1889 unternahm Maudslay eine fünf-monatige Ausgrabung in Chichén Itzá, dem großen Ruinenort im Norden der yukatekischen Halbinsel.
Zu diesem Aufenthalt lag mir kein Feld-Tagebuch Maudslays vor, und so fußt die folgende Zusammenfassung seiner Arbeit dort auf seinen Beschreibungen in der Biologia Centrali-Americana.

Die postkoloniale Geschichte Chichén Itzás begann, als 1528 Francisco de Montejo, Adelantando und Gouverneur von Yucatán, mit 400 Spaniern nordöstlich von Conil landete und versuchte, die Einheimischen unter spanische Herrschaft zu bringen. Der Franziskaner Fray Diego de Landa ("Relacion de las Cosas de Yucatan, sacada de lo que escribió el padre Fray Diego de Landa de la orden de St. Francisco", 1566, erstmal 1860 von Abbé Brasseur de Bourbourg veröffentlicht) und der M.R.P. Fray Diego Lopes Cogulludo ("Historia de la Provincia de Yucathan", Madrid, 1688) schrieben später, daß die Spanier in Chichen Itza campierten und dort für zwei Jahre ihr Hauptquartier einrichteten.
Ein 1579 in Valladolid verfaßtes Dokument ("Relacion de la Villa de Valladolid de yucatan, escrita por el Cabilde de Aquella Ciudad") erwähnt allerdings nichts dergleichen, und Maudslay war der Ansicht, daß man vorerst lieber davon ausgehen sollte, daß sich der Name Chichén Itzá damals vielleicht über ein viel weiteres Umfeld als nur auf den Ruinenort erstreckt hatte¹⁷².
Erst 1540 gelang den Spaniern eine erfolgreiche Unterwerfungsexpedition, und 1542 erfolgte die Gründung von Mérida. In der Folgezeit wurden die Ruinen von Chichén Itzá als Steinbruch für den Haus- und Kirchenbau genutzt:

"The Indian ruins had been freely used as quarries when the buildings of Pisté and the hacienda were being raised, and many well-squared blocks of stone bearing fragments of hieroglyphics and other sculpture can be found embedded in the church-walls."¹⁷³

Am Weihnachtsabend 1888 war Maudslay in Mérida eingetroffen, von wo aus er seine Expedition planen und ausrüsten wollte. Zunächst mußte er jedoch einen Monat lang warten, bis sein Gepäck aus England eintraf und er die versprochenen Empfehlungsbriefe der "Regierungsauthoritäten" in Mexico bekam.
Diese erzwungene Wartezeit nutzte Maudslay für einen "flying visit" bei Mr. Thompson, dem amerikanischen Konsul, der die Ruinen von Labná (und später Chichén Itzá) untersuchte, und machte auch einen Abstecher nach Uxmal.
Als er schließlich alles beisammen hatte, was er benötigte, brach Maudslay auf, und "heartily tired of Merida [...] was delighted to turn my back on it."¹⁷⁴ Die Expedition gestaltete sich jedoch nicht als einfach:

"I was now breaking what was to me completely new ground, none of my old companions who assisted me at Copan and elsewhere were with me, and the attempt to employ a half-caste, as successor to Gorgonio López, proved a complete failure."

Am 6. Februar traf er in Pisté ein, einem zwei Meilen von Chichén Itzá entfernten Ort. Es folgte kontinuierliche Arbeit in Chichén bis zum 2. Juli (abgesehen von zwei Wochen, die er in Valladolid und Izamal verbrachte bei dem Versuch, mehr Arbeitskräfte zu bekommen).

Der Mangel an Arbeitskräften war auch hier ein großes Problem. Zu der Lage der yukatekischen Landarbeiter schreibt Maudslay:

"Until a very few years ago Yucatan was a most out-of-the-way corner of the world; it had little commercial intercourse with other countries and was seldom visited by travellers. The Spanish families, most of them large landowners, formed an exclusive aristocracy with complete control over the Indians, who were then, as indeed they are now, in a state of villenage, or, more accurately, "adscripti glebae". Although this condition of villenage is not likely to be in accordance with the laws of the Mexican Republic, it is strictly enforced by local custom, and in Yucatan, as well as in the Central-American republics, a moneyless debtor can be forced to give his services to his creditor until the debt has been worked off. Such debts are transferable, and a creditor is allowed to sell his claim to a third party, who thus becomes in turn entitled to the debitor´s services. Under these circumstances it can be easily understood that free Indian labourers are scarce in the land."¹⁷⁵

Zeitweise standen Maudslay gar keine Hilfskräfte zur Verfügung, doch zu seinem Glück stieß im März Henry N. Sweet (Boston), der bei Konsul Thompson in Labná assistiert hatte, für einen einwöchigen Besuch zu ihm und entschloß sich dann, bis Juli zu bleiben und Maudslay zu helfen.
Sweet erwies sich als "...not only a delightful companion but a most energetic and enthusiastic worker, and without his timely help my expedition must have proved almost a failure. As Mr. Sweet is a careful and finished photographer I turned over my apparatus to his charge, and his series of photographs of Chichén now published can be left to speak for themselves."¹⁷⁶

Bei seiner Ankunft fand Maudslay

"the whole site under somewhat dense vegetation. But this vegetation was of a very different character from that which clothes the Central-American ruins. Partly owing to the small depth of the soil and partly to the clearings made for food-plantations, there was an absence of forest-trees, and the wood resembled overgrown copse-wood in England rather than a tropical forest, with, however, this difference - that the saplings grew very close together and the numbers of lianas and climbers sometimes formed it into a dense jungle, and clearing was made the more dificult owing the the thorny stems both of trees and creepers.
A portion of the site we cleared entirely of all vegetation by burning the felled trees and shrubs; in other parts we found it to be an economy both of time and labour merely to clear away the undergrowth thoroughly and heap it together and burn it when dry."¹⁷⁷

Das hauptsächliche Unterscheidungsmerkmal, das Maudslay bei den Ruinen von Chichén Itzá im Vergleich mit anderen Ruinen, die er untersucht hatte, auffiel, waren die gerundeten Ecken der Gebäude sowie der häufige Gebrauch von Schlangen-Säulen und von Balustraden.

Als interessanteste Gebäudegruppe betrachtete Maudslay den Tlachtli, den Großen Ballspielhof, und die ihm angeschlossenen Tempel. Tempel A am südlichen Ende der Ost-Flanke des Ballspielplatzes (heute Upper Temple of the Jaguar genannt) besaß am Eingang zwei massive Säulen in Form von aufgerichteten Schlangen:

"The columns (j, j) are 3 feet 4 inches in diameter, and the bases, which measure in total length 7 feet, are fashioned into the resemblance of huge serpents´ heads. [...] A forked tongue, carved on a separate stone, projected for a distance of 2 feet 6 inches in front of each head. These tongues are not now in position, but were found amongst the débris at the foot of the wall. The southern column, including the serpent´s head, is formed of two block of stone, the northern column of three blocks. These columns rise to a height of only 7 feet 6 inches, and were surmounted by a most extraordinary form of capital, consisting of two limbs nearly at right angles one to another, cut from a single block of stone: one limb covered the top of the column and formed the capital suporting the wooden architrave, and the other turned up in front of the building and was carved on its sides and face to represent the rattles of the rattlesnake. [..]
I had for some time been greatly puzzled by finding similar stones lying at the bottom of the mounds [...]. The markings on them were clearly meant to represent the tails of rattlesnakes, but in no instance did I find one in position, and it was no easy matter to determine whence they had fallen. The proper position at the top of the columns at last occurred to me, but there was nothing beyond probability to guide me in determining if the tail should be turned up or down; eventually one was found with very faint traces of human figures carved on one side, and the position of these figures was conclusive evidence that the tails were turned upward. However, whilst those investigations were going on, no trace had been seen of any such capitals belonging to the two serpent columns of the great Ball Court Temple; but, having formed our conclusions from the other examples, we set to work and unearthed from the débris at the foot of the wall the huge fragments of two such capitals, from which accurate measurements were taken; and the thickness of those capitals, when added to the height of the columns, was found to bring their upper surface exactly to the level of the top of the pilasters h, h, so that the wooden lintel would lie evenly over then."¹⁷⁸

Im Inneren dieses Tempels fand Maudslay farbige Wand- und Deckengemälde vor, auf denen in lebendigen Farben Menschen, Häuser, Bäume, Kämpfe und häusliche Szenen dargestellt waren.
Auf die Existenz dieser Gemälde war Maudslay durch die Lektüre von Stephens bereits vorbereitet. Dieser hatte den Temple 1843 besucht, bedauerte jedoch schon damals:

"... the first feeling of gratified surprise was followed by heavy disappointment, for the whole was mulitated and disfigured. In some places the plaster was broken off; in every part deep and malignant scratches appeared in the walls, and while individual figures were entire, the connection of the subjects could not be made out."

Maudslay erwartete deshalb nicht allzuviel vom Zustand der Gemälde, die er nun mehr als vierzig Jahre später erneut betrachten wollte:

"If such were the condition of the walls in 1843 I expected to find very little remaining in 1888. However, although much of the plaster had fallen since the time of Stephens´s visit, and the floor was heaped high with fragments of plaster and rubbish, and although the paintings had been further ruthlessly damaged by visitors from the neighbouring towns and villages, who, with the point of a charred stick, had written their names in large letters all over the walls, yet there is still so much remaining of great interest that I deeply regret not having provided myself with materials for making tracings of all that is sufficiently distinct.
The fragments which I am now able to reproduce were traced on thin bank-post letter-paper, then transferred to the linen-backed paper which had been prepared for my large plane-table, and were coloured on the spot."¹⁷⁹

Die Arbeitsbedingungen wurden indes nicht besser:

"Then the heat became intense and the physical hard work very trying; for the Indians, although they could be trusted to some extent in the matter of clearing bush, would do next to nothing in the way of digging and moving away earth and rubble, unless one of us not only worked with them but worked much harder with pickaxe and spade than they did."¹⁸⁰

Im Mai hatten sowohl Maudslay als auch Sweet Fieber, aber nacheinander, so daß

"we could each take it in turn to be nurse and patient. The fever left us both very weak, and as at this time we were entirely deserted by our workmen it was difficult even to supply ourselves with wood and water; and I well remember one occasion on which it took us the whole afternoon to draw our water at the ´cenote, carry the tin only half full to the foot of the stairway, and then drag it step by step up to the house, so weak had the fever left us."¹⁸¹

Als ihr Proviant zur Neige ging, waren sie gezwungen, zusammenzupacken, "and on the 2nd July set out on our return to Merida."

Maudslay hatte im sogenannten Casa de Monjas gewohnt, und er war begeistert von dem Gebäude, dem Ausblick und der luftigen Höhe:

"On the broad terrace which ran round the house, thirty feet above the ground, we were on a level with the tree-tops, and we could see over the country for miles round to an unbroken horizon.
The weather was delightful up to the middle of May. The woods were alive with singing birds, and the beautiful Mot-Mots frequently flew in and out of our rooms; later on the heat became intense through the day and the showers not unfrequent. The cloud effects were most beautiful, and we never tired of watching the storm-clouds, three or four at a time in different directions, travelling across the country."¹⁸²

Trotz der harten Arbeit, der steten Sorgen um Arbeitskräfte und dem Fieberanfall konnte Maudslay nicht umhin, auf seinen Aufenthalt in Chichén Itzá mit "considerable pleasure and satisfaction" zurückzublicken.