Brett A. Houk, Marilyn A. Masson, Michael E. Smith, and John W. Janusek
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- September 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780813060637
- eISBN:
- 9780813050973
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Florida
- DOI:
- 10.5744/florida/9780813060637.003.0003
- Subject:
- Archaeology, Prehistoric Archaeology
This chapter is directed primarily at the non-Maya scholar reading this book; it provides summaries of the geography of the Maya area, Maya cultural history, and Classic period Maya political ...
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This chapter is directed primarily at the non-Maya scholar reading this book; it provides summaries of the geography of the Maya area, Maya cultural history, and Classic period Maya political history. The physical setting of the Maya area fundamentally affected the development of Maya culture and urbanism, and the summary in this chapter highlights the physiographic diversity that characterizes the Maya lowlands. In many books culture history and political history are blended together, but they are separated here to mirror the structure of the case studies that follow in Chapters 5 through 9. The culture history discussion is divided into sections on the Archaic, Preclassic, Classic, and Postclassic periods. The summary of political history describes how the Maya recorded time using the Tzolk’in, Haab, and Long Count calendars, and summarizes what is know about major political events and people of the Classic period based on epigraphic data.Less
This chapter is directed primarily at the non-Maya scholar reading this book; it provides summaries of the geography of the Maya area, Maya cultural history, and Classic period Maya political history. The physical setting of the Maya area fundamentally affected the development of Maya culture and urbanism, and the summary in this chapter highlights the physiographic diversity that characterizes the Maya lowlands. In many books culture history and political history are blended together, but they are separated here to mirror the structure of the case studies that follow in Chapters 5 through 9. The culture history discussion is divided into sections on the Archaic, Preclassic, Classic, and Postclassic periods. The summary of political history describes how the Maya recorded time using the Tzolk’in, Haab, and Long Count calendars, and summarizes what is know about major political events and people of the Classic period based on epigraphic data.
