Transcript Pre-Columbian Civilizations in the Americas

Where in the World Wednesday
 What is this?
 Where is it
located?
 Which culture
created it?
 When was it
created?
 When was it
“discovered”?
Where in the World Wednesday
 Machu Picchu
 Peru in the Andes
Mts
 Incas
 circa 1450
 Discovered in
1911 by an
American
professor
searching for the
Lost Incan City
Influences of Latin America
 Many different cultures
influence the Latin American
region
 These cultures combined
with the early civilizations
that were settled around
Central and South America
 Early Pre-Columbian
cultures are the Mayans,
Incas, and Aztecs
Today’s Assignment
 Divide your paper into three columns
 Label one Maya, one Aztec, and one Inca
 Read through the notes provided.
Summarize each slide for the different
civilizations.
 Once your notes are completed,
complete the assignment on the last
slide of the handout on the back of your
notes sheet.
 If you have any spare time work on your
map.
 Yucatan Peninsula,
between A.D. 300
and 900.
 Central America
and southern
Mexico.
The Yucatan
Peninsula
Mayans- Politics
City-states
– Built around temples and their specific gods
Governed by a hereditary ruling class.
– States warred with one another
– Believed rulers descended from gods
Captured nobles and war leaders were
used for human sacrifice.
Mayans- Religion
 Believed life is in the
hands of divine
powers
 Appeased gods
through human
sacrifice
 Itzamna was the
supreme god
– Gods were either
good or evil
– He was good
Mayan
Glyphs
sky
king
house
child
Mayan
Mathematics
city
Mayan- Social
• Social classes
• Rulers, nobles, scribes
• Artisans, officials, merchants
• Peasant farmers (majority)
• Gender roles
• Women- homemaking & raising
kids
• Men- fighting & hunting
• Built many advanced temples
and pyramids
• Developed a complex calendar
End of the Mayan civilization
• Mystery
•
•
•
•
invasion?
internal revolt?
natural disaster (volcano)?
overuse of the land?
Twelfth century A.D., the Aztec
began a long migration to the
Valley of Mexico.
Capital at Tenochtitlan on an
island in the middle of Lake
Texcoco
Aztec: Political
• semi-independent
territories governed by
local lords
• tribute- goods or money
paid by conquered
peoples to their
conquerors
Aztec- Social
• monarch - lords & government officials,
commoners, indentured workers, slaves
• men and women have different roles from
birth
• women- house, can own property, & enter
contracts, & become priestess
• men- warriors
Aztec- Religion
 According to legend, the
Aztec believed that a sign
would come from the god of
war and of the sun,
Huitzilopochtli, telling them
where to settle.
 Struggle between good and
evil
 Practiced human sacrifice to
put off the end of time
Quetzalcoatl
 The feathered
serpent.
 According to Aztec
tradition, this being
left his homeland
and vowed to return
in triumph.
– Return would be
preceded by a sign
of arrow through a
sapling
Aztec Writing
Aztec Math
The End
• Montezuma
• Hernan Cortes
• Quetzalcoatl confusion
• disease
• gunpowder
• South America
• Modern day Peru
• Centered on
Chilean
Mountains
Inca- Political
• Pachacuti
• Founder of the Incas
• Warfare
• Largest city- Machu Picchu
Inca- Economics
• roads
• irrigation
• agriculture
• peanuts
• potatoes
• cotton
Inca- Religion
• Polytheistic
• Sun God- chief diety
• Belief in afterlife
evident by
mummification
Inca- Accomplishments
• Gender roles
• women - raise children & weave
cloth
• Men- work and provide for family
• could choose to marry anyone in
your social class
• Architecture
• Quipu
• Writing system using a system of
knotted strings
• Theater
• Poetry, music, tragic & comic works
The End
• 1531 Francisco Pizarro
• Spanish explorer
• Brought steel weapons,
gunpowder, horses, &
small pox
Early History
Ancient Civilizations were mostly
conquered by the Europeans during the
Age of Exploration.
Age of Exploration
 1400-1600
 God, Gold, Glory
 Spanish and Portuguese explorers started settling
around Latin America
– Treaty of Tordesillas
• Line of Demarcation: Pope gave everything
East of the Atlantic to Portugal, everything
West of Atlantic to Spain
• Gave Brazil to Portugal
European Influence
 New government systems developed
 Spread of Christianity throughout the
region
 Goods and services now cost
money…no longer based on
bartering/trading
 Diffusion of products and people
 Changing of the landscape- land now
used for economic reason and less for
survival