Transcript Americas

Americas
Environmental Management
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Bering Strait to Americas
Hunter/gatherers
Late 15th century: domestication of plants
Densely populated settlements (Mesoamerica
and western South America)
• Chinampas (floating gardens)
• Terraced hills in Andes Mountains
• Corn and potatoes not labor-intensive
Olmec
• Oldest civilization in Americas-all later
Mesoamerican civilization derived from them
• Our knowledge based on archeology
• Based on agriculture
• Spread over central Mexico
• Built scattered ceremonial centers
• After 1500 bce developed hierarchical
societies
Olmec Society
• Aristocrats lived in large cities with palaces,
plazas, temples, ball courts, water reservoirs,
and carved stone drains
• Monumental stone structures
• Human sacrifice practiced at sacred
ceremonial sites
• 900 bce San Lorenzo, center of Olmec
civilization, was destroyed
Olmec Great Pyramid
• La Venta in Mexico
• Center of Olmec religion
• Required estimated 800,000 man hours to
build
• Around 300 bce La Venta fell
Maya
• Sophisticated system of writing
• Most accurate calendar of any civilization at
the time
• Advances in mathematics
Background of Maya
• Group that emigrated from northern Oregon
to the western highlands of Guatemala
• Cholans and Tzeltalans moved into the
Yucatan peninsula
• Cholan-speaking Maya created the culture
Key features of Maya culture
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Agriculture was basis of support
Staple crop was maize
Raised, narrow, rectangular plots for growing
Milpa system-burn down trees and plant in the
ashes (only productive for 2 years)
• Agriculture supported large populations (up to 14
million)
• Population centers lacked industry—they were
ceremonial centers
Maya Economy
• Fairs that accompanied ceremonies
• Items of value: jade, obsidian, beads of red
spiny oyster shell, lengths of cloth, and cacao
• Extensive trade promoted common language
and unity, along with common sense of
identity
• Long-distance trading based on trade of “gifts”
by aristocratic ambassadors
Maya Technology
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Transportation: canoes on rivers and swamps
Wide roads
Hieroglyphic writing with 850 characters
Recorded chronology, religion, and astronomy
in books made of bark paper and deerskin
• Inscriptions on steles=historical documents
• Vigesimal math (based on 20, not 10)
• Abstract knowledge
Maya Warfare
• Wars fought for land, slaves, avenge insults
and punish theft, control trade routes and
sources of valued products like salt
• Famine led to wars
Collapse
• Between 8th and 10th centuries Maya
abandoned population centers and their
civilization collapsed
• Reasons: land exhaustion, drought,
overpopulation, disease, and constant wars
Teotihuacan and Toltec
• People from east and south of Valley of
Mexico
• Great commercial and ceremonial center
• Center of Teotihuacan stood Pyramids of Sun
and Moon
• Artisans lived in barrios at edge of town
• Toltec was heir to Teotihuacan—the people of
Toltec intermarried and integrated with
people of Teotihuacan
Aztec (Mexica) Society
• Aztecs shared Nahuatl language as Toltecs
• Aztecs were considered foreign barbarians,
had to settle on swampy islands in Lake
Texcoco
• By 1428 they had embarked on expansion
• By 1519 (when Cortes arrived) they contolled
all of central Mexico
Aztec Economy
• Strong mercantile class made luxury items
available: cotton, feathers, cocoa, skins,
turquoise, gold
Aztecs and War
• Aztecs attributed their success to their god
Huitzilopochtli, god of war
• Kings ordered war to acquire tribute and
captives for sacrifice
• Fighting was pathway to social advancement
• Military service was shared (men called up by
city wards)
• King planned battle, route, and travel plans
Aztec Attack
• Priests led the army
• Object city was warned of imminent attack; if
surrendered, tribute was modest (compared
to being attacked)
• Aztec strategy was to encircle the enemy
• Goal was not to kill the enemy but to get him
to provide tribute or to use him for sacrificial
victim
Aztec religion
• Religion shaped everything, and war was an
article of faith
• Huitzilopochtli symbolized the sun, who had
to be kept moving (fed blood by human
sacrifice)
• Sociological reasons for human sacrifice?
• Mexica religion destroyed the economic basis
of the empire
A Human Moment
How did conquered people respond to the
Aztecs?
Incas
• Archeology shows ruins older than those of
the Maya and Aztecs
• Located in Andes mountains of western South
America
Moche Valley
• 100 and 800 ce
• Rivers allowed for irrigation
• Large ceremonial centers with palaces and
pyramids
• Expert at metalworking
Inca social organization
• Grew in valleys in the Andes Mountains
• 2500 bce lived on fish and mussels; cotton for
clothing
• 200 bce Andean people made several leaps in
lifestyle, creating vertical archipelagoes
• Potatoes as basis of diet
• Coca leaves used to build stamina
Inca rule
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Inca ruler considered descended from sun-god
Dead rulers linked people to sun-god
Treated as still-present rulers
Mummies brought out for ceremonies and
human sacrifices made to mummies
• “Cult of royal mummies”
• Dead retained full rights over property
Inca government
• Ruled by imperial unification
• Imposed religion and language
• Forced relocation called “mitima”
Fall of Inca
• Overextension
• Huascar and Atauhualpa contested throne in
1525
• Huascar was the legitimate heir; ordered that
dead rulers should be buried and their lands
consolidated
• Led to civil war; nobles (who managed dead
rulers’ lands) backed Atauhualpa
• On the way to coronation Atauhualpa met
Pizarro-Spaniards took over
North America
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Mound Builders (Ohio, Mississippi)
People of wooded northwest Pacific
Iroquois of northeast
Tribes of southeast
Plains Indians