Essay Preview: Maya
Report this essay
The Maya civilization was never united under one governing body like the Aztec. Instead, independent city-states shared many traits and beliefs that categorized them as Maya. The ancient Maya had a complex pantheon of deities whom they worshipped and offered human sacrifices. Rulers were believed to be descendants of the gods and their blood was the ideal sacrifice, either through personal bloodletting or the sacrifice of captives of royal blood.
There was a distinct class system in ancient Maya times. Between the ruling class and the farmer/laborer, there must have been educated nobility who were scribes, artists and architects. Evidence of their skill and innovation remains in works of stone, stucco, jade, bone, pottery, obsidian and flint.
The Popol Vuh is the creation story of the Maya. One part of this story recounts the first attempts of the creator, Heart of Sky to make humans. The story goes on to explain that the final attempt, which resulted in the “True People”, was accomplished by constructing people with maize. This is a very reasonable explanation since, in essence, it was the cultivation of maize that gave the early Maya culture the means to change from hunters gatherers to their highly advanced civilization.
Limestone structures, faced with lime stucco, were the hallmark of ancient Maya architecture. The Maya developed several unique building innovations, including the corbel arch which was a false arch achieved by stepping each successive block, from opposite sides, closer to the center, and capped at the peak. Tombs were often encased within or beneath Maya structures. Frequently new temples were built over existing structures. A honeycombed roof comb towered above many structures. In addition to temples, most Maya sites had multi-roomed structures that probably served as royal palaces as well as centers for government affairs. Historically significant events, such as accessions, the capture or sacrifice of royal victims and the completion of the twenty year cycle, were recorded on stone tablets.
As unique and spectacular as any Greek or Roman architecture, Maya architecture spans many thousands of years; yet, often the most dramatic and easily recognizable as Maya are the fantastic stepped pyramids. the process of rebuilding on top of old structures is indeed a common one. Most notably, the North Acropolis at Tikal seems to be the sum total of 1,500 years of architectural modifications.
As Maya cities spread throughout the varied geography of Mesoamerica, the extent of site planning appears to have been minimal; their cities having been built somewhat haphazardly as dictated by the topography of each independent location, Maya architecture tends to integrate a great degree of natural features. For instance, some cities existing on the flat limestone plains of the northern Yucatan grew into great sprawling municipalities, while others built in the hills of Usumacinta utilized the natural loft of the topography to raise their towers and temples to impressive heights. However, some semblance of order, as required by any large city, still prevailed.
At the heart of the Maya city existed the large plazas surrounded by their most valued governmental and religious buildings such as the royal acropolis, great pyramid temples and occasionally ball-courts. Though city layouts evolved as nature dictated, careful attention was placed on the directional orientation of temples and observatories so that they were constructed in accordance with Maya interpretation of the orbits of the stars. Immediately outside of this ritual center were the structures of lesser nobles, smaller temples, and individual shrines: the less sacred and less important structures had a greater degree of privacy. Outside of the constantly evolving urban core were the less permanent and more modest homes of the common people.
The most prolific tool used by the Mayans in their building and construction would have been the amount of manpower needed to complete structures. Beyond this enormous requirement, the remaining materials seem to have been readily available. All stone for Maya structures appears to have been taken from local quarries. They most often utilized limestone, which remained pliable enough to be worked with stone tools while being quarried and only hardened once removed from its bed. In addition to the structural use of limestone, much of their mortar consisted of crushed, burnt, and mixed limestone that mimicked the properties of cement and was used just as widely for stucco finishing as it was for mortar. However, later improvements in quarrying techniques reduced the necessity for this limestone-stucco as their stones began to fit quite perfectly, yet it remained a crucial element in some post and lintel roofs. In the case of the common homes, wooden poles, adobe, and thatch were the primary materials; however, instances of what appear to be common houses of limestone have been discovered as well.
The Maya developed a highly complex system of writing, using pictographs and phonetic or syllabic elements. A complete discussion of their writing system is beyond the scope of this paper. Their writing was highly sophisticated, probably only members of the higher classes were able to read their symbols. The Maya carved these symbols into stone, but the most common place for writing was probably the highly perishable books they made from bark paper, coated with lime to make a fresh white surface. These “books” were screen-folded and bound with wood and deer hide. They are called codices, codex is singular. Maya art shows that writing was done with brushes made with animal hair and quills. Codex-style writing was usually done in black ink with red highlights, giving rise to the Aztec name for the Maya territory as the “land of red and black”.
The contents of the codices must have varied, but some of them were evidently similar to astronomic almanacs. We have examples of a Venus table, eclipse tables in a codex in Dresden. There is a codex in Paris that seems to contain some kind of Maya Zodiac, but if it is and how it must have worked is still unknown. Another major example of Maya almanacs is present in the Madrid Codex. The fourth codex is called the Grolier and was authenticated as late as 1983. These codices probably contained much of the information used by priests or the noble class to determine dates of importance or seasonal interest. The codices probably kept track of dynastic information as well.
In common with the other Mesoamerican civilizations, the Maya used a base 20 (vigesimal) and base 5 numbering system. Also, they independently developed the concept of zero by 357 ACE. Europeans did not embrace zero until the 12th century. Inscriptions show them on occasion working with sums up to the hundreds of millions and dates so large it would take several lines