![]() Among these were the Pyramid of the Sun (Figure 4) (which is two hundred feet high) and the Pyramid of the Moon (one hundred and fifty feet high). Large-scale agriculture and the resultant abundance of food allowed time for people to develop special trades and skills other than farming.īuilders constructed over twenty-two hundred apartment compounds for multiple families, as well as more than a hundred temples. The ethnicity of this settlement’s inhabitants is debated some scholars believe it was a multiethnic city. One of the largest population centers in pre-Columbian America and home to more than 100,000 people at its height in about 500 CE, Teotihuacan was located about thirty miles northeast of modern Mexico City. (2) The MayaĪfter the decline of the Olmec, a city rose in the fertile central highlands of Mesoamerica. The Olmec also developed a system of trade throughout Mesoamerica, giving rise to an elite class. It was the Olmec who worshipped a rain god, a maize god, and the feathered serpent so important in the future pantheons of the Aztecs (who called him Quetzalcoatl) and the Maya (to whom he was Kukulkan). Although no one knows what happened to the Olmec after about 400 BCE, in part because the jungle reclaimed many of their cities, their culture was the base upon which the Maya and the Aztec built. They also bred small domesticated dogs which, along with fish, provided their protein. They grew maize, squash, beans, and tomatoes. The Olmec built aqueducts to transport water into their cities and irrigate their fields. Figure 1-2 – Olmec Warrior by O.Mustafin, Wikimedia Commons is in the Public Domain, CC0 Figure 3 – La Venta Pirámide cara norte by Alfonsobouchot, Wikipedia is in the Public Domain Most recognizable are their giant head sculptures (Figure 2) and the pyramid in La Venta (Figure 3). The mother of Mesoamerican cultures was the Olmec civilization.įlourishing along the hot Gulf Coast of Mexico from about 1200 to about 400 BCE, the Olmec produced a number of major works of art, architecture, pottery, and sculpture. ![]() Weapons made of obsidian, jewelry crafted from jade, feathers woven into clothing and ornaments, and cacao beans that were whipped into a chocolate drink formed the basis of commerce. Though the area had no overarching political structure, trade over long distances helped diffuse culture. ![]() Most important for our knowledge of these peoples, they created the only known written language in the Western Hemisphere researchers have made much progress in interpreting the inscriptions on their temples and pyramids. They developed a mathematical system, built huge edifices, and devised a calendar that accurately predicted eclipses and solstices and that priest-astronomers used to direct the planting and harvesting of crops. Corn, or maize, domesticated by 5000 BCE, formed the basis of their diet. Mesoamericans were polytheistic their gods possessed both male and female traits and demanded blood sacrifices of enemies taken in battle or ritual bloodletting. Although marked by great topographic, linguistic, and cultural diversity, this region cradled a number of civilizations with similar characteristics. Mesoamerica is the geographic area stretching from north of Panama up to the desert of central Mexico. Nowhere in the Americas was this more obvious than in Mesoamerica. With this agricultural revolution, and the more abundant and reliable food supplies it brought, populations grew and people were able to develop a more settled way of life, building permanent settlements. Researchers believe that about ten thousand years ago, humans also began the domestication of plants and animals, adding agriculture as a means of sustenance to hunting and gathering techniques. Recent research along the west coast of South America suggests that migrant populations may have traveled down this coast by water as well as by land. (The fact that Asians and American Indians share genetic markers on a Y chromosome lends credibility to this migration theory.) Continually moving southward, the settlers eventually populated both North and South America, creating unique cultures that ranged from the highly complex and urban Aztec civilization in what is now Mexico City to the woodland tribes of eastern North America. Later settlers came by boat across the narrow strait. When the glaciers melted, water engulfed Beringia, and the Bering Strait was formed. The first inhabitants of what would be named the Americas migrated across this bridge in search of food. (Figure 1) Figure 1-1 – Beringia Land Bridge by National Park Service is in the Public Domain Between nine and fifteen thousand years ago, some scholars believe that a land bridge existed between Asia and North America that we now call Beringia.
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