Mesoamerica: Olmecs & Maya

Mesoamerica

  • Cultural region, not just geographic “Middle America.”
  • Shared tradition traced to the Olmecs ("mother culture").

Olmecs (c. 1500-400\ \text{BCE})

  • Built first Mesoamerican cities; basalt “colossal heads” (elite/ritual figures).
  • Religious architecture: earthen pyramids, ceremonial ball courts.
  • Ballgame: heavy rubber ball (basketball ✕ soccer); primarily ritual, linked to celestial movement.
  • Innovations
    • Earliest known American writing (glyphs on stone slab, \approx900\ \text{BCE}).
    • Long-distance trade (rubber, jade, obsidian) reaching present-day U.S. Southwest & Central America.
    • Tortilla (ground-maize flatbread) enabled portable food for traders.

Maya Overview

  • Region: SE Mexico (Chiapas, Yucatán) → Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, El Salvador.
  • Continuity: >8{,}000{,}000 modern speakers, >30 dialects.
  • Adopted & expanded Olmec writing, ballgame, religious forms.

Classic Era (c. 100\ \text{BCE} - 900\ \text{CE})

  • Early city El Mirador; later power centers Tikal, Caracol, Palenque, etc.
  • City-states: independent, ruled by divine kings; frequent alliances & warfare (Bonampak murals).
  • Peak populations: up to \sim50{,}000 per city.
  • Achievements: monumental pyramids, sophisticated art, mathematics, astronomy.

Writing & Record-Keeping

  • Syllabary of \approx800 glyphs (each = syllable).
  • Surviving texts: carved stelae & 3–4 pre-Columbian codices (e.g., Dresden Codex). Majority burned by Spanish clergy.
  • Uses: dynastic history, astronomy, tribute, ritual schedules.

Religion & Ritual

  • Polytheistic; gods active in human affairs.
  • Cosmos: 13 upper & 9 underworld layers (death god Ah Puch at lowest level).
  • Practices: fasting, bloodletting (ears, tongue, etc.), animal sacrifice; limited evidence for human sacrifice.

Calendrical System

  • Solar calendar: 365-day year = 18 months ✕ 20 days + 5 unlucky days.
  • Sacred (lunar) calendar: 260 days.
  • Two cycles interlock; realign every 52 years ⇒ major “New Fire” renewal rites.
  • Time viewed as both cyclical & linear; no indigenous prediction of a 2012 apocalypse.

Classic Collapse (c. 800-900\ \text{CE})

  • Prolonged drought + overpopulation ⇒ water/food shortages, internal revolts, warfare, mass migration.
  • Rapid urban abandonment; regional population fell dramatically—recovered only by 20^{\text{th}} century.

Post-Classic & Spanish Contact

  • Power shifted north to Yucatán: Chichén Itzá, later Mayapán.
  • Continuous cycles of rise/decline until Spanish conquest (early 16^{\text{th}} century).