HOOK

1
HOOK
At certain times of the day it looked as if a
writhing serpent was crawling up the steps
In what ways do the huge buildings at Chichen
Itza show how the Mayan people felt about their
gods?
2
What conclusions might someone make about U.S.
culture from viewing the heads of the presidents
at Mount Rushmore?
3
SWBAT

• Explain and describe the key features of the
  Mesoamerican civilizations.
• Understand how Mesoamerican cultures shared ideas
  about gods and astronomy.

4
BERINGIA
Beringia is a fancy way of naming the Bering Land
Straight that once connected the northeast Asian
continent to the northwest American
continent. This natural bridge lasted
approximately 15,000 years. Why did people
travel across the land bridge?
5
Mesoamerica
6
This region shared cultivating corn, the building
of pyramids, a 260 day calendar, an important
ritual ball game, a belief in the role of human
blood in sustaining the gods the universe.
7
Olmecs

• Earliest known of the Mesoamerican civilizations

• Not united politically (unusual for ancient
  civilizations)
• Highly developed astronomy - used to predict
  agricultural cycles and please the gods
• Polytheism religious rituals important, shamans
  as healers
• Writing, calendars, ritual ballgames, irrigation
  and drainage canals
• Well-developed agriculture based on maize, beans
  and squashno large domesticated animals

• Perhaps the best-recognized Olmec art is the
  enormous helmeted heads. There have been 17
  colossal heads unearthed to date.

8
Mayans

• Constructed fortified cities and palace
• complexes, which included terraced pyramidal
• shrines for rituals and burial of rulers
• All buildings having to do with beginning of life
• faced east, while those related to death faced
  west.
• Ceremonial games are played in a ballpark.
• One of the teams is sacrificed to the sun god.
• Bloodletting of Mayan nobility was believed to
• appease the gods and to prove the legitimacy
• of the rulers.
• Mayans produced a written language made up
• of hieroglyphs.
• Unfortunately, most records of Mayan
• literature were destroyed by Spanish

9
Aztecs

• A conquering tribe of people, the Aztecs
• created an enormous empire
• Tenochtitlán (Place of the Gods) is their
  capital (present day Mexico City)
• Aztecs were skillful engineers, created roads,
  canals, aqueducts, pyramids, temples, and palaces
• Believed in a pantheon of gods particularly
• important was the sun god
• Expanded trade networks

10

• The Inca consolidated lands and imposed their
  authority on other peoples to create an empire
  that extended almost 3,000 miles from Ecuador to
  Chile (climates varied from tropical to polar)
• Inca built a network of roads to link the cities
  of the empire and to encourage trade
• The sun cult dominated religious life
• Gold and silver were used for ceremonial purposes
  
• Temples and fortresses were built

Inca