Inca And Maya Civilization Essay

Maya, Aztec, and Inca civilizations The Maya, Aztec, and Inca civilizations were the earliest Mesoamerican societies. The Mayan society came first and it had many influences on the other two societies. The societies began as small city-states which as time went on became civilized and stronger. At the time that these societies were around and populated, they were considered to be very advanced compared to other societies and regions in the world during the same time. Today, archeologists still search for remnants of cities from the Maya, Aztec, and Inca civilizations and they still wonder and ask many questions about how these civilizations came to pass and how the people were so advanced at the time. The three societies each influenced the past and still have influences today in many different ways. “The Mayans studied the stars and developed sophisticated and accurate calendars”, “they developed complex hieroglyphic writing that they used to record historical and religious

For example, the Maya’s society was divided by class and profession. “Below the king was a class of nobles; a middle class was composed of priests and commoners; at the lowest level were slaves” (Hopkins 2). Many years later in many places all over the world, the same social class system was used for a long period of time. The Aztec society was rigorously hierarchical, it was ruled by a godlike emperor, where religion was a very important part of people’s lives, however, they were very harsh rulers because they kept captives to use as human sacrifice (Maldonado 5). Lastly, the Inca’s hierarchical system was very similar to the Maya’s by having a social pyramid where the emperor was at the top, the local rulers and leaders in the middle and lastly the common people at the bottom (Patel 3). The Inca was also similar to the Aztec in terms of having a godlike emperor and strongly practicing