Batey (game) - Batey Origins

Batey Origins

There is no consensus as to whether the batey ball game in the Caribbean was independently developed in different regions of the New World or whether it diffused from one or more locations. The large centrally located cemeteries in Saladoid villages served as plazas like those seen in the lowland communities of South America.

The ceremonial and religious significance of the later-developed ball game appears to indicate a connection with the Mesoamerican ballgame, and it has been argued that the batey ball game of the Caribbean is a simplified version of the Maya pok ta pok, specified to the culture and religion of the Taino. It is possible that the route of diffusion of the game of pok ta pok and other elements of Mayan culture was not a direct one from the Yucatan to the Caribbean, but an indirect one by way of South America, because the Otomacos in South America also played a similar game.

Interestingly, ethnographer Ralph Beals reported in the early 1930s that the Acaxee tribe from western Mexico played a ball game called "vatey batey" on "a small plaza, very flat, with walls at the sides".