Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Unlike the Aztecs and the Inca, the Maya political system never integrated the entire Maya cultural area into a single state or empire. Rather, throughout its history, the Maya area contained a varying mix of political complexity that included both states and chiefdoms .
The peoples and cultures which comprised the Maya civilization spanned more than 2,500 years of Mesoamerican history, in the Maya Region of southern Mesoamerica, which incorporates the present-day nations of Guatemala and Belize, much of Honduras and El Salvador, and the southeastern states of Mexico from the Isthmus of Tehuantepec eastwards, including the entire Yucatán Peninsula.
In agreement with this pattern, detected both in the Maya Lowlands [9] and elsewhere in Mesoamerica, [10] the north (and main) face of the temple of Kukulcán at Chichén Itzá has an azimuth of 111.72°, corresponding to sunsets on May 20 and July 24, separated by 65 and 300 days (multiples of 13 and 20). Significantly, the same dates are ...
Location of Mesoamerica in the Americas: this prototypic culture area is situated on the Middle American isthmus, or land bridge, adjoining southern North America with South America. The geography of Mesoamerica describes the geographic features of Mesoamerica , a culture area in the Americas inhabited by complex indigenous pre-Columbian ...
The Maya Region is firmly bounded to the north, east, and southwest by the Gulf of Mexico, the Caribbean Sea, and the Pacific Ocean, respectively. [1] [2] It is less firmly bounded to the west and southeast by 'zones of cultural interaction and transition between Maya and non-Maya peoples.' [3] [2] The western transition between Maya and non-Maya peoples roughly corresponds to the Isthmus of ...
Map of the Maya region showing locations of some of the principal cities. Click to enlarge. Until the 1960s, scholarly opinion was that the ruins of Maya centres were not true cities but were rather empty ceremonial centres where the priesthood performed religious rituals for the peasant farmers, who lived dispersed in the middle of the jungle. [11]
The Aztecs [a] (/ ˈ æ z t ɛ k s / AZ-teks) were a Mesoamerican civilization that flourished in central Mexico in the post-classic period from 1300 to 1521. The Aztec people included different ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl language and who dominated large parts of Mesoamerica from the 14th to the 16th centuries.
Chichén Itzá [nb 1] (often spelled Chichen Itza in English and traditional Yucatec Maya) Yucatec Maya pronunciation ⓘ was a large pre-Columbian city built by the Maya people of the Terminal Classic period. The archeological site is located in Tinúm Municipality, Yucatán State, Mexico. [1]