Transcript Maya - Cities

Empires of the South
Maya, Aztec, and Inca
Chapter 2 Section 3
Maya Empire
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Began to develop
around 1500 B.C.
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Known as the
“People of the
Jaguar”
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250 A.D.
10 million people
200 cities
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Maya - Farming
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Extremely skilled Farmers who produced
enough for trade.
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Terraces – leveled off strips of land on hillsides.
Maya - Farming
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They used rich soil from riverbanks to make their fields
more productive (fertilization).
Cacao beans were a precious commodity consumed
mostly by nobles and even used as a type of money
throughout the empire.
Maya - Cities
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Mayans were master city
builders.
Maya - Cities
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At the center of most cities were pyramids.
The most important Mayan city was Tikal.
Temple of the Jaguar in
Tikal.
Maya – Religion and Science
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Mayan religion reflected the fundamental role of
agriculture in their society.
Gods kept the world in order and maintained
the agricultural cycle in exchange for sacrifices.
Priests were the most
important people in the
empire.
Human Sacrifice
Maya - Religion and Science
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The Mayans had a ball game that was an
important part of Mayan political and religious
festivals.
High-ranking captives were forced to play the
game for their very lives.
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The losers became sacrificial victims and faced
torture and execution immediately following the
match.
Maya - Religion and Science
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Object of the game was to propel an 8 inch ball
of solid baked rubber through a ring or onto a
marker without using your hands.
Maya Ball Court, Chichén Itzá
Maya - Religion and Science
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Excelled in astronomy and mathematics
 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.
Maya - Religion and Science
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By combining astronomy and mathematics, calculated
the length of the solar year at 365.242 days– about 17
seconds shorter than the figure reached by modern
astronomers.
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They studied the sky and
created two calendars to
keep track of time.
The Mayans also created
a system of writing using
symbols or pictures called
hieroglyphs.
Not the end of the World?
The Mayan calendar does not
end in 2012!
For the ancient Maya, it was a
huge celebration to make it to
the end of a whole cycle.
It marks the beginning of a
new era.
Maya - Decline
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By about 800, most Mayan populations had begun to
desert their cities.
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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.
Aztec Empire
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Developed around
1300 and 1520.
Wandering huntergatherers who were
instructed by a God
Huitzilopochtli to
find a place to settle.
Aztec Empire
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The God said an eagle
perched upon a cactus
eating a snake would
mark the place where
they should build their
home.
The people found the
eagle on Lake Texcoco
(present day Mexico
City).
Aztec - Tenochtitlán
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Three large causeways or raised highways over
water, connected the island capital with the
mainland around the lake.
Ancient Aztecs tending to chinampas
Aztec - Tenochtitlán
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The Aztec build aqueducts, channels or big
pipes for flowing water, to bring fresh water
from the mountains.
Chapultepec Aqueduct or Great Aqueduct.
Aztec – Conquest and Trade
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Conquered people became members of Aztec
society and were forced to pay tribute.
Aztec society had a rigid social system with
nobles at the top. All classes except for the
nobles had to pay tribute.
The Aztec traveled great distances to trade.
• 1400's - The Aztecs conquered neighboring peoples, becoming
an empire.
Empire - a large group or government that controls other groups
or governments
• By 1500, the Aztecs ruled millions of people.
• People revolted against high taxes and human sacrifices, only to
lose to the powerful Aztec army.
Aztec Religion
• Religion was central to
Aztec life.
• Thousands of prisoners
were sacrificed to the Aztec
gods.
An Aztec tzompantli, as
illustrated in 1596. A
tzompantli is a type of
wooden rack used for the
public display of human
skulls, typically those of war
captives or other sacrificial
victims.
Aztec - Religion
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The most sacred god was the Sun God.
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The sun was a god that was powered by human blood.
They were disliked by many people because of
their brutal religious sacrifices.
The Aztecs believed that the sun
god needed daily "nourishment" that is, human blood and hearts and that they, as the "people of
the sun," were required to provide
the sun god with his victims.
Warriors who died in battle or on
the sacrificial stone were called
quauhteca ("the eagle's people").
It was believed that after their
death the warriors first formed
part of the sun's brilliance; then,
after four years, they went to live
forever in the bodies of
hummingbirds.
Aztec - Decline
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The Aztec ruler Montezuma II was an
unpopular emperor, and feared that a white god
was coming to seize his throne.
In 1519, Hernán Cortés took Montezuma
captive and looted the city.
Inca Empire
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Began around 1200 A. D.
Largest empire in the
Americas. It stretched
approximately 2,500 miles
down the western coast
of South America!
Emperor is known as
Sapa Inca.
• The Incas built their ancient civilization in the 1200s high up
in the Andes Mountains.
The Incas were known as the Sky
People!
Inca - Conquest
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Unlike the Aztec, the Inca conquered many of
their subjects by peaceful means.
They would send ambassadors to persuade the
people to surrender.
 Those who surrendered were often allowed to keep
their own rulers.
 Newly conquered people were required to learn
Incan religion and language.
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Inca - Cuzco
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The Incan ruler governed from the capital city
of Cuzco.
• One of their
greatest
achievements
was the
construction
of a “hidden
city” high up
in the
mountains
called Machu
Picchu.
• Inca masonry (stonework) is some of the best in the world
– they didn’t use anything to hold their stones together!
Inca - Farming
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Incans developed a system of “terrace farming”
inorder to survive on steep hillsides.
All food that was grown belonged to the government.
Inca - Roads
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The government used the labor
of the people to build a large
system of roads.
These roads stretched 25,000
km.
Inca - Roads
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Allowed the Inca government to
maintain centralized control by
moving military forces around
the empire quickly.
• A few more impressive facts … scientists now believe that
the Inca performed some sort of brain surgery (based on skulls
that have been found)!
Golden alpaca
Gold drinking cups
While it was tough to farm
there, the Andes mountains
did provide one very
important resource …
Gold necklace
Inca - Decline
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In the early 1500s, the
Incan ruler died and there
was a bitter fight for the
throne.
Thus when Europeans
arrived they found the
Incan Empire in a
weakened condition.
Gold knife handle