1.
Mesoamerica
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It is one of six areas in the world where ancient civilization arose independently, and the second in the Americas along with Norte Chico in present-day northern coastal Peru. As a cultural area, Mesoamerica is defined by a mosaic of cultural traits developed and shared by its indigenous cultures, while Mesoamerican civilization did know of the wheel and basic metallurgy, neither of these technologies became culturally important. Among the earliest complex civilizations was the Olmec culture, which inhabited the Gulf coast of Mexico and extended inland, frequent contact and cultural interchange between the early Olmec and other cultures in Chiapas, Guatemala and Oaxaca laid the basis for the Mesoamerican cultural area. All this was facilitated by considerable regional communications in ancient Mesoamerica and this Formative period saw the spread of distinct religious and symbolic traditions, as well as artistic and architectural complexes. In the subsequent Preclassic period, complex urban polities began to develop among the Maya, with the rise of such as El Mirador, Calakmul and Tikal. Mesoamerica is one of three regions of the world where writing is known to have independently developed. Upon the collapse of Teotihuacán around AD600, competition between several important political centers in central Mexico, such as Xochicalco and Cholula, ensued. During the early period, Central Mexico was dominated by the Toltec culture, Oaxaca by the Mixtec. Towards the end of the period, the Aztecs of Central Mexico built a tributary empire covering most of central Mesoamerica. The distinct Mesoamerican cultural tradition ended with the Spanish conquest in the 16th century, over the next centuries, Mesoamerican indigenous cultures were gradually subjected to Spanish colonial rule. The exact geographic extent of Mesoamerica has varied through time, as the civilization extended North and South from its heartland in southern Mexico, Mesoamerica is recognized as a near-prototypical cultural area, and the term is now fully integrated in the standard terminology of pre-Columbian anthropological studies. Conversely, the sister terms Aridoamerica and Oasisamerica, which refer to northern Mexico, 10° and 22° northern latitude, Mesoamerica possesses a complex combination of ecological systems, topographic zones, and environmental contexts. A main distinction groups these different niches into two categories, the lowlands and the altiplanos, or highlands. In the low-lying regions, sub-tropical and tropical climates are most common, as is true for most of the coastline along the Pacific and Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. The highlands show much more diversity, ranging from dry tropical to cold mountainous climates. The rainfall varies from the dry Oaxaca and north Yucatan to the humid southern Pacific, several distinct sub-regions within Mesoamerica are defined by a convergence of geographic and cultural attributes. These sub-regions are more conceptual than culturally meaningful, and the demarcation of their limits is not rigid, the Maya area, for example, can be divided into two general groups, the lowlands and highlands. The lowlands are further divided into the southern and northern Maya lowlands, the southern Maya lowlands are generally regarded as encompassing northern Guatemala, southern Campeche and Quintana Roo in Mexico, and Belize
2.
Maya script
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The earliest inscriptions found which are identifiably Maya date to the 3rd century BCE in San Bartolo, Guatemala. Maya writing was in use throughout Mesoamerica until the Spanish conquest of the Maya in the 16th and 17th centuries. Maya writing used logograms complemented by a set of syllabic glyphs, modern Mayan languages are written using the Latin alphabet rather than Maya script. It is now thought that the codices and other Classic texts were written by scribes, usually members of the Maya priesthood, there is also some evidence that the script may have been occasionally used to write Mayan languages of the Guatemalan Highlands. However, if languages were written, they may have been written by Ch’olti’ scribes. Mayan writing consisted of an elaborate set of glyphs, which were laboriously painted on ceramics, walls or bark-paper codices, carved in wood or stone. Carved and molded glyphs were painted, but the paint has rarely survived, about 90% of Mayan writing can now be read with varying degrees of certainty, enough to give a comprehensive idea of its structure. The Mayan script was a logosyllabic system, individual glyphs could represent either a word or a syllable, indeed, the same glyph could often be used for both. For example, the calendaric glyph MANIK’ was also used to represent the syllable chi, there was polyvalence in the other direction as well, different glyphs could be read the same way. For example, half a dozen apparently unrelated glyphs were used to write the common third person pronoun u-. However, in the case of Mayan, each tended to correspond to a noun or verb phrase such as his green headband. Also, glyphs were sometimes conflated, where an element of one glyph would replace part of a second, conflation occurs in other scripts, For example, in medieval Spanish manuscripts the word de of was sometimes written Ð. Another example is the ampersand which is a conflation of the Latin et, in place of the standard block configuration, Mayan was also sometimes written in a single row or column, L, or T shapes. These variations most often appeared when they would fit the surface being inscribed. For example, the logogram for fish fin, came to represent the syllable ka, for example, balam jaguar could be written as a single logogram, BALAM, complemented phonetically as ba-BALAM, or BALAM-ma, or ba-BALAM-ma, or written completely phonetically as ba-la-ma. Phonetic glyphs stood for simple consonant-vowel or bare-vowel syllables, when these final consonants were sonorants or gutturals they were sometimes ignored, but more often final consonants were written, which meant that an extra vowel was written as well. This was typically an echo vowel that repeated the vowel of the previous syllable and that is, the word fish fin would be underspelled ka or written in full as ka-ha. A more complex spelling is ha-o-bo ko-ko-no-ma for they are the guardians, a minimal set is, ba-ka ba-ki ba-ku = ba-ke ba-ke-le Despite depending on consonants which were frequently not written, the Mayan voice system was reliably indicated
3.
Teotihuacan
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Additionally, Teotihuacan exported fine obsidian tools that garnered high prestige and widespread usage throughout Mesoamerica. The city is thought to have been established around 100 BC, the city may have lasted until sometime between the 7th and 8th centuries AD, but its major monuments were sacked and systematically burned around 550 AD. Teotihuacan began as a new center in the Mexican Highlands around the first century AD. This city came to be the largest and most populated center in the pre-Columbian Americas, Teotihuacan was even home to multi-floor apartment compounds built to accommodate this large population. The term Teotihuacan is also used for the civilization and cultural complex associated with the site. The later Aztecs saw these magnificent ruins and claimed a common ancestry with the Teotihuacanos, the ethnicity of the inhabitants of Teotihuacan is also a subject of debate. Possible candidates are the Nahua, Otomi, or Totonac ethnic groups, scholars have also suggested that Teotihuacan was a multi-ethnic state. The city and the site are located in what is now the San Juan Teotihuacán municipality in the State of México. The site covers a surface area of 83 square kilometres and was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1987. It is the most visited site in Mexico. The name Teōtīhuacān was given by the Nahuatl-speaking Aztecs centuries after the fall of the city around 550 A. D, the term has been glossed as birthplace of the gods, or place where gods were born, reflecting Nahua creation myths that were said to occur in Teotihuacan. Nahuatl scholar Thelma D. Sullivan interprets the name as place of those who have the road of the gods and this is because the Aztecs believed that the gods created the universe at that site. The name is pronounced in Nahuatl, with the accent on the syllable wa, by normal Nahuatl orthographic conventions, a written accent would not appear in that position. Both this pronunciation and Spanish pronunciation, are used, and both appear in this article. The original name of the city is unknown, but it appears in texts from the Maya region as puh. This naming convention led to confusion in the early 20th century. It now seems clear that Tollan may be understood as a generic Nahua term applied to any large settlement, the early history of Teotihuacan is quite mysterious, and the origin of its founders is uncertain. Around 300 BC, people of the central and southeastern area of Mesoamerica began to gather into larger settlements, Teotihuacan was the largest urban center of Mesoamerica before the Aztecs, almost 1000 years prior to their epoch
4.
Tikal
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Tikal is the ruin of an ancient city, which was likely to have been called Yax Mutal, found in a rainforest in Guatemala. Ambrosio Tut, a gum-sapper, reported the ruins to La Gaceta, a Guatemalan newspaper, after the Berlin Academy of Sciences magazine republished the report in 1853, archeologists and treasure hunters began visiting the forest. Today, tourism to the site may protect the rainforest. It is one of the largest archaeological sites and urban centers of the pre-Columbian Maya civilization and it is located in the archaeological region of the Petén Basin in what is now northern Guatemala. Situated in the department of El Petén, the site is part of Guatemalas Tikal National Park, Tikal was the capital of a conquest state that became one of the most powerful kingdoms of the ancient Maya. Though monumental architecture at the dates back as far as the 4th century BC, Tikal reached its apogee during the Classic Period. There is evidence that Tikal was conquered by Teotihuacan in the 4th century AD, following the end of the Late Classic Period, no new major monuments were built at Tikal and there is evidence that elite palaces were burned. These events were coupled with a population decline, culminating with the site’s abandonment by the end of the 10th century. The name Tikal may be derived from ti akal in the Yucatec Maya language, the name was apparently applied to one of the sites ancient reservoirs by hunters and travelers in the region. It has alternatively been interpreted as meaning the place of the voices in the Itza Maya language, Tikal, however, is not the ancient name for the site but rather the name adopted shortly after its discovery in the 1840s. Hieroglyphic inscriptions at the ruins refer to the ancient city as Yax Mutal or Yax Mutul, the kingdom as a whole was simply called Mutul, which is the reading of the hair bundle emblem glyph seen in the accompanying photo. The closest large modern settlements are Flores and Santa Elena, approximately 64 kilometres by road to the southwest, Tikal is approximately 303 kilometres north of Guatemala City. It is 19 kilometres south of the contemporary Maya city of Uaxactun and 30 kilometres northwest of Yaxha, the city was located 100 kilometres southeast of its great Classic Period rival, Calakmul, and 85 kilometres northwest of Calakmuls ally Caracol, now in Belize. The city has been mapped and covered an area greater than 16 square kilometres that included about 3,000 structures. The topography of the consists of a series of parallel limestone ridges rising above swampy lowlands. The major architecture of the site is clustered upon areas of higher ground, the area around Tikal has been declared as the Tikal National Park and the preserved area covers 570 square kilometres. The ruins lie among the tropical rainforests of northern Guatemala that formed the cradle of lowland Maya civilization, the city itself was located among abundant fertile upland soils, and may have dominated a natural east–west trade route across the Yucatan Peninsula. Conspicuous trees at the Tikal park include gigantic kapok the sacred tree of the Maya, tropical cedar, jaguars, jaguarundis, and cougars are also said to roam in the park
5.
Spear-thrower
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A spear-thrower or atlatl is a tool that uses leverage to achieve greater velocity in dart-throwing, and includes a bearing surface which allows the user to store energy during the throw. It may consist of a shaft with a cup or a spur at the end that supports, the spear-thrower is held in one hand, gripped near the end farthest from the cup. The dart is thrown by the action of the upper arm, the throwing arm together with the atlatl acts as a lever. The spear-thrower is a low-mass, fast-moving extension of the throwing arm and this extra length allows the thrower to impart force to the dart over a longer distance, thus imparting more energy and ultimately higher speeds. Common modern ball throwers use the same principle, a spear-thrower is a long-range weapon and can readily impart to a projectile speeds of over 150 km/h. In the United States the Nahuatl word atlatl is often used for revived uses of spear-throwers, the ancient Greeks and Romans used a leather thong or loop, known as an ankule or amentum, as a spear-throwing device. Spear-thrower designs may include such as thong loops to fit the fingers, the use of flexible shafts, stone balance weights. Darts resemble large arrows or thin spears and are typically from 1.2 to 2.7 m in length and 9 to 16 mm in diameter, another important improvement to the spear-throwers design was the introduction of a small weight strapped to its midsection. Some atlatlists maintain that stone weights add mass to the shaft of the device, causing resistance to acceleration when swung and resulting in a more forceful, others claim that spear-thrower weights add only stability to a cast, resulting in greater accuracy. Based on previous work done by William S. Webb, William R, the use of the device would reduce the telltale zip of a swung atlatl to a more subtle woof sound that did not travel as far and was less likely to alert prey. The woomera design is different from most other spear-throwers, in that it has a curved, hollow shape. Several Stone Age spear-throwers are decorated with carvings of animals, the British Museum has a mammoth, many pieces of decorated bone may have belonged to Bâtons de commandement. The Aztec atlatl was often decorated with designs and feathers. Wooden darts were known at least since the Middle Paleolithic, while the spear-thrower is capable of casting a dart well over one hundred meters, it is most accurately used at distances of twenty meters or less. The spearthrower is believed to have been in use by Homo sapiens since the Upper Paleolithic, most stratified European finds come from the Magdalenian. In this period, elaborate pieces, often in the form of animals, are common, the earliest secure data concerning atlatls have come from several caves in France dating to the Upper Paleolithic, about 21,000 to 17,000 years ago. The earliest known example is a 17, 500-year-old Solutrean atlatl made of antler, found at Combe Saunière. In Europe, the spear-thrower was supplemented by the bow and arrow in the Epi-Paleolithic and this allowed for more forgiving flint knapping, dart heads designed for a particular spear thrower tend to differ in mass by only a few percent
6.
Maya civilization
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The Maya civilization developed in an area that encompasses southeastern Mexico, all of Guatemala and Belize, and the western portions of Honduras and El Salvador. The Archaic period, prior to 2000 BC, saw the first developments in agriculture, the first Maya cities developed around 750 BC, and by 500 BC these cities possessed monumental architecture, including large temples with elaborate stucco façades. Hieroglyphic writing was being used in the Maya region by the 3rd century BC, in the Late Preclassic a number of large cities developed in the Petén Basin, and Kaminaljuyu rose to prominence in the Guatemalan Highlands. Beginning around 250 AD, the Classic period is defined as when the Maya were raising sculpted monuments with Long Count dates. This period saw the Maya civilization develop a number of city-states linked by a complex trade network. In the Maya Lowlands two great rivals, Tikal and Calakmul, became powerful, the Classic period also saw the intrusive intervention of the central Mexican city of Teotihuacan in Maya dynastic politics. In the 9th century, there was a political collapse in the central Maya region, resulting in internecine warfare, the abandonment of cities. The Postclassic period saw the rise of Chichen Itza in the north, in the 16th century, the Spanish Empire colonized the Mesoamerican region, and a lengthy series of campaigns saw the fall of Nojpetén, the last Maya city in 1697. Classic period rule was centred on the concept of the divine king, kingship was patrilineal, and power would normally pass to the eldest son. A prospective king was expected to be a successful war leader. Maya politics was dominated by a system of patronage, although the exact political make-up of a kingdom varied from city-state to city-state. By the Late Classic, the aristocracy had greatly increased, resulting in the reduction in the exclusive power of the divine king. Maya cities tended to expand haphazardly, and the city centre would be occupied by ceremonial and administrative complexes, different parts of a city would often be linked by causeways. The principal architecture of the city consisted of palaces, pyramid-temples, ceremonial ballcourts, the Maya elite were literate, and developed a complex system of hieroglyphic writing that was the most advanced in the pre-Columbian Americas. The Maya recorded their history and ritual knowledge in screenfold books, there are also a great many examples of Maya text found on stelae and ceramics. The Maya developed a complex series of interlocking ritual calendars. As a part of their religion, the Maya practised human sacrifice, the Maya civilization developed within the Mesoamerican cultural area, which covers a region that spreads from northern Mexico southwards into Central America. Mesoamerica was one of six cradles of civilization worldwide, the Mesoamerican area gave rise to a series of cultural developments that included complex societies, agriculture, cities, monumental architecture, writing, and calendrical systems
7.
Uaxactun
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Uaxactun is an ancient sacred place of the Maya civilization, located in the Petén Basin region of the Maya lowlands, in the present-day department of Petén, Guatemala. The site lies some 12 miles north of the center of Tikal. The name is spelled as Waxaktun. The name Uaxactun was given to the site by its rediscoverer, United States archeologist Sylvanus Morley and he coined the name from Maya words Waxac and Tun, to mean Eight Stones. The name has two meanings, Morleys stated reason for the name was to commemorate it as the first site where an inscription dating from the 8th Baktún of the Maya calendar was discovered. The other meaning is a pun, since Uaxactun sounds like Washington, the Carnegie Institution conducted archeological excavations there from 1926 through 1937, led by Oliver Ricketson. The excavations added greatly to knowledge of the early Classic and pre-Classic Maya, the remains of several badly ruined late Classic era temple-pyramids were removed, revealing well-preserved earlier temples underneath them. For most of the Carnegie teams time at Uaxactun, communication with the world was via a four-day mule convoy to El Cayo. Towards the end of the time an airstrip was opened, flights to Uaxactun continued and a small village grew there, as it became a center for gathering of chicle sap from the Peten jungle. In 1940 A. L. Smith and Ed Shook of the Carnegie project returned to some additional excavations. In the late 1970s a rough road was opened, connecting Uaxactun to Tikal and thence to Flores, in 1984 the road was much improved. Shook returned again in 1974 to oversee consolidation and restoration of some architecture excavated earlier, in 1982 Guatemalas Tikal National Park was expanded to include the ruins of Uaxactun within its protected area. In 1990 de Maya Biosphere Reserve was created, including Uaxactun as a part of the reserves Multiple Use Zone, in 2009 an excavation project of Slovak Archaeological and Historical Institute was started by professor Milan Kováč. Linda Schele, in A Forest of Kings, devotes a chapter to a war between Tikal and Uaxactun, in which Uaxactun was defeated by forces led by Fire is Born of Tikal. In this chapter, she gives a brief overview of the known history of Uaxactun up to the final year of the war. The combined political entity of Tikal-Uaxactun dominated the Guatemalan Petén for the following 180 years, Siyaj Kak might have come from Teotihuacán, been the general of the Teotihuacano ruler Spearthrower Owl, and conquered Tikal earlier the same year. This was a moment of the Classic Maya. After the conquest by Siyaj Kak in 378 AD, Uaxuactun was still able to keep elite prerogatives of monument carving, temple erection, there was no erection of dedicatory monuments between 554 AD and 711 AD
8.
Yaxchilan
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Yaxchilan is an ancient Maya city located on the bank of the Usumacinta River in what is now the state of Chiapas, Mexico. In the Late Classic Period Yaxchilan was one of the most powerful Maya states along the course of the Usumacinta, architectural styles in subordinate sites in the Usumacinta region demonstrate clear differences that mark a clear boundary between the two kingdoms. Yaxchilan was a center, important throughout the Classic era. It dominated such smaller sites as Bonampak, and had a rivalry with Piedras Negras and at least for a time with Tikal, it was a rival of Palenque. The site is known for its well-preserved sculptured stone lintels set above the doorways of the main structures. These lintels, together with the stelae erected before the major buildings, epigraphers think that the ancient name for the city was probably the same as that of its realm, Pa Chan. Pronounced, meaning Cleft Sky. pronounced, Teoberto Maler gave it its modern name, for some time, the Emblem Gylph was read as Siyaj Chan, or Sky Born. Yaxchilan is located on the bank of the Usumacinta River. This loop defends the site on all sides except for a land approach from the south. The site is 40 kilometres upriver from the ruins of Piedras Negras, Yaxchilan is 21 kilometres from the ruins of Bonampak. The site lies in Ocosingo Municipality in the state of Chiapas, on the Mexican side of the border with Guatemala. It is 80 kilometres downriver from the Maya site Altar de Sacrificios, Yaxchilan has its origins in the Preclassic Period. Some retrospective inscriptions appear to have used to rewrite Yaxchilans dynastic history to suit king Bird Jaguar IV. Before the rule of king Itzamnaaj Balam II, who reigned from 681 to 742, the city-state then grew to a regional capital and the dynasty lasted into the early 9th century. The known history of Yaxchilan starts with the enthronement of Yopaat Balam I and he was the founder of a long dynasty, and took the throne when Yaxchilan was still a minor site. Hieroglyphic inscriptions dating to the Late Classic describe a series of wars in the Early Classic between the city and its neighbours, the long running rivalry with Piedras Negras had already begun by the fifth century AD, with both cities struggling to dominate the Usumacinta trade route. King Moon Skull was credited with gaining a victory over Piedras Negras in 460 and with capturing the enemy king, by the middle of the 5th century Yaxchilan had formal contacts with the great city of Tikal. Bird Jaguar II, the king of Yaxchilan, captured a vassal of the king of Piedras Negras around 478
