HIST 101 Lecture Notes - Lecture 21: Ajaw, Mesoamerican Long Count Calendar, Dos Pilas
Document Summary
Period also saw the rise of the first major mesoamerican civilization, the. Classic maya civilization grew to some 40 cities, including tikal, Uaxact n, cop n, bonampak, dos pilas, calakmul, palenque and r o bec; each city held a population of between 5,000 and 50,000 people. Mesoamerica: mayan excavations, excavations of maya sites have unearthed plazas, palaces, temples and pyramids, as well as courts for playing the ball games that were ritually and politically significant to maya culture. Maya cities were surrounded and supported by a large population of farmers. A system of writing using glyptic symbols was developed and was inscribed on buildings, stele, artifacts and books (only a few examples of maya books survive today). Contrary to popular belief, this system did not predict the end of the world in 2012, the unit in millions of years providing evidence of this: the maya used three different calendars.
