What does “Mayans” bring to mind?

The second core pillar of the setting of “Vikings & Mayans & Dinosaurs” is “Mayans.”

So, similar to yesterday’s post on “Vikings,” I will try to rattle off some things that come to my mind about the concept of “Mayans.”

1) Mysterious cities deep in the jungle. Pyramids. Temples. Over a long span of time, some cities are abandoned, while new ones periodically emerge.

2) Warring city-states. Ritualized warfare. Capture & sacrifice of rival nobles / royalty.

3) The Underworld. Passages to the Underworld via caves and tunnels. The 12 Lords / Death Gods. Mortal heroes being tested by the gods.

4) A cyclic sense of time, with each great cycle relating to the end of one era of the world and the start of another.

These are elements that should be incorporated into a game-setting with a Mayan-like culture. Obviously, I will need more research into “Mayans” than “Vikings” just by the nature of me being an American of European descent who went to school in the 1970s and 1980s. (I’m not even sure the Mayan system of writing had been deciphered yet back then.)

All I’m looking for at this stage is a high-level concept.