Americas Before European Encounter

Origins of Native Americans

• Human presence in North America up to 12,000 years ago

• Indian creation stories say they were always here

• Maritime people who came here by sea

• Crossed Bering Strait

• Clovis (N.M.) weapon points date people to 11,500 years ago

Human Beginnings in America

• Archeologists believe humans were in Chile 12,500 years ago

• Monte Verde is site of oldest dated human habitation in Americas

• http://www.cabrillo.edu/~crsmith/mverde.html

• http://anthropology.net/2008/05/08/earliest-known-archaeological-evidence-of-americans-found-in-monte-verde-chile/

Olmecs

• Precursors of Mesoamerican civilizations

• All knowledge of them comes from archeological evidence

Olmecs: Lifestyle

• Lived on maize, squash, beans, other plants, wild game, fish

• Originally egalitarian

• After 1500 organized in chieftains, or more hierarchical communities

• Common people lived in villages, leaders lived in urban centers

Olmecs: Culture

• Sophisticated system of symbols shown in art

• Monumental stone structures

• Ruler portraits in stone

• Sacred ceremonial sites for human sacrifice

• Courts for playing games with hard rubber balls

Olmecs: Interaction with others

• Trade over long distances

• Exchanged rubber, cacao, pottery, figurines, jaguar pelts, and painters and obsidian sculptors, basalt, iron ore, and shells

Olmecs: Urban Centers

• 900 B.C.E. San Lorenzo destroyed

• La Venta in Tabasco until 300 C.E.

• Tres Zapotes until approx 900 C.E.

• http://www.delange.org/SanLorenzo/SanLorenzo.htm

Maya

• In Classic period they achieved intellectual and artistic accomplishments rivaled by few other civilizations before them

Maya: Lifestyle

• Linguistics causes scholars to believe they migrated from Oregon/California to Guatemala. Cholan-speaking Maya created the culture we identify as “Mayan.”

• Staple crop was maize, raised on milpa or on raised, rectangular plots

• Also lived on beans, squash, chili peppers, root crops and fruit trees

• Could have supported as many as 14 million people

Maya: Culture

• Culture was based on agriculture• Hierarchical society, with wealth concentrated in

noble class• Nobles lived in palaces, were buried in pyramids• Steles were stone-slab monuments with

historical records• Masonry temples, altars, sophisticated

polychrome pottery• Courts for games played with rubber ball• http://www.ballgame.org/

Maya: Culture continued

• Hieroglyphic writing• Popul Vuh [Book of Council] has Mayan

view of creation, concepts of good and evil, and purpose of life

• Calendar of 18 20-day months and one 5-day month

• Accomplished in math, astronomy, calendar, and recording of history

• Culture peaked in 600-900 C.E.

Maya: Interaction with Others

• Public fairs for trade

• Long-distance traders considered foreign ambassadors, so merchants were members of noble families

• Rivers and swamps used for transportation

• Goods carried by humans on wide roads

• Mayans were warlike people

Maya: Religion

• Worship of Quetzalcoatl (feathered serpent god)

• Worship of rain-god, sun god, and moon god

Maya: Urban Centers

• Teotihuacan in central Mexico: trade and ceremonial center [Pyramids of Sun and Moon in center]

• Oaxaca: great religious center that displayed wealth of nobility

What happened to Maya?

• Agricultural failures

• Overpopulation

• Disease

• Constant wars

Time of Troubles

• Characterized by disorder and militarism

• Militant gods and warriors dominated petty states

• Toltec confederation dominated

• Toltecs intermarried and assimilated with Teotihuacan people

Aztec/Mexica

• Mexica people were some of the northern Chichimecas invaders

• Spoke Nahuatl language as Toltecs

• Arrived as poor barbarians

• Settled on swampy islands in Lake Texcoco

Aztec Lifestyle

• Preparation for war was basis of social organization

• King prepared and directed war• Lived on food grown by conquered people

or by lower classes among Aztecs• No beasts of burden, so all labor

performed by humans• War provided laborers and source of

human sacrifice victims

Aztec Culture

• Based on war; success in war was means of social advancement

• Social hierarchy: king, nobles, warriors, maceualtin (working class with land), tlalmaitl (landless workers), and slaves

• Women practiced weaving, a sacred art. Purpose of woman was marrying and having children.

• Berdaches

Aztec Interaction with Others

• King would announce that he planned to attack

• The attacked could either capitulate or fight

• Aztecs did not fight to kill but to capture

Aztec Religion

• Chief god was Huitzilopochtli, symbolized sun

• Aztecs believed this god had to be fed blood so it would continue to rise every day

• Purposes of human sacrifice

Aztec Cities

• Tenochtitlan

Incas

• Civilization in Andean highlands is unusual

• Archeological remains discovered since 1980s

Inca Social Organization

• Emperors revered when dead

• New emperor had to conquer new lands

Inca Culture

• Language: Quechua

• Relocation: mitima

• Communication: runners

• Ayllu: clan

• Curacas: headman

• Mita: draft for men to perform public works