LOS LLANITOS — María Herrera, 53, has begun teaching the ancient Mesoamerican ballgame ulama to her grandchildren in Los Llanitos, a village on the outskirts of Mazatlan in Sinaloa, about 1,000 kilometers northwest of Mexico City. Herrera took up the role after the death of her husband, ulama player Aurelio Osuna, to continue his legacy.

Youth between the ages of 8 and 13 play the game on a dirt field in the village. Adults help the children fasten the pre-Hispanic-style fajado, securing loincloths and leather belts around their hips before play begins. The Osuna children grab a rubber ball weighing 3.2 kilograms, about 7 pounds, or seven times heavier than a soccer ball. Only the hips may touch the ball, requiring players to leap or dive to keep it in play, though variants of the game allow contact with the hip, forearm, or a mallet. "This seed will bear fruit someday," Herrera said.

The sport dates back about 3,400 years and was practiced by the Olmecs, the earliest known Mesoamerican civilization. Archaeologists have unearthed millennial rubber balls and identified nearly 2,000 ancient ball courts from Nicaragua to Arizona. The game is depicted in codices, stone carvings, and sculptures, reflecting its use in fertility or war ceremonies, political acts, and human sacrifices. According to the Popol Vuh, the world was created from a ballgame in which light and darkness clashed to balance life and death and set the universe in motion.

In some periods and regions, some players were beheaded, possibly the losers, but this practice occurred only in specific contexts, according to Guatemalan archaeologist and anthropologist Carlos Navarrete. The game also functioned as a social event that drew crowds for entertainment and betting. Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés was impressed by the spectacle of ulama presented by the Aztec emperor Moctezuma. Spanish authorities later banned the game and ordered the destruction of its courts during the colonial period.

"For the Catholic Church, the ball was the living devil," said Emilie Carreón, a researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico and director of a project studying and practicing ulama. The sport was nearly erased during the Spanish conquest and survived only in remote pockets of northwestern Mexico before its late 20th-century revival.

As Mexico prepares to co-host the 2026 FIFA World Cup, authorities and modern players are leveraging the momentum of international soccer to raise awareness of the ancient sport. Many players worry that projecting an exotic image undermines a tradition central to their identity. "We must rid the game of the notion that it is a living fossil," Carreón said.