A major lowland Maya city-state on the Vaca Plateau of present-day Belize; its royal dynasty was officially founded by Te' K'ab Chaak in AD 331 (Long Count 8.14.13.10.4), beginning as a client state of the more powerful Tikal before growing into one of the largest Classic Maya cities, at its height covering some 200 sq km with well over 100,000 people.
Caracol later broke from Tikal's orbit and, under Lord Water (Yajaw Te' K'inich II), decisively defeated Tikal in the AD 562 'star war,' opening Tikal's mid-Classic hiatus. Caracol itself declined through the Terminal Classic collapse; occupation of its epicentre ended no later than c. AD 900-950, after which the site was abandoned to the jungle until 20th-century rediscovery.
The atlas holds 3 border frames for Caracol — the shape you scrub through changes in 331 · 600 · 751.
Standard glyphic-history account of Classic Maya dynastic politics, including Tikal's rivalry with Caracol; already used elsewhere in this dataset for the same Maya-political-history angle.
Broad standard survey with dedicated treatment of Caracol's archaeology, its 4th-century dynastic founding, and the 562 AD 'star war' against Tikal.