mayans
Post on 07-Jan-2016
21 Views
Preview:
DESCRIPTION
TRANSCRIPT
The mysterious
Mayans
The Mayan civilization spread to the Yucatan Peninsula. It included more than 40 cities of 5,000 to 50,000 people each.
The Maya cities were split into two areas the highlands and the lowlands
The highlands traded with those in the lowlands.This way, people all over could get things they did not
have nearby.
Location
Southern LowlandsCovered by a rainforestContained scattered savannas and swampsGrew cropsPlayed an important role in transportation route
Northern HighlandsAlso comprised of forests – much drier, mainly
grew small thorny treesClimate: Much cooler and drier; fertile soilVolcanic Highlands: Source of obsidian, jade, and
other precious metals used to develop a tradeSubject to tsunamis, volcanoes, and earthquakes
Location
Mayan society was split up into many distinct city-states, often warring, which usually surrounded temples
Traveling merchants served not just as traders but also as ambassadors to neighboring lands and allied people
Traded mainly in exotic and luxury goods such as rare animal skins, cacao beans, and finely crafted works of art which rulers coveted as signs of special status
Cacao beans were used as money
Government
Cacao beans used as money
Set up as a hierarchy King and ruling familyPriestsHereditary nobility (from which came the merchant class)WarriorsProfessionals and artisansPeasantsSlaves
Social Structure
King and ruling familyRuled from the city-kingdoms such as TikalRuled by semi-divine right and believed their connection
with the gods was maintained by ritual human sacrificeOften had names associated with the jaguar
PriestsMaintained an elaborate calendar and transmitted
knowledge of writing, astronomy, and mathematics
Social Structure
Mayan King
Mayan King
Mayan Priest
Hereditary nobility (from which came the merchant class)Owned most of the land and cooperated with the kings and
priests by organizing military forces and participating in religious rituals
WarriorsMayan kingdoms fought constantly with each other and
warriors won tremendous prestige by capturing high-ranking enemies
Captives were usually made slaves, humiliated, tortured, and ritually sacrificed
Social Structure
Mayan Warrior outfits and a male and female warrior
Professionals and artisansArchitects and sculptors supervised construction of the large
monuments and public buildingsPeasants
Fed the entire societySlaves
Provided physical labor for the construction of cities and monuments
Often had been captured in battle
Social Structure
The Maya believed their rulers were related to the gods.
Priests were the most educated people and planned religious ceremonies.
Professional warriors fought battles against other cities.
Merchants organized the transportation and distribution of trade.
Upper Class
The lower classes lived outside the city. The women worked in the house, and the men hunted and farmed.
The lower class supported the upper class with food and labor, and the upper class led religious ceremonies for them in return.
Slaves were the lowest class and consisted of orphans, slaves’ children, and people who owed money.
Majority of Mayan society was lower class
Lower Class
Had several gods to represent all of natureBelieved in cosmologyHad different gods in the different levels of the world
Upperworld – 13 levelsMiddleworld – where human’s are Underworld – 9 levels, mirror image of
worlds above
Religion
A popular bloodletting ritual was for a Mayan to pierce his own tongue and thread a thin rope through the hole, thus letting the blood run down the rope
Sometimes they would catch the blood on paper and burn it, so the smoke reaches the gods
Mayan kings and queens gave blood more often than villagers
Bloodletting
They believed the gods needed blood to prevent disasters and the end of the world.
Blood is a metaphor for control and to see spiritually deeper
Blood and pain bring “vision serpent”Used sting ray spines to poke the tongue an inch through
Bloodletting
Stingray spine
The Mayas had several methods of giving the human sacrifices. Often, the priests took the victim to the altar at the temple. Then
the priests cut the heart out of the living victim and presented it to the god.
In another method, the priests tied the victim to a wooden pole. Then they threw spears and arrows at the victim's chest in the area of the heart.
Sacrifices
In the third type of sacrifice, they threw the victim into a sacred well. the most famous of these wells is the Well of Sacrifices at Chichén Itzá.
If victims survived the fall and did not drown, the priests pulled them back out of the well. The Mayas believed the gods had chosen to spare these victims.
The priests then asked the victims what messages they brought back from the gods. The victims received special treatment from then on since the Mayas believed they had spoken to the gods.
Sacrifices
Mayans use slash and burn method to clear land for farming
Main food source is from farming: Mayans plant corn (maize), cacao, bananas, squash, beans, and cotton for weaving.
Used bees for honey and waxMeat was rarely eaten because it is
expensive and/or hard to find.Dogs and turkeys were the main animals kept
as pets and/or food.
Agriculture
Best soils were found in southern highland valleys where volcanic eruptions have enriched the earth
Spring-like climate and fertile valleys have made southern highlands a popular place to settle, despite volcanic threats
• Mayans built terraces to retain the silt and therefore greatly improved agricultural production
Agriculture
Terracing for crops
The Maya calendar was complex and served a variety of purposes
Shaman used the day a child was born in the 20-day cycle to forecast its future.
Recorded recurring cosmological cycles, such as the sun, the moon, and Venus, some of the most important objects in the sky.
By combining astronomy and mathematics, calculated the length of the solar year at 365.242 days– about 17 seconds shorter than the figure reached by modern astronomers
Inventions / Technology
The 2012 phenomenon comprises a range of Mayan beliefs that cataclysmic or transformative events will occur on December 21, 2012, which is said to be the end-date of a 5,125-year-long cycle in the Mayan Calendar.
To support this, several astronomical alignments and numerological formulae related to this date
Will the world end in 2012?
The Maya built cities without using metal tools. The Maya built observatories for priests to study the
stars.They developed religious and agricultural calendars.They created a number system and were the first to
include “0”.They developed a writing system that included both an
alphabet and hieroglyphics wrote in bark paper books.
Inventions / Technologies
Mayan Calendar and Observatory
Around 900 A.D., for reasons still not proven, the Mayas suddenly started to decline. The theories proposed by archaeologists for their collapse are very diverse and most likely will remain a mystery forever. Due to this, the theories that caused the disintegration of this incredible civilization deserve to be looked at in more detail.
The Mystery
increased warfare over foodpeople may have rebelled against the kings, who
demanded too much of them causing a civil warThe top of the government hierarchy fell a partforeign invasion from the SpanishClimate change, scientists found odd levels of
oxygen in different areasecological problems caused by destruction of the
forests epidemic diseases like the bubonic plaguenatural disasters (earthquake, long drought)
Theories
When the Spanish conquistadors stumbled over Mayan ruins six hundred years later, they didn’t believe that the ancestors of the indigenous people--whom they described as “savages”--had built these architectural wonders.
Explorer - Spanish
top related