Acheivements of the Mayans

Plan of Investigation The research paper will be on the achievements of the Mayans. The research question developed for this paper is â€Å"How did Mayan achievements lead to the development of the empire? This paper will be focusing on how the achievements of the Mayans led to the development of their civilization. This will not look into the fall of the Mayan empire but will look into where the Mayans came from and the beginning of the Mayan empire. All sources in this paper are secondary sources. The paper had chosen its sources by evaluating their information on how much they explained on Mayan achievements.Some of the paper’s sources also talked about the locations of the Mayan empire. Some main ideas of the paper would be Mexico which is where the Mayan civilization was and will be covering major achievements like the three hundred and sixty five day solar calendar and the Mayan language which consisted of hieroglyphics. Summary of Evidence The Mayan civilization is a v ery complex civilization, established in the Pre-classic period (2000 BC – 250 AD). Mayans were very artistic and achieved many artistic achievements. Classic Maya art spanned the centuries from the time of Christ until about 1000, and had its home in central Yucatan, bounded on the south by the Guatemalan highlands and on the north by a flat and dry limestone plain. â€Å"Mayan ceramics were used as currency, tableware, and offerings to the dead. Pottery was also decorated with rituals, myths, and hieroglyphs. With Mayan artistic abilities they developed a writing system. The Mayans had scribes who were trained at their writing system. Scribes usually had many pens in their hair dress. The writing system was so hard to learn not every class knew it. On the other hand, the Classic Maya had a system of written hieroglyphic script, largely syllabic in nature, which, although once considered astronomical or religious in content, is now considered primarily dynastic and politica l. † The language of Ancient Maya was written and was complex. The writing was containing pictures. The language was so sophisticated that only few members of the higher class were able to read it. The writing was commonly carved into stone. Other than art Ancient Maya had achievements in mathematics and science. Mayans were interested Zenial Passages unlike western astronomers.Mayan astronomers also were able to predict lunar eclipses with their lunar knowledge. The Mayans had 2 different calendar years, 360 day year and a formal year of 365 days. The Mayan calendar kept running ahead of the true year. The Mayans did not have leap year and would not implement it because it would ruin their day count. Mayans used math in their math in their art especially geometry. Mayans used geometry when making art in architecture. A common type of art on their structures was mosaics usually being ethnical. Mayans mainly used art on their temples or other religious structures.Mayans also de veloped a math system. The Mayans had a numerical system. It used 0 as a place holder. The numeric system was a base 20 system. Daniel Lukach Evaluation of Source Maya by the Columbia University Press is an article published in 2009. It was published by the Columbia University Press. This article was created by many authors and was compiled by the Columbia University Press. The publisher and author are credible as they published and created more books. The publisher and author are run by Columbia University. All outside sources used in the article were stated in a bibliography.This article was written for people who wanted to know about the Maya. The article seeks to address the question, â€Å"What is Maya? † There is no thesis but the author is trying to explain anything around the Mayan people. There is many values and limitations in this article. A value in this article is that the author goes in-depth about the Mayans. This publication is also not out dated. This publica tion or article also answered the question, â€Å"What were Mayan achievements made? † A major value is also that th author does not rely on one specific source as the article uses multiple sources.This article also has limitations; one limitation is that the author did not state where he used the sources in the article. Another problem is this is a secondary source which means the article isn’t on firsthand experience and used other sources for its research. Two questions unanswered is, â€Å"To what extent did Mayan achievements lead to the success of the empire? † which is the research question. And, â€Å"Why were the Mayans so religiously based? † Analysis This topic was important over its time because there was many achievements the Mayans had and also many discoveries.The Mayans at their time developed many great achievements and also was a vast civilization spanning across the Yucatan peninsula. â€Å"Classic Maya art spanned the centuries from t he time of Christ until about 1000, and had its home in central Yucatan, bounded on the south by the Guatemalan highlands and on the north by a flat and dry limestone plain. † The Mayan’s were the most advanced civilization in the Americas at the time. Their culture spread across the Americas. This even had a large impact on social development. The Mayan achievements built a large culture for a vast civilization. By the end of the Middle Preclassic period, after 500 B. C. , communities like Mirador were beginning to reflect a new developmental trajectory. Jewelry and other goods made from exotic raw materials indicate increasing prosperity, expanded economic ties to distant regions, and sharper differences in wealth and social status; large-scale, elaborately decorated public buildings reflect the emergence of powerful permanent leaders, chiefs or kings. These trends continued and intensified during the Late Preclassic period, setting the fundamental patterns of Classic -period Maya city-states. As the Mayan civilization grew more art developed and spread making a great impact on their culture. Mayan science had a great impact also on their culture. â€Å"The calendar of months was probably inaugurated in 580 B. C. when 0 Pop, New Year's day, coincided with the winter solstice. A third era, 9. 0. 0. 0. 0, 8 Ahau 13 Ceh, February 10, 176 A. D. , is the one used in the Mayan chronicles. † The Mayans had 2 different calendar years, 360 day year and a formal year of 365 days. The Mayan calendar kept running ahead of the true year. The Mayans did not have leap year and would not implement it because it would ruin their day count.With the creation of the calendar, Mayan religion began using it to predict special religious days. Art also affected the Mayan religion. This event could be considered a turning point, as the Mayans developed new technologies and cultural achievements. The Mayans were the first civilization of the Americas and had impact on other tribes. Their culture spread across the Americas changing the way life. This event can be analyzed from a different perspective, as people might view the Mayan culture not to impact other tribes in the region. People might also believe the Mayan’s weren’t a great civilization either.Conclusion To what extent did Mayan achievements lead to the development of the empire, the Mayan achievements led to a development of an empire by social development, the Mayans main development was science and art. Mayans use of technology made it easy to expand but since the civilization wasn’t fully connected different Mayan groups thought with each other. Mayans were also able to expand their empire by making all cities built in a similar design. By the research two questions are developed, â€Å"How did the Mayans discover their art forms? and â€Å"Why did Mayans do more science then religion? † A few connections I can make to the Mayans is that they were a l arge civilization that fell like the Incas and the Aztecs. The Mayans also invented many new technologies to the world like ancient China. Except the Mayans vanished unlike other civilizations and many people still don’t know why. ——————————————– [ 1 ]. George Kubler, The Art and Architecture of Ancient America (Baltimore,MD: Penguin Books, 1962), page #114-201, accessed October 28, 2010, http://www. questia. com/PM. qst? a=o&d=8129097. [ 2 ].John S Henderson, The World of Ancient Maya (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University, 1997), page #1-255, accessed October 28, 2010. [ 3 ]. Columbia University, The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th 2009 ed. (New York: Columbia University Press, 2009), s. v. â€Å"Maya,† accessed January 5, 2011, http://www. questiaschool. com/PM. qst? a=o&d=117023420 [ 4 ]. 1. Michelle Ayache, The Ancient Maya, accessed October 27, 2010, http://www. digitalme esh. com/maya/history. htm. [ 5 ]. Herbert J Spinden, Ancient Civilizations of Mexico and Central America (New York: Biblo and Tannen, 1968), page #80-250, accessed January 4, 2011, http://www. uestiaschool. com/PM. qst? a=o&d=104407482. [ 6 ]. George Kubler, The Art and Architecture of Ancient America (Baltimore,MD: Penguin Books, 1962), page #156-210, accessed October 28, 2010, http://www. questia. com/PM. qst? a=o&d=8129097 [ 7 ]. Columbia University, The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th 2009 ed. 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