History
Who were the Maya?
Quick answer
The Maya were a people of Central America who built great stone cities, developed writing, maths and calendars, and whose descendants still live there today.
In one sentence
The Maya were a civilisation in Mexico and Central America famous for pyramids, writing, maths and an accurate calendar.
Explained
The Maya lived in the warm rainforests and lowlands of southern Mexico, Guatemala, Belize and Honduras. Their culture began more than 3,000 years ago and was at its peak in the Classic period, from about 250 to 900 CE. They were never a single empire. Instead, they were many city-states, such as Tikal, Palenque, Copán and Chichén Itzá, each with its own ruler. Rulers claimed a link to the gods.
sun
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Maya farmers grew maize (corn), beans and squash, and they also grew cacao, whose beans were used to make a bitter chocolate drink. Cities had stone pyramids with temples on top, palaces, ball courts and plazas. Builders had no metal tools or wheeled carts for heavy loads, yet they made precise stone buildings.
The Maya developed one of the first complete writing systems in the Americas. It used glyphs, picture-like signs for words and sounds, carved on stone and painted in folded paper books. They also invented a number system that used dots for ones and bars for fives, and a symbol for zero, which was a major idea. Their number system worked in twenties. See place value.
Maya astronomers watched the Sun, Moon and Venus closely and kept very accurate calendars. One calendar had 260 days, and another had 365 days. A third, the Long Count, recorded long stretches of time. In 2012, a big cycle of the Long Count ended, and some people wrongly said it meant the end of the world. It was simply the start of a new cycle, like a car's mileage ticking over.
After about 900 CE, many cities in the southern lowlands were left, probably because of a mix of drought, war and changes in how land was used. Other Maya cities in the north, such as Chichén Itzá, flourished for longer. Spanish soldiers arrived in the 1500s. The Maya did not vanish. Millions of Maya people live today, speak Mayan languages such as K'iche' and Yucatec, and keep their traditions. Compare with other early peoples, such as in ancient Egypt, and see South America for another continent with ancient civilisations.
Examples
| Maya achievement | Detail |
|---|---|
| Pyramids | stepped temples, like at Tikal |
| Writing | glyphs on stone and paper |
| Numbers | dots, bars and a zero |
| Calendar | 260-day and 365-day cycles |
| Cacao | used to make chocolate |
Common mistakes
- "The Maya vanished." They still live in the region.
- "The Maya, Aztecs and Incas were the same." They were different peoples in different places and times.
- "The calendar predicted doom." It was a counting system.
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The Maya
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Where did the ancient Maya live?
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