Archaeological Mexico

Előszó

INTRODUCTION When the New World was discovered at the end of the 15th century, the Europeans were astonished by the civilizations they encountered, little imagining that they were the result of an evolution that had begun several thousand years before the birth of Christ. Part of the territory of what at present is the Republic of Mexico was occupied by civilizations which developed along similar lines and which shared many of their basic characteristics. This entire area now goes by the name of Meso- America. The development of the Meso-American cultures has been divided into three stages by archaeologists: preclassic: 2000 B.C.-100 A.D.; classic: 100 B.C.-A.D. 900 and postclassic: A.D. 900-1519. The preclassic stage began with agriculture, as far back as the year 2000 B.C., when the first villages were established and large groups which lived together and required a more complex social organization were förmed. However, not until the year 1000 B.C. did the Olmecs of the coast of the Gulf of Mexico create the first civilization in which many of the traits which distinguish the MesoAmerican cultures could be identified: it was among the Olmecs that large stone sculpture, writing, organized ceremóniái centers, and the cult of a jaguár god were to be found. The classic period began in the early years of the Christian era: this was when the Meso-American cultures acquired distinct régiónál characteristics, and manifested their own styles in architecture, painting, and sculpture in stone and clay. Cities such as Teotihuacán, Palenque and Monté Albán, to name only a few, were built at this time. The postclassic period began when the large classic centers were abandoned and somé of them destroyed. When the groups that had lived there emigrated to other regions, they took with them many of the characteristics they had developed in the large metropolises: somé of these groups arrived as far as Central America, such as the Pipiles and the Nicaraos, Náhuatl speaking tribes, to be found in El Salvador and Nicaragua in the 16th century. The books (codexes) written during this period, documents which record historical, astronomical and religious events, have survived up to our time. But for an understanding of the postclassic period the importance of the Chichimecs in Meso-America cannot be overlooked. Groups of hunters who lived in the north erupted violently and left their mark on the civilized life of MesoAmerica, provoking changes in all aspects, changes which make it possible to explain the development of the Mexica or Aztec people. CHRONOLOGY OF THE CULTURES IN CHRONOLOGY OF THE MAYA CULTURE PRECOLUMBIAN MEXICO Vissza