Egypt in America? The Mayan pyramids remind us of the Egyptian pyramids of the Nile Valley. The 79-foot-high restored El Castillo pyramid, which encloses an earlier pyramid, was probably built in the tenth century A.D. It is the central building of the Toltec settlement of Chichén Itra in the Yucatan. The Toltecs were a warlike people who swept across the valley of Mexico around the tenth century A.D. See photograph of the step pyramid of King Zoser for comparison.