Early Americas:

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Early Americas

• Mayas, Aztecs, Incas, and Llamas

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Mayas

• Yucatan Peninsula, 250-900 CE
• Organized into small city-states ruled by kings
• Known for
• Pyramids
• Ball Game
• religious and political significance
• Playing the game would maintain cycles of sun and
  moon and bring rains
• Gameplay
• The goal was to get the ball through a hoop
• The goal was also NOT to touch the ball with
  one's hands
• The winners of the game were treated as heroes
  and given a great feast. The penalty for losing a
  game was death. The leader of the team who lost
  the game was killed
• Polytheistic

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More Mayas

• Limited human sacrifice
• Cut own bodies so blood would nourish gods
• Sacrifices some captured enemies to gods never
  to extent of other societies
• Calendar-predicts massive catastrophe in Sunday,
  December 23, 2012 which few will survive
• Bad times ?
• We dont know what happened to them

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Greeks of the Americas

• Contributions include
• Writing based on pictographs
• Use of zero as a placeholder
• Astronomy and eclipses
• Calculated length of year
• Cultivation of maize
• Copper metallurgy
• Great city Teotihuicán, center for trade and
  worship

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Rise of the Aztecs

• Decline of the Mayan civilization
• Nomadic Toltecs established an empire in Mexico
• Built Chichén Itzá
• Legend of Quetzalcóatl
• Toltecs fell in 12th C., taken over by nomadic
  Mexica (Aztecs)
• Capital at Tenochtitlán in 1325
• Built on island in Lake Texcoco
• Built chinampas floating gardens
• Maize and beans were staple crops

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Aztecs

• Central Mexico, 1200-1500 CE
• Known for
• Worship of Huitzilopochtli, the sun god
• polytheistic
• Human sacrifice on a large scale
• Sun god needed human blood to battle evil and
  rise the next day
• Victims included enslaved people, criminals, and
  people offered as tribute by conquered peoples
• Prisoners of war preferred victims priest
  required steady supply of victims battle tactics
  adapted to ensure opponents taken alive

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More Aztecs

• Calendar
• called Eagle Bowl
• Predicts end of earth on December 24, 2011
• Stratified Society
• Nobles, peasants, and slaves
• Often slaves were war prisoners
• Organized into clans called calpulli
• Women
• Women who died in childbirth were given same
  status as men who died in battle
• Politically subordinate
• Could inherit property

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• Peru (Andes), 1200-1500 CE
• Known as Quechua, name Inca comes from rulers
  title- Inca
• Organized into clans called ayllus
• Government forced people to supply Mita, work on
  government lands
• Ruled a large empire over diverse people
• 1438 clan ruler Pachacuti gained control over
  Lake Titicaca
• Approximately 11,000,000 people
• Unified empire by
• Roads
• Quechua language
• Royal marriage alliances
• Settling conquered people far away from their
  lands

Incas
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More Inca

• Known for
• Gold and Silver
• Sun god important because Incan ruler was
  descendant of Inti
• Sacrifices typically agricultural or animal
• Great builders Manchu Picchu (unsure of its
  purpose)
• Quipu record keeping system of knots instead of
  a written system
• Did not use wheel-even though available-used
  llamas
• Mummies

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Comparisons

• Legend of Quetzalcóatl
• Polytheistic
• Great builders
• Sacrifices Inca Animal, Aztecs Human
• Aztecs ruled brutally, Incas ruled by
  incorporating people into empire
• Aztecs long distance trade, Inca system of roads