INTRODUCTION TO ARCHAEOLOGY Nancy White - Touro Institute

the rubber tree (show books on Mesoamerican ball game, Scarborough and Wilcox 1991 and
Whittington 2001, and relate to team sports fanaticism
in our society).
Mesoamerican civilization.
Who were the Olmec? Along the Gulf Coast of
Mexico, the term is used for the art style and
associated early culture that is sometimes seen as
ancestral to all the later great Mesoamerican states
(the”mother culture”; certainly elements of later
cultures are first seen in the Olmec horizon). Major
characteristics are the huge carved basalt stone heads,
stylistic attributes that emphasize jaguar faces and jade
carvings, and earthen pyramid complexes, as seen at
San Lorenzo. Olmec sites date to between 1500 B.C.
and A.D.1, and there is debate over whether they were
complex chiefly societies or the first true
Who were the Maya? An early Mesoamerican
civilization that lasted from about A.D. 250-900 in the
Yucatan area of Mexico and the lowlands of
Guatemala and Belize. In Guatemala, El Mirador is an
early site, and Tikal is a Classic period major center,
with several huge pyramid complexes. Palenque, in
Chiapas state, Mexico, is the center, with the tomb of
the Lord Pacal. Chichén Itzá is a center in northern
Yucatan that lasted longer after the collapse of major
centers in the south. Advances in reading Mayan
writing have allowed us to learn the names of rulers
and the history of the rise and fall of different centers
of political power. Agricultural production to support
great populations of large Maya centers was made possible through construction of massive
raised field complexes in the lowlands, which archaeologists often could not see without
sophisticated remote sensing methods (see picture p.
339 of raised fields).
Where are the sites of San José Mogote and Monte
Alban, and what culture history do they relate to? In
the Valley of Oaxaca, in the southern highlands of
Mexico, they relate to the development of the Zapotec
state, with major monuments and carved images of
danzantes (dancers) who probably really represent war
captives.
What sites relate to culture history in the Valley of
Mexico? In the center of Mexico the highland valley