The Olmecs
 | Olmec civilization began around
1200 BCE and was at its peak between 700 and 400 BCE
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| The Aztecs gave the Olmec their
name, which means rubber people since the Olmecs supplied
the Aztecs with sap from rubber trees
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| The 2 Olmec cities discovered
by archaeologists are San Lorenzo and La Venta. San Lorenzo is
the oldest known Olmec city, and containes giant stone heads
that are 9 feet high and weigh 40 tons. The main structure in La
Venta is a volcano-shaped pyramid over 110 feet tall.
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| Hematite is a glass-like
substance caused by volcanic eruptions that the Olmecs used to
make polished mirrors
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| The Olmecs used a form of
picture writing, had a number system, and a calendar, but we do
not know how or why the civilization came to an end.
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Teotihuacan
| The ancient city of Teotihuacan
is near modern-day Mexico City.
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| Indians known as the Altiplano
built Teotihuacan. The Altiplano are thought to have descended
from the Olmecs, and Teotihuacan became their capital. It had a
population of over 100,000 people.
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| The main street of the city is
now called the Avenue of the Dead, and the most famous structure
is the Pyramid of the Sun, which is 200 feet tall.
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| Quetzalcoatl is a feathered
serpent god.
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| Teotihuacan is famous for its
enormous size, its many apartment buildings, the 4 main pyramids
and temples of the city, and the mysterious end to the
civilization that built it.
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| We know that people from
Teotihuacan traveled widely because a special thin orange
pottery only made there can be found throughout Mexico.
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| Around the year 750 CE, the
entire city was destroyed and burned. The ancient temples and
carvings were smashed - but nobody knows by whom.
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| The Aztecs believed that the
gods built Teotihuacan. |
The Toltecs
| The Toltec civilization lasted
bout 300 years, from 900 - 1200 CE
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| Mixcoatl was the first great
ruler of the Toltecs
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| Topiltzin was the founder of
Tula, the largest city and capital of the Toltecs
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| Toltecs became fierce warriors,
with a society ruled by the military. They demanded tribute from
the people they conquered and sacrificed their war captives to
the gods.
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| The most famous ruin of the
Toltecs is the Temple of Quetzelcoatl, the feathered serpent
god.
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| The capital city of Tula was
destroyed in about 1150 CE, and the Aztecs reused parts of their
cities in their own buildings many years later.
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| The Aztecs and many other
tribes proudly claimed to be descended from the Toltecs
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The Incas
| Very little is known about the
early history of the Incan because they never developed a system
of writing.
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| One of the myths that did
survive tells how the sun created the first Incan, Manco Capac,
and his sister. They went into the wilderness to create a city
and teach other Indians, and thus founded the capital city
Cuzco.
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| The Inca probably began as a
small tribe in the Andes Mountains, but grew into a huge
imperial power under the leadership of Pachacutec, who ruled
from 1438 to 1471. The empire gre so large that they built over
12,000 miles of pedestrian roads, a system matched only by the
Romans'. The Incas developed terrace farming and dug irrigation
systems to grow crops in the mountains. They used the llama for
transpotation, food, and wool.
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| The Inca developed a base 10
counting system and used quipas, cords with knotted
colored strings tied into it, to remember numbers. The colors of
the strings and the distance between knots had special meanings.
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| Fransico Pizarro, a Spaniard,
defeated the Incan ruler Atahualpa and overthrew the Incan
empire in 1533.
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