Mayan Disappearance

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Isabella Gines Anthropology 115R Professor Stanton The Mysterious Collapse Mayan civilization began long before Christopher Columbus, “ founded the new world”, The Mayan civilization persisted for more than 1,000 years, That is over twice as long as America, just think that a society formed by people some see as primitive expanded into a thriving society which lasted over 1,000 years. This also means that in 1,000 years there were factors slowly leading to the Mayans demise. Archaeologists and other scientists each have their own beliefs for how the Mayan society disappeared. Some hypothesis it was brought upon by a drought, others say it was due to a collapse in their socio-political structure. There are also some who believe that either…show more content…
For instance, even though archaeologists accept that there was a collapse no one would agree that the Mayan civilization broke down completely. There are still many people today who live in central Mexico and Guatemala who identify themselves as Mayan. They speak the language of their ancestors and still use farming techniques that were passed down through the centuries. Although Mayans were not the largest civilization thriving at the time they were unique in the ideals. Their ideals including their city-states - which spread out over a large area, interacting, sharing language, religious ideas, and forms of political symbolism which persisted for almost 1000 years. We know the civil institution and political life collapsed but the population themselves persisted. The Mayans evolved from small farming villages to cities with high population. Take Tikal for example, It is now accepted that Tikal was the largest Mayan city during the classic period reaching on average 150,000 people. Now many people ask the question what happened to the Mayans out of curiosity but others see that our society can be like that of the Maya and that we too will slowly disappear. Factors that seem to have affected the Maya and what were responsible for their collapse are factors we see in American society. War, disease, drought and socio- political unrest are issues in our day to day…show more content…
Going hand in hand with the idea that the people began looking towards their government with anger due to lack of food is this idea of civil unrest from within. This can begin with a class conflict. If we look at Tikal we notice that there were at least three socioeconomic classes in classic Maya ( Hamblin, Robert L, Brian L. Pitcher. 1980). There was the elite which included the nobles, soldiers and their families, the middle class which was closely involved with the elites. These people would be respected artists, craftsmen and then there was the rest of society. A key factor in noticing the change in this class structure was with the artwork. There was a mural at Bonampak that can be depicted as the elites response to a nearby peasant rebellion ( Hamblin, Robert L, Brian L. Pitcher. 1980). Although this mural represents the elites handling a single rebellion from commoners it does prove that here was war from within. War that could be heightened with stress from a lack of food. Just like in any society with a class structure, the benefits will always go to the elites first because they have priority. We can hypothesis that the commoners, angry and starving, would go as far as to

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