientEgypt in the jungle rather than desert.

* The Long Count Calendar, which has 394-year ''b'ak'tun'' cycles one of which ended on December 21, 2012. The historical Mayans did ''not'' predict any sort of apocalypse on this date -- it is basically January 1st, 2000 in Mayan time units -- but it has nonetheless resulted in the MayanDoomsday trope. Incidentally, the Mayan calendar is frequently erroneously portrayed with the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aztec_calendar Aztec calendar]].

* Conquistadors often feature as conquerors of the Mayincatec. Alternate history or fantasy variations have the Mayincatic seeking to slaughter and/or sacrifice their would-be conquerors. The Conquistadors are also often used as villains in stories where the Mayincatec are the protagonists.
* Conquistadors [[GodGuise mistaken for gods]], leading to [[FalseFriend the downfall of the Mayincatec people]].

* Jungle settings and an abundance of wildlife: snakes, spiders, alligators/crocodiles, [[PantheraAwesome jaguars]] and monkeys. In case of Incas, [[EverythingsBetterWithLlamas llamas]] may pop up. May overlap with ArtisticLicenseGeography, as the Valley of Mexico is actually a temperate forest land, and the Inca were a mountain-dwelling culture rather than a jungle-dwelling one.

* Jungle settings and an abundance of wildlife: snakes, spiders, alligators/crocodiles, [[PantheraAwesome jaguars]] and monkeys. In case of Incas, [[EverythingsBetterWithLlamas llamas]] may pop up. May overlap with ArtisticLicenseGeography, as the Inca in particular were a mountain-dwelling culture rather than a jungle-dwelling one.

* VirginSacrifice: Men were the primary choice of sacrifice and virginity didn't factor into it. But you get more drama out of virgin sacrifices, so that's what Hollywood goes with.

** The treasure's backstory being an Aztec ransom paid to Cortes and then Cortes going back on his word and being cursed for it is actually closer to the story of [[UsefulNotes/SpanishConquestOfTheIncaEmpire Pizarro, Atahualpa and the Room of Gold]] than anything that happened during the [[UsefulNotes/SpanishConquestOfMexico Conquest of Mexico]]. The Aztecs didn't even use gold as a currency. Cortes had a long, mostly prosperous life after conquering the Aztecs (other than being barred from returning to Mexico), while Pizarro's pals were marred by infighting and assassinations, including Pizarro's own.

* During the Spanish conquest, many indigenous peoples allied with the Spanish and re-settled in places far from their land of origin, like Tlaxcalans in northern Mexico (and as far as New Mexico and Texas) and Nicaraguans in Peru. Some Tlaxcalans even ended up in the Philippines.

* In ''WesternAnimation/TheTick'' episode "Sidekicks Don't Kiss," Arthur was kidnapped by a group of "Aztecs." As with the comic example above, these "Aztecs" were originally a baseball theam that got stranded in the jungle and copied Aztec culture through a book they picked up at the airport.

* ''ComicBook/TheTick'' parodies this with [[http://home.jps.net/~lsnyder/7_tick.html#aztecs The Deertown Aztecs]] -- a former sports team that crashed in the jungle and now attempt to live their lives according to the only book they had: "Aztecs On My Mind." They have a temple pyramid complete with traps.

** Giving the name "Eldorado" to the Mayan Unique Technology is inexcusable. This seems to pursue the Mayas for some reason: When the fan-made x-pack ''Forgotten Empires'' (later [[AscendedFanon officialized]] as ''The Forgotten'') gave civilizations a second UT, the Mayans got one called "Tlatoani" - the title used by ''Aztec'' emperors. When fans complained, it was changed to "Obsidian Arrows", which also makes more sense as a name for the technology (a boost in archer damage to buildings).
*** Later, "Obsidian Arrows" was found to be overpowered and was replaced with "Hul'che Javelineers", which allows skirmishers to throw two javelins instead of one (Hul'che is the Mayan version of the Atlatl, which is also the name of an Aztec tech buffing their skirmishers, though in a different way).

* Right in the Midwest, the Mississippian civilization had large urban centers, a powerful priestly class, warriors associated with birds (though they were falcons rather than eagles), giant pyramids (of mud, not stone), and human sacrifice. They collapsed in the 15th and 16th centuries for not entirely clear reasons (most likely being plagues unwittingly brought from Europe that killed off [[AfterTheEnd more than 90%]] of pre-Columbian North Americans), and from their ruins emerged the horse nomads of the plains that most people associate with prehistorical North America.

* ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfSpyroANewBeginning'': The Apes in [[TempleOfDoom Tall Plains]] wear feathered headpieces and decorated armor in a pseudo-Aztec style, and the larger ones also wield clubs loosely resembling Aztec weaponry.

* Tribalstack Tropics in ''VideoGame/YookaLaylee'' has this aesthetic with it's temples and mask-wearing Corplings.

* The Darkness Pagoda from ''TabletopGame/FengShui'''s Netherworld styles itself after the Aztec Empire, and its ruler, Ming I the Queen of Darkness, is one of the vilest villains of the entire Feng Shui setting.
* ''TabletopGame/InNomine'' -- based on the conflicts of gods and devils -- features Quetzalcoatl, Mictalantechtli, Huitzilopochtli and other [[Myth/AztecMythology Aztec gods]].

* ''VideoGame/CurseOfTheDeadGods'' features a temple to the titular Gods of Wonder(and [[spoiler:BigBad X'belz'aloc]]) that has Incan rope bridges, a huge emphasis on Aztec blood sacrifice, and a giant rotating stone wheel-door that bears much similarity to the Mayan long-count calendar. Justified, as the temple was built by the in-universe [[FantasyCounterpartCulture Chatac]] civilization, which is implied to have influenced the other cultures in Mesoamerica in a weird inverted example of CultureChopSuey.

* VirginSacrifice: Ironically, the Aztecs, Mayans, and Inca primarily sacrificed men--female sacrifices aren't unheard of, but they tended to be special occasions or practiced by other tribes in the area. To be sure, it's not as prevalent in this setting as others featuring human sacrifice.

** The Maya-style temple in ''Film/IndianaJonesAndTheKingdomOfTheCrystalSkull''. [[spoiler: The film has aliens living with the ancient Maya and teaching them about agriculture, never mind that the characters are in Peru, closer to the Inca than the Maya, and even so using Inca may have been inaccurate geographically speaking.]] The civilization is supposed to be an {{Expy}} of El Dorado located in {{The Amazon}}, with references to the Maya and other Mesoamerican cultures. The temple also included artifacts from civilizations all over the world. It should also be noted, that apparently Indy picked up Quechua riding with Pancho Villa!

** The treasure's backstory being an Aztec ransom paid to Cortes and then Cortes going back on his word and being cursed for it is actually closer to the story of Pizarro, Atahualpa and the Room of Gold than anything that happened during the Conquest of Mexico. The Aztecs didn't even use gold as a currency. Cortes had a long, mostly prosperous life after conquering the Aztecs (other than being barred from returning to Mexico), while Pizarro's pals were marred by infighting and assassinations, including Pizarro's own.

* ''VideoGame/CurseOfTheDeadGods'' features a temple to the titular Gods of Wonder(and [[spoiler:BigBad X'belz'aloc]] that has Incan rope bridges, a huge emphasis on Aztec blood sacrifice, and a giant rotating stone wheel-door that bears much similarity to the Mayan long-count calendar. Justified, as the temple was built by the in-universe [[FantasyCounterpartCulture Chatac]] civilization, which is implied to have influenced the other cultures in Mesoamerica in a weird inverted example of CultureChopSuey.

* ''VideoGame/CurseOfTheDeadGods'' is a {{Roguelike}} based on the premise of exploring the single Aztec temple where their gods still have power since Cortez destroyed their faith. They have just enough power left to 1) TheHorde of TheUndead guarding their treasure, and 2) curse any explorer searching for it. Of course, curses are subjective...