Textbook:

• Discovered ancient cities in A.D. 1839 by archaeologists John Lloyd Stephens and Frederick Catherwood

• A.D. 300: Maya develop complex culture in parts of Mexico and Central America

• Area of settlement: Peten

• Problems:

  • Thick forests block out sunlight

  • Stinging insects

• Year-round water sources: Swamps and Sinkholes (area where the soil has collapsed into a hollow or depression)

  • Sinkholes gave access to network of underground rivers and streams

• Worked to clear forested areas

• Planted fields of corn and other crops

• Built cities under government direction

• Set up more than 50 independent city-states

  • Connected by culture, political ties, and trade

  • Often fought each other for control of territory

  • Ruled by king: claimed he was descended from the sun god

    • God-kings expected people to serve them

• Greatest Maya king: Pacal II

  • Ruled city state Palenque for 67 years in the A.D. 600s

  • Built many structures → among some of the best examples of Mayan architecture

• Strict class system

  • King

  • Nobles and Priests

  • Farmers, Artisans, and Hunters

    • Paid taxes and worked on large building projects

• Believed that the gods controlled everything that happened

  • Priests performed ceremonies to please the gods

  • Sometimes included human sacrifice

• Drought:

  • Tried to please Chac, god of rain, by offering lives of their captives

• Women:

  • Significant role in Maya city-states

  • Calakmul: at least 2 women served as ruling queens

    • One may have helped found the city

  • Often married into royal families in other Maya city-states

    • Increased trade

    • Formed alliances

• Priests were advisors

  • Thought the gods revealed their plans with movements of the sun, moon, and stars

  • By watching the stars, they learned about astronomy

• Developed calendar system to predict eclipses and to schedule religious festivals

  • Decide when to plant and harvest crops

• 2 major calendars:

  • 260-day

    • Religious events

  • 365-day

    • Agricultural and seasons

• System of mathematics:

  • Base 20

  • Concept of 0

• Written language to record numbers and dates

  • Carved hieroglyphics on stone monuments and used them in books

• A.D. 900: Maya civilization collapsed:

  • Historians do not know why

  • Evidence that it may be conflict and increased warfare among city-states

  • Erosion and overuse of soil may have led to less food production

    • Illnesses and starvation

BrainPop:

• One of the first great civilizations of the Americas

• Stretched from the Yucatan Peninsula to El Salvador

• Came thousands of years before the Aztecs

• First settlements almost 4,000 years old

• Wasn’t a centrally controlled empire → loose collection of independent states

  • Each had its own ruling family

• Peak of civilizations:

  • Capitals of states were major urban centers

  • Dominated by massive step pyramids and huge palaces for the ruling families

• City-states controlled surrounding farmland and smaller towns

• Looked to expand influence through military conquest

  • Cities constantly at war with one another

  • Did not speak the same language

• Considered the same civilization because they shared common culture

• Most complex writing system in Mesoameria

  • Maya script = looks like Egyptian hieroglyphics

  • Phonetic symbols

    • Sounds instead of ideas

  • Hundreds of phonetic symbols

  • Much of what we know about them came from their writings

  • Carved into stone/wood, painted on wood, painted on early type of book called a codex

  • Inscribed onto giant stone columns (stelae)

    • Depict stories of conquest, rulers, and gods

• Religion = center of Maya culture

  • Desire to understand gods drove many scientific and technological advances

  • Step pyramids often topped with temples

    • Dedicated to important gods

    • Astronomical observatories

• Created detailed charts of the stars

  • Shifting night sky was story of gods’ activities

• Temples and pyramids constructed to align with specific constellations

• Pleiades cluster

  • Believed ancestors came from there

• Maya calendar

  • Marked time

  • One of the most accurate in history

  • 365-day sun cycle

    • 20 day names

    • 13 day numbers

    • 20,000 unique days

    • Takes 52 years to complete one calendar round

• Maya number system

  • Base 20

  • Bar = 5

  • Dot = 1

  • Shell = 0

    • One of the earliest civilizations to use concept of 0

• 8th century

  • Disappeared

  • Cities abandoned

  • Left behind ruins

  • Droughts?

  • Bad environmental management?

  • Starvation?

• 16th century

  • Spanish arrived

  • Encountered small, scattered settlements

  • Took more than 150 years to to conquer

  • End of 17th century: Spain completed conquest

• Maya people still live in the same area