Annotated Bibliography: The Collapse Of The Mayan Culture

1656 Words4 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Essay on mayan religion

Annotated Bibliography “Thesis Statement” The Mayans were a native Mesoamerican group of people who erected one of the most sophisticated cultures in the Western Hemisphere. They inhabited areas in southern Mexico, and also surrounding Locations included Guatemala, Belize, El Salvador and parts of Honduras. The Mayan religion civilization came into prominence in 250 A.D., administering a polytheistic approach to worship which included human blood sacrifices to honor their gods or to culminate the crowning of a King. Historians record that the Mayan civilization abruptly and mysteriously abandoned their cities between 900 and 925 A.D.; this also marks the end of the classical period in Mayan history. In this Annotated Bibliography, I will analyze and summarize key …show more content…

Popular believe we want to believe that the Mayan culture collapsed because of disintegration of the political structure. Actual reasons of the collapse were much more complex than a breakdown of the political hierarchy, contrary to this belief evidence suggests a disorganization of system structures such as agriculture. Variables that caused the Mayan collapse started with the late classic Maya and their issues with reproduction and raising children due to a series of nutritional problems which cause the burden of disease. These depopulation factors coupled with the decrease of full production because of a lack of labor required to maintain the agricultural ecosystems which cause erosion of the systems economic base. The insight of this article suggests that the collapse of the Mayan civilization was caused primarily to environmental instability of their ecosystem. The author is evidence in this article allows the conclusion to be drawn that the Mayans religion was not the cause to the collapse of their civilization, but rather the inability to sustain population growth and ecosystem erosion lead to their

Show More
Related

  • Dbq Mayan Achievements

    636 Words  | 2 Pages

    It is very likely that most people have heard about the Mayan Civilization in one way or another. Whether fictitious or factual, this ancient culture iw idelt recognized. The Mayan people lived from about 250 to 900 CE in Mesoamerica. Which includes modern day Belize, Honduras, Guatemala, and parts of southern Mexico.These people had many remarkable achievements, all of which can fit under the categories of scale, genius effort, and significance. These achievements include an advanced trade system, an amazing understanding of numbers, and the ability to design and build cities that are still mostly standing today. However, their most impressive achievement is their complex calendars.

    Read More

  • Analysis: Why Did The Mayan Civilization Collapse

    686 Words  | 2 Pages

    The US have always been having many advancements. They are one of the most powerful countries in the world with advancements like military, technology, arts, and etc. Although they have many of those advancements there is always a negative side happening in the US that could potentially make them fall. Many people will think that there could be no way the US will fall, but there is always an end to something. For example, empires from thousands of years ago who had many advancements had a fall. The US is going to soon turn like into one of these fallen empires because they are having the same issues that made those empires fall. The US will fall soon because of their environmental problems, immune system, and military spending.

    Read More

  • Similarities Between Maya And Inca

    1970 Words  | 4 Pages

    However, it is clear that they derived influence from each other. This paper provides an insight into how these cultural arts are strikingly similar yet different in their own way. The Maya Civilization This was the first civilization of the Mesoamerica. It was developed by the people of Maya between the period of 800 BC and 900 AD (Maya Art History, 2016). Maya civilization is widely acknowledged for its development of a full writing system known as the hieroglyphic script, and the development of remarkable systems of astronomy, architecture, art, mathematics and calendar (Maya Art History, 2016).

    Read More

  • Mayan Influence On Guatemala

    259 Words  | 1 Pages

    A rich and diverse culture is what Guatemala is known for. It’s a mixture of the Spanish that conquered it and the indigenous people. Before it was conquered in the 16th century, it had a thriving people called the Mayans. The Mayan civilization is split into three different time periods called the Preclassic period, the Classic period, and the Postclassic period. The Preclassic period consisted mostly of small villages of farmers. The Classic period is when the Mayans were at the height of their civilization. Many sites in Guatemala show just how thriving these people were. It lasted until 900 AD when it all of the sudden collapsed. Many of the cities were abandoned and many were killed off by a drought. The Postclassic period brought on many new cities, but none had the greatness of those of the Classic period. This period lasted until the Spanish conquered them beginning in 1915.

    Read More

  • Maya Civilization Collapse

    1318 Words  | 3 Pages

    Diamond, Jared M. (2005) "The Maya Collapses.” Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. New York: Viking, 157-77.

    Read More

  • Mayan Religion

    1535 Words  | 4 Pages

    In the Central America, most notably the Yucatan Peninsula, are the Maya, a group of people whose polytheistic religion and advanced civilization once flourished (Houston, 43). The Maya reached their peak during the Classic Period from around CE 250 to the ninth century CE when the civilization fell and dispersed (Sharer, 1). Although much has been lost, the gods and goddesses and the religious practices of the Classic Maya give insight into their lives and reveal what was important to this society.

    Read More

  • The Mayan Civilization

    962 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Maya built enormous and elaborate stone temples, stela, and other stone structures within their cities. It was unknown for some time how exactly they managed to quarry and move these large stones due to the fact at the time it was not known what tools they possessed or how they were transported because the Maya did not use the wheel. Many of the large structures in ancient Maya cities in Central America were constructed from limestone blocks. It was important to determine the process by which the Maya built these structures, and the effort put forth, in order to estimate the labor force, the overall population in the area, the resources used, and how the environment was affected. James C. Woods and Gene L. Titmus from the Herrett Museum, working with the RAINPEG (Regional Archaeological Investigations in the Northern Peten, Guatemala) Project set out to known Mayan quarries, such as Nakbe, to investigate how these limestone blocks were quarried. Woods and Titmus found a large amount of broken, flaked stone bifaces that they concluded were used to cut and shape the limestone blocks. The two replicated their hypothesis about the cutting process by testing it with similar bifaces hafted on spears, which cut the limestone fairly easily. Thus, in the process of testing discovered their resulting toolmarks matched almost exactly to that of those in the ancient Maya quarries. They continued to repeat their process for several stones so to roughly calculate the labor, resources, and time required to construct the huge Maya structures. After their calculations were reviewed they came to the conclusion that a work force of nearly one thousand working half of each year over a period of up to four centuries would have been necessary to pr...

    Read More

  • The Decline Of The Mayan Civilization

    999 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Mayan civilization was located in southeastern Mexico on the Yucatan Peninsula. One of the first American civilizations, it lasted from about 1000 B.C.-1542 A.D. Their civilization flourished during the Sixth Century. They built many temples and over forty cities. The Mayan population consisted of almost fifteen million people who were all living in one of the many cities. The Mayan people were extremely religious and believed in multiple gods which meant they were polytheistic. Their most commonly worshiped god was the Maize God, or god of corn, as corn was the most grown and most relied on crop. The Mayans grew all of their own food so they needed to have useful farming methods. The one they used most often was the slash and burn method, which involved cutting down trees and burning them to make the soil fertil which was necessary to grow crops. This method worked for many years, but soon started to backfire. The Mayans were ahead of their time, but that did not prevent their mysterious decline which occurred between the years 800 A.D.-900 A.D. Although it is not known exactly why the powerful empire fell, but there are various probable theories. The mysterious decline of the Mayans may have been caused by

    Read More

  • The Mayan Mythology

    1130 Words  | 3 Pages

    Mythology ,to this day, is a fascination to many. Made first to explain the wonders of the world and the creation of space, time, and life itself.Every Region had their own explanation to all these questions and have even put their own twist on earlier myths. Mayan mythology centered around life and its principals. Often in Mayan mythology, the connection between the deity and the human were the most important for both counter parts. This would allow such deities to perform such extraordinary things. Spanning back to the sixteen hundredths, the Popol Vuh is the sacred book of the Mayans, it contains the early stories of great deities and powerful stories .Things so grand that only and all mighty could create. Such force of great power for the

    Read More

  • Mayan Civilization Dbq

    779 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Mayans lived in Southern Mexico and Central America in their capital, Tikal, which is in present day Guatemala. The Mayans were known for their engineering, one structure they were famous for is their pyramid temple in Tikal (Document 1). This pyramid was the tallest structure in the Americas up until the 20th century and is still standing today. The government must have been strong and well organized in order to carry out such a large task. The Mayan religion had multiple gods and this pyramid was most likely devoted to one or used as a place for sacrifices. Another accomplishment of the Mayans was the creation of their calendar. An extra document that would be useful is one that explains how the calendar was created. The Mayans must have studied astronomy and math to a great length. Similar to the Ancient Egyptians, they wrote with symbols and pictures known as glyphs that were used in the calendar. These glyphs were gods, such as Zotz (Document 2). The use of glyphs is an acknowledgement of a writing system, which is another accomplishment.

    Read More

  • Mayan Society During The Dark Ages

    1089 Words  | 3 Pages

    The European and Mayan civilizations had inverse experiences during the Classical era, but they were similar in some aspects. While the Mayans were basking in their glorious success as a civilization, the Europeans stood in their shadow. However, after the Renaissance Era, it was as if the Mayans stood in the shadow of the European revival. These two societies have a definite inverse relationship, in that while one was succeeding, the other was squandering. For example, the forward thinking of the Mayans and their knowledge of arithmetic and science was overshadowed by the revolutionary ideas created by European scientists, the fact that the Mayans had created a complex, and accurate calendar wasn’t nearly as celebrated as a European man who got hit by an apple.

    Read More

  • The Apache and The Maya

    878 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Maya had to clear through thick tropical forests of northern Guatemala in order to have land and space to farm crops like beans, squash, avocados, and maize. The forests allowed them to hunt deer, rabbits and monkeys, for food, and provided building materials like wood, vines and mud for their houses. With the increase of trade, they began to expand out of their small villages by building large cities in Mesoamerica around 200 AD. It was in Mesoamerica, a region from the central part of Mexico south to the northern part of Central America, that the Maya civilization thrived from ...

    Read More

  • The Maya Civilization

    1075 Words  | 3 Pages

    Maya civilization was based mainly on agriculture and religion. Maya every day life revolved around an innumerable number of earth Gods. The most important God was chief, ruler of all Gods. The Mayans prayed to these God’s particularly about their crops. For example, they prayed to the Rain God to nourish their crops. They practiced their religion during ceremonies conducted by priests. They also practiced confession and even fasted before important ceremonies (Gann and Thompson 1931 118-138). The Mayans also b...

    Read More

  • Mesoamerica and Complex societies

    790 Words  | 2 Pages

    The transformation between the simple hunter-gathers society and the complex Mayan state occurred from the Pre-Olmec Period between 1200 and 400 BC to the Late Classic Maya society between AD 700 and 800.The Pre-Olmec Period signified pre-complex society due to the structure of egalitarianism and diversity in cultures, this is significantly different to the Maya society that witness not only the upheave of literature, counting system, religious ideology and political hierarchy. What is significant about this era is these innovations not only created social classes and allowed high upkeep for large population densities, they were able to unify the geopolitical sphere of cities under the same language and belief system through accepted iconography in art repre...

    Read More

  • Comparison: The Tainos, Mayans, and Kalinagos

    2032 Words  | 5 Pages

    ...The Mayans were polytheistic and they believed in many manifestations of their one God Kunabku and these manifestations looked over everything. Priests were appointed not only through their religious commitment but also thought their literacy level. The Halach Uinic was also referred to as the K’uhul Ajaw which refers to Holy Lord/ Ruler which demonstrates the close association between the king and God and in turn State and Religion. The Mayans also believed in ancestor worship and communication performed by the Halach Uinic and priests during their hallucinations. Bloodletting was also an activity practiced by the Mayans as a means of sacrifice towards their God and as worship. It was drained from captives in war and prisoners but a nobles’ blood was especially treasured and used on special occasions

    Read More

More about Annotated Bibliography: The Collapse Of The Mayan Culture

Open Document