Hormiguero
Hormiguero is Spanish for "anthill," referring both to the looters' tunnels that honeycombed these ruins when archaeologists discovered them and the number of enormous anthills in the area. The buildings here were constructed roughly between 400 BC and AD 1100 in the Río Bec style, with rounded lateral towers and ornamental stairways, the latter built to give an illusion of height, which they do wonderfully.
Note the intricately carved and well-preserved facade of the site's largest structure, Estructura II. Estructura V is also noteworthy owing to the Chaac masks arranged in a cascade atop a pyramid. Nearby is a perfectly round chultun (water-storage tank), and, seemingly emerging from the earth, the eerily etched designs of a still unexcavated structure.
