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� The Maya People� About 10,000 years ago, the first people to inhabit what is now Latin America moved from the north into the lands that would later compose the realm of the Maya�a 125,000 square mile diverse expanse of highlands and lowlands, thick forests, and scrubby terrain encompassing the entire Yucatan Peninsula, all of Guatemala and Belize, and parts of Mexico, Honduras, and El Salvador. Over the next 6,000 years, the native populations gradually shifted from a semi-nomadic existence as hunter-gatherers to a more sedentary agricultural life centered around beans, squash, and�what was to become the sacred crop�corn (or maize). By around 1500 BCE, village building had begun in earnest marking the onset of the Pre Classic period of Maya civilization. The Maya were influenced by their trading partners, the Olmec civilization to the south. As Olmec power waned (400 BCE), southern Maya trading centers grew and prospered. The Classic period of Maya civilization stretched from 250 CE ("CE" or "common era", a.k.a. AD) to about 900 CE and saw great accomplishments in architecture, astronomy, the arts, and road building. The Maya uncovered the mathematical concept of zero, devised a calendar more accurate than any other up until the modern era (they could predict eclipses), and developed a full writing system (the only native American people to do so). At its peak, there were about 200 sizable Maya cities (probably twenty or so containing more than 50,000 people), and a total population of 10-20 million. Each city-state was ruled by a divine king, It was a brilliant civilization worthy of comparison to that of the ancient Greeks and Egyptians and it existed during the time Europe was in its Dark Ages.� The Maya viewed the world with a combination of dread and wonder. Religion dominated their lives. Among others they worshipped gods of creation, days, wind, soil, stars, the hunt, and rain (the rain god was named Chac and statues of him abound). Every act of Maya life had a religious connection. Prayers and rituals were all a part of everyday life and each was carried out with precision, for the Maya believed that all life was in the hands of divine powers. To them, the three levels of the cosmos�the Overworld of the heavens, the Middleworld that was earth, and the Underworld of the dead�were all alive with sacred energy. Cosmic order or balance could be maintained only by reciprocal acts of generosity by gods and humans. That is, the gods would continue to bestow food, children, sunshine, rain, and other gifts on the Maya in return for acknowledgment, respect, and praise. The Maya feared death, even though they believed worthy individuals would be rewarded with a heavenly paradise while evildoers would be consigned to an underworld hell. Life was spent placating the ancient, human fear of the unknown.� It was believed that the gods made Maya of corn and brought them to life with their own, godly blood�which the Maya would return. The Mayas had been thought of as generally peaceful, but now they are considered to have been an often violent, warring people. Their wars were religious-based, ritualized, and usually fought between neighboring city-states. Their weapons were bows and arrows (during the late Classic and Post Classic periods), spears, spearthrowers, turtle shell shields, clubs, daggers, and a hornets' nest bomb. One of their main reasons for waging wars was to capture prisoners for enslavement or human sacrifice. The Maya sometimes drowned the human sacrifices (often children), decapitated, hung, beat, disemboweled or mutilated them; but more often they cut out the hearts of living victims. In addition to the common practice of sacrificing human lives, the people participated enthusiastically in ritual bloodletting and self-torture as forms of sacrifice. Over time it became the express duty of the nobility or elite, on behalf of their people, to perform the ritual acts of devotion necessary to keep the earthly and the supernatural worlds in alignment. Royalty used stingray spines to draw blood from their own earlobes, nose, lips, tongue, or penis. They would bleed on bark paper then burn it as a sustenance offering to the gods. The Maya believed that the gods needed human blood to become strong and serve the people. In addition to being a service to and communion with the gods, human sacrifice enabled the people to add meat to their diet by eating the sacrificial victims. As there were inadequate large game or domesticated animals for people to include meat as a regular part of their diets, cannibalism helped satisfy the desire for eating meat.� In addition to the food staples of maize, beans, and squashes, the Maya also grew chilies and cacao. Cacao beans were used as currency and only made into chocolate drinks for the elite.� The Maya produced monumental architecture for their gods and rulers. Their pyramids, in addition to being crowned with a temple, served as funeral crypts for nobles and kings. They also built large and elaborately decorated palaces and recorded their local history in steles (upright, engraved stone slabs). These largely limestone wonders were built with ropes, stone and wooden tools, and lots of human energy.� Though the Maya wrote extensively only three books, or codex, have survived. Their books were destroyed by the Christian Spanish who realized the writings formed part of Maya religious beliefs and daily life. The Spanish called these books "superstitions and lies of the devil" and burned them, destroying the valuable knowledge of an advanced culture. The Spanish also forbade the music and dances used in Maya religious ceremonies, replacing them with Spanish religious music.� Many Maya cities had one or more ball courts where pok-a-tok, a game played mainly as a religious ceremony, was contested. The game was played with a solid 8 pound, basketball-sized, rubber ball, though no one knows what the rules were. In uncovered courts, there are apparently goal rings and markers along the center of the court or along the sides�though some floors are perfectly plain. Art work suggests one object of the game was to keep the ball off the floor without using one's hands (the hips were heavily padded). The stakes were sometimes high. The losers of these games may have been sacrificed. They could be pummeled to death with the heavy solid ball, decapitated, or in a sequel to the game, used as the ball itself being bound tightly and tossed down the temple steps or batted around the court.� The Maya painted, pierced, tattooed, and decoratively scarred their bodies as that was considered culturally attractive. They also perfumed their bodies (they probably didn't bathe much as water was often in short supply). Other physical attributes the Maya considered beautiful were a long, pointed head (shaped to resemble an ear of corn pointed towards the back; they were after all "men of maize"), pointed teeth, crossed eyes, and a hairless face. To help their children achieve these unnatural features, Maya parents would sometimes strap boards over the still malleable heads of their newborns to shape them into cones. They would hang objects just beyond the newborn's nose to try to cross their eyes, and they would apply hot cloths to their faces with the intent of preventing hairs from growing. [We can't attest to the success of these latter practices but we've seen long, pointed Maya skulls (in the Museum of Man in San Diego) that show the "pressing of the boards" technique accomplished its purpose of cranial deformation.] Maya adults would file their own teeth to get that desired "pointed look."� Maya marriages were arranged and the typical age for a marrying couple were 18 years for boys, 14-15 for girls. Prior to marriage, the young man had to live with his wife's family for a period of service that lasted 6 years. Divorce was allowed, for example, if the woman did not produce enough children to work with her husband in the fields. There were extreme contrasts in wealth and social status between the nobility and ordinary Maya families. The lowest social class was that of the slaves. Captives taken in war, thieves, murderers, debtors, and orphans became slaves.� Though they had both, jade was considered more precious than gold. Its color reflected the green of growing corn and the glimmering shades of deep pools of life-giving but not always available water.� The demise of Maya civilization in the southern lowlands (present day Guatemala and Honduras) in the tenth century has been called, "One of the most profound cultural failures in human history." There is no agreement as to what caused this failure, though there is a growing consensus that multiple factors contributed significantly. These interrelated factors include:�
Many of the once-great Maya cities were abandoned or allowed to deteriorate. Another native Yucatan people, the Itz�, accompanied by Toltec mercenaries from central Mexico, overran the northern Maya cities in the 9th and 10th centuries; concurrent with the final phase of the brilliant southern Maya civilization. Rather than subjugate, these invaders sometimes absorbed their Maya foes. This enabled classic Maya culture to continue to thrive in some northern Yucatan centers. Some northern communities had oligarchic governments (rule by a group of nobles) rather than kings.� The Yucatan Maya cities of Uxmal, Kabah, Sayil, and Labn�, nestled in the Puuc hills, lasted until about 1000 AD when they fell to the Toltec-Itz�es. The large, eastern city of Cob� (50,000 inhabitants) also prospered during this period. Generally, the art and architecture of the eastern cities of the Yucatan (e.g., Tulum, Xel-H�, and those on Cozumel Island) are inferior to that found in the southern Maya civilization. Around 1000 AD, the city of Chich�n Itz� (partly named for its conquerors) embarked on two centuries of prosperity. Its spectacular art and architecture differs from that of the southern, classic Maya�though in the minds of the general public it is thought to epitomize it. Its non-Maya elements include a domelike observatory, use of colonnades, interior courts, rooms divided by columns, different exterior wall treatments, construction of square platforms, and different sculptural motifs. These architectural and sculptural traits are more closely related with Toltec culture.� Around 1200, Hunac Ceel became ruler of the nearby city of Mayap�n by "miraculously" surviving immersion in the sacred, sacrificial well of Chich�n Itz�. After he conquered Chich�n Itz�, the walled city of Mayap�n became the major Yucatan power. Mayap�n was destroyed in 1441 by rival chieftains vying to control it. Maya civilization then lapsed into disarray and soon faced an even greater catastrophe: the arrival of the Spaniards at the beginning of the 16th century.� The ancient Maya calculated that the present universe was formed on a date that corresponds in the Julian calendar to August 11, 3114 BCE. Their system of cosmic cycles dictated that it would end on December 21, 2012 CE (fourteen years from now). The classic Maya world ended hundreds of years sooner.� Seven years prior to the arrival of the first conquistadors, a sailor who may have accompanied Christopher Columbus on one of his four trips to the New World was blown off course and shipwrecked off Cozumel Island. Gonzalo Guerrero and 19 other survivors were captured by the Maya; all were sacrificed save for himself and a priest. Guerrero married an Indian princess, and his children were thus the first "Mestizos" (people of mixed Spanish and Indian blood). The priest became conquistador Hern�n Cort�s' translator.� When the Spaniards came to present day Mexico in 1517, their armor, beards, light skin, horses, huge ships, guns, and cannons made them seem like gods to the native peoples. Aztec gifts of gold and precious gems whetted the Spaniards appetite for riches. The Aztecs were conquered in 1521 by Cort�s. The Yucatan, including the Maya, were largely conquered by the Spaniards by 1547 (and further harassed by the often present pirates), though holdouts and descendants survived as a culture in the jungle for another 150 years. Colonial expansion led Spain to finally and thoroughly conquer this last refuge in 1697. The Maya had their lands taken from them and they were made into vassals, indentured laborers, and slaves. They were abused, tortured for non-Christian idolatry, and had much of their cultural heritage suppressed or destroyed. Hundreds of thousands of Maya died from the European diseases of smallpox and measles. Their soil was worn out by Spaniards who year after year planted it with tobacco and sugar cane.� Though they enslaved the native people, the Creoles (the Mexicans of pure Spanish descent) wanted their own freedom. While Spain was in revolution in 1820, Mexico moved to become independent and did so in 1821. That set a dangerous model. Just twenty years later, while the Mexican government was occupied with the Mexican-American War, the Maya revolted in the Caste War. Their vicious uprising saw them take revenge on every captured white man, woman, and child by rape and violent murder. European survivors on the Yucatan Peninsula retreated to the last two Spanish strongholds of M�rida and Campeche. When Spain, France, and the United States declined calls for help, it became apparent that these cities would soon fall. Just as M�rida was about to be evacuated, the Maya picked up their primitive weapons and walked away. It was time to plant corn.� During this interlude, help for the Spanish settlers arrived from Cuba, Mexico City, and in the form of 1,000 US mercenary troops. Vengeance was merciless. Most captured Maya were killed, some were sold into slavery in Cuba. Between 1846-1850 the population of the Yucatan Peninsula was reduced from 500,000 to 300,000. Guerrilla war ensued as the escaped Maya made sneak attacks upon the whites. When Campeche seceded from the state of Yucatan in 1857, the Indians (with arms bought from the British financed by Maya trade in timber) took advantage of the internal strife by seizing the Fort at Bacalaar and taking control of the entire Caribbean Coast. In three years they destroyed hundreds of towns and slaughtered or captured thousands of whites. Whites were used as slave labor in the fields and forest and women were put to work doing household chores or as concubines. After forty years of an uneasy truce, the Mexican army recaptured the fort and scattered the Maya. Guerrilla war resumed. Quintana Roo along the Caribbean coast (including Canc�n) was considered a no man's land for almost another hundred years. In 1915 the Mexican army pulled out and returned the land to the Maya. In 1936 it became a territory under the jurisdiction of the Mexican government and in 1974; with the promise of the birth of tourism, it was admitted to the Federation of States of Mexico.� While the Maya controlled the eastern coast of the peninsula, M�rida, the capital of the Yucatan was prospering because of its henequen crops (they were used to produce twine and rope). Spanish haciendas and their Indian slaves enriched the patrones, who in turn built beautiful mansions in M�rida while the Indians remained in servitude. When an American journalist documented and publicized these lifestyle differences in 1908, change became inevitable. The Mexican government began to heavily tax the hacienda owners and the new constitution created after the Mexican Revolution of 1910 established a democratic system of government and instituted land reform and human rights measures. It would take decades but the poor would eventually benefit from these changes. Currently, the average yearly wage in Mexico is about $2000 (US dollars).� Not until the mid-19th century was the greatness of the Maya civilization rediscovered. Many cities are still undiscovered or only very recently discovered (in the last 10-20 years). Only about half of the Maya hieroglyphs are understood.� Though their ancient cities are no longer populated, the Maya are not a vanished race. Today, many of the people who inhabit the Yucatan Peninsula are direct descendants of the Maya. They number 2 million in Mexico and Central America. Many Maya still live in abject poverty and remain indentured workers. In some of their small villages, the na�an oval-shaped, thatched-roofed hut with sascab (lime dirt) floors�is still the principal dwelling. In 1994, in Chiapas, the southern and most poverty-stricken state in Mexico, a new guerrilla movement emerged. The Zapatista National Liberation Army is pressing for greater indigenous rights and more economic opportunities. About one third of the Mexican army, some 30,000-40,000 troops, are currently spread across the territory in an attempt to keep the Maya revolt�which began as a plea to be heard�from turning violent.� Though the Maya are still deeply religious, their beliefs now incorporate a mixture of native and Christian elements. Nearly every activity is accompanied by ceremonies involving "pagan" deities. "The Word," even when brought by missionaries of a far more powerful people, was not swallowed whole.� Other People Who Were Influential in Mexico's History�
The 1846-48 Mexican-American War was provoked by the US because it was intent on gaining sparsely populated Mexican lands that appeared to stand in the way of "manifest destiny." When newly independent (from Spain) Mexico refused to sell its land, the US initiated a series of provocations that led to war. Though Mexico and the US were comparable in size, there were three times as many Americans as Mexicans. The Americans also had the cultural advantage of being technologically and forward-looking oriented. Mexicans were tradition bound by their close ties to Old World Spain and the native Indian people. As a young officer who fought in Mexico, Lieutenant Ulysses S. Grant called the war "one of the most unjust ever waged by a stronger against a weaker nation." The war was one of the more shameful acts of American history; not only for the reasons it was fought but the way it was fought. Thousands of American soldiers defected and many who stayed were often drunk and committed atrocities on Mexican civilians. In the end, the US gained half of Mexico's territory; 500,000 square miles (what became the states of Texas, New Mexico, California, Utah, Arizona, Nevada, and part of Colorado). The US reimbursed Mexico $15 million. The year after the war ended gold was found in California. Within a few years $200 million worth of gold would be extracted. Did it pay to be immoral? The enormous parcels of new American territory made the future of slavery a bigger question. Would states formed from the new lands be free or slave? Thirteen years after the Mexican-American War, veteran American officers of that war led forces against each other during the American Civil War. For the United States, the killing fields had come home. Did immorality pay for Spain? For a time Spain extracted tremendous riches from its New World colonies (peaking at nearly $400 million annually�in today's dollars�in silver alone). However, these riches helped inspire and finance Spanish involvement (under Philip II) with European religious wars and this overreaching contributed to Spain's demise as the most powerful nation in the world. Spain's great Armada was defeated in 1588. Its growing dependency on plundering from American lands made it less self-sufficient. Within 100 years of conquering the Aztec, Maya, and other Indian civilizations, stealing their wealth and subjugating their people, Spain had gone from the world's mightiest empire to a mere conduit for passing riches from the New World to the northern European countries.� �
� 1999 [email protected]
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