Maya

MAYA

The Maya were American Indians who settled in southern Mexico and in Central America. Their territory covered Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, Belize, much of Guatemala, and parts of Honduras and El Salvador. Originating in the region about 1000 b.c., the Maya developed a highly advanced civilization which reached its height during the Classical Period, a.d. 300-900. At its peak, the Mayan population numbered some fourteen million people who lived in agricultural communities and in the city-centers in Honduras (Copan), Mexico (Palenque, Uxmal, and Chichen Itza), and Guatemala (Piedras Negras, Uaxxactan, and Tikal). The capital was at Tikal (population 50,000), which was a center of education, economics, science, and religion. Mayan accomplishments were numerous and many were unparalleled at the time. Engineers produced remarkable architecture including flat-topped pyramids, temples, and towers. Artisans created elegant sculptures, paintings, and murals. Scholars developed an original writing system, which was used to record astronomical observations, chronology, and history. Mathematicians developed a system more advanced than any European system of that time.

The Mayans supported themselves by using slash- and-burn agriculture. The vegetation was cut down and burned to clear the land and provide nutriments for the soil, which was then planted with crops, especially corn, beans and squash. The Mayans also developed advance systems of irrigation and terracing. Terracing involves the construction of horizontal ridges in a hillside as a means of increasing the arable (farming) land. It also hindered soil erosion and evaporation. Though they used no beasts of burden, the Maya established a trade network that linked several Central American Indian groups and eventually extended into central Mexico, where the Maya exchanged goods with the Aztecs.

During the Post-Classic Period, a.d. 900–1546, the Maya were invaded by the Toltecs, whom they eventually absorbed. Rebellions and civil war as well as widespread famine dominated the century preceding the arrival of the Europeans. When the Spaniards arrived in the mid-1500s, the Mayan civilization was in decline. The Maya were conquered by the Spaniards and they became assimilated into the larger Hispanic culture that developed in the region.

See also: Aztec, Inca, Mesoamerica