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Cult of the Jaguar continued. Mayan Civilization. Map. Political Systems. City states united in a loose confederacy Ruled by powerful semi-divine kings called halach uinic ("True Man") and his lesser nobles Nobles own most of the land and are the important merchants Priests
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Cult of the Jaguar continued Mayan Civilization
Political Systems • City states united in a loose confederacy • Ruled by powerful semi-divine kings called halach uinic ("True Man") and his lesser nobles • Nobles own most of the land and are the important merchants • Priests • Maintained an elaborate calendar and transmitted knowledge of writing, astronomy, and mathematics • Population largely rural used cities for primarily relgious centers
War • Mayan 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
Temple of the Jaguar • Tikal was the most important Mayan political center between the 4th and 9th Centuries • Meeting place for all Mayan city states on important astronomical/religious dates • 40,000 people lived here
Economic Systems • Agricultural society • Terrace farming • Shifting cultivation • Maize, cacao • Architects, sculptors, Potters • Cacao used as money • Merchants traded in luxury goods like jade, fancy textiles and animal pelts
Religion • Polytheistic; gods made people out of maize and water • Human Blood Sacrifice and ceremony keep the gods happy so they keep the world going and agriculture good
Mayan Ball Game • Winners live losers sacrificed to the gods
Human Sacrifice and Bloodletting Rituals • Bloodletting involved both war captives and Mayan royals • Bloodletting involved pircing the tongue and/or genitals and dripping the blood down a rope into a bowl before offering it to the gods
Religious Ritual • Killing animals, slaves, children, and prisoners of war were important parts of their culture • occurred on important dates, when priests demanded it, or as punishment for crimes. • Burned copal resin along with the sacrifice, creating more smoke and a sweet smell. • Offerings to the spirits were to insure agricultural success.
Priests – • responsible for keeping calendar, holding ceremonies to the gods and Human sacrifice • Most important Priest called Ah Kin Mai ("The Highest One of the Sun") • ruled over priests below him (called Ah Kin , "The Ones of the Sun"). • There were two special priestly functions involved in human sacrifice: the chacs, who were elderly men that held down the victim, and the nacon, who cut the living heart from the victim.
After life • The Mayas believed in an elaborate afterlife, but heaven was reserved for those who had been hanged, sacrificed, or died in childbirth. Everyone else went to xibal, or hell, which was ruled over by the Lords of Death.
Social Hierarchy • King and ruling family • Priests • Hereditary nobility (from which came the merchant class) • Warriors • Professionals and artisans • Peasants • Slaves
Mayan beauty • prized a long, backward sloping forehead • infants would have their skulls bound with boards. • Crossed-eyes favored • infants would have objects dangled in front of their eyes in order to permanently cross their eyes (this is still practiced today).
Intellectual Developments • astronomy, calendrical systems, hieroglyphic writing, ceremonial architecture, and masonry without metal tools • Could plot planetary cycles and predict eclipses of the sun and moon • Invented the concept of zero and used a symbol to represent zero mathematically, which facilitated the manipulation of large numbers • calculated the length of the solar year at 365.242 days– about 17 seconds shorter than the figure reached by modern
Mayan Calendar • Interwove two kinds of year • A solar year of 365 days governed the agricultural cycle • A ritual year of 260 days governed daily affairs by organizing time into twenty “months” of thirteen days each
Writing • ideographic elements and symbols for syllables • Used to write works of history, poetry, and myth and keep genealogical, administrative, and astronomical records
Mayan Decline • By about 800, most Mayan populations had begun to desert their cities • Full scale decline followed everywhere but in the northern Yucatan • Possible causes include foreign invasion, internal dissension and civil war, failure of the water control system leading to agricultural disaster, ecological problems caused by destruction of the forests, epidemic diseases, and natural disasters
Aztecs – c. 1350- 1550 A Continuation of the Olmec and Maya cultures
Location / Geography • Central Mexico (not the Yucatan) • Capital at Tenochtitlan (island)500,000 people • Total Pop: 10-20 million
Politics • Theocracy led by divine king/Priest • Military – nearly constant brutal wars for conquest, collect tribute, captives forslaves and sacrifice
Economics • Agriculturally based • merchants are limited by what they can carry since they don’t have large pack animals • Chinampas – huge floating islands for agriculture • The great market – daily trade in the merchant section of large cities
Religion • Polytheistic • Many Temples based on astronomy for worship, agricultural planning and sacrifice • Each holiday included ceremonies involving human sacrifice/cannibalism • Fatalistic and cyclical view of the world
Social • Large gap between upper/lower classes • Role of Women – decide fate of prisoners, domestic chores (grinding maize), can inherit land • Common people in constant fear of war/sacrifice/slavery
Intellectual • calendar, numbers and pictorial writing similar but not identical to Maya • Capital built on an island required great planning and coordination
Art • Temples • Gold objects • Sculpture • Skull racks
Conquered by Spanish • Spanish conquistadors led by Cortes crush the Aztecs during the 1530s • More on that later
Geography • Western coast of S. America • Total Pop: 10 million • Capital at Cuzco, religious center Machu Pichu • 4000 miles in length • Made up of hundreds of tribes loosely ruled by the Inca • Empire included deserts along the coast, jungle and high mountain villages
Politics • Loose confederation of tribes • Smart captives were trained/brainwashed in Cuzco to rule for Inca and then sent back home to be Incan governors • Maintain authority by trading supplies to “good” regions and not to “bad” regions • Constant need to expand in order to support the trade/bribery with other regions
Divine Kings • Emperor and principle wife seen as gods • Inca nobility dominate the bureaucracy
