Theories of the Maya collapse have varied.
Warfare
and invasion, elite's guilt, superstition, environmental
destruction altogether with population growth are some of them (Wilk:
1985: 315-16, Montejo 1999:). Even the esoteric thinking propose
that in 830 AD, The Maya Elites returned to their Dimension, at
the end of
Bak'tún
9.
There
was not only that
enormous Classic collapse
but also at least one
smaller
Pre-Classic collapse,
around A.D. 150, as well as some
post-Classic collapses,
(Kaminal Juyú,
Cotzumalguapa
Nuclear Zone, Chichén Itzá, etc). The Classic collapse was obviously not
complete, as occupation in some cities such as
La
Joyanca, in
Northwestern
Petén expanded up to at least 1000 AD, and because hundreds of thousands of Maya descendants,
(some 28 tribes), survived, in areas with stable water supplies,
to meet and fight the Spaniards. The collapse of population (as
gauged by numbers of houses, sites and of
obsidian tools) was in
some cases much slower than the decline in numbers of
Long Count
dates. Many apparent collapses of cities were nothing more than
"power cycling"; i.e., particular cities becoming more powerful
at the expense of neighboring cities, then declining or getting
conquered by neighbors, without changes in the whole population.
Finally, cities in different parts of the Maya area rose and
fell on different trajectories. in a south to north and west to
east pattern beginning ca 800 DC. Archaeological evidence
indicates a large population decline in the
Mirador Basin
at the end of the Late Preclassic (300 B.C. to 250 A.D.). The
most important site,
El Mirador, was abruptly
abandoned around A.D. 150 (R.D. Hansen 1990; Howell and
Copeland 1989).
EL Mirador in 300 BC
The abandonment of
El Mirador and the
surrounding area appears to have been relatively rapid and
enduring. Small populations occupied the region during the Late
Classic period (A.D. 600-900), but did not rival the cultural
apogee of the Late Preclassic period. The pollen data from Lake
Puerto Arturo in the Mirador Basin, corroborate this abandonment. The paleo-environmental
evidence for this abandonment is similar to that of the Middle
Preclassic recovery phase. Increased values of grasses and
weeds, including maize pollen, from ca. 1200 B.C. to A.D. 100,
mark the intervening disturbance period. After A.D. 100, these
grasses began a steep decline and minimum values persist from
~A.D. 130-225. Thus, it appears the Preclassic abandonment was
underway shortly after A.D. 100. The Late Classic collapse is
clearly present in the Puerto Arturo pollen record. An abrupt
drop in grass, weed and agricultural pollen begins around A.D.
915. By A.D. 960, pollen from these groups, which had dominated
the record for 2400 years, dropped to near zero values which
persist to the present. The rapid change of pollen frequencies
at this time is similar to changes in the Late Classic pollen
record from "Aguada Zacatal", near
Nakbé (Wahl 2000). Forest
recovery was also relatively rapid; pollen from forest trees
reached pre-disturbance levels within 100 years. The vegetation
record shows three discrete periods of decreased disturbance and/or
abandonment in the late Holocene: ~2500-2300 cal yr B.P.
(550-350 B.C.), ~1820-1725 cal yr B.P. (A.D. 130-225), and ~1000
cal yr B.P. (A.D. 950)–present. (David Wahl, 2005) .
Pollen shows an
abrupt increase in anthropogenic disturbance in the Early
Preclassic (~1450 B.C.), coincident with archaeological evidence
of early settlement.
Before its
collapse, the Mayan empire stretched out from its center in
Guatemala’s
Petén region to the north lowlands, across the
Highlands and
Pacific lowlands of Central
America. Pollen samples collected from columns of soil that
archeologists have excavated in
lakes across the region
provide evidence
of widespread deforestation approximately 1,200 years ago, when
weed pollen almost completely replaced tree pollen. The clearing
of rainforest led to heightened erosion and evaporation; the
evidence of the erosion appears in thick layers of sediment
washed into lakes. This also disrupted the
intensive
agricultural system, that they have been using during
2000 years.
Another piece of evidence, is the thickness of the floor stones
in the Mayan ruins. They would have needed about 20 trees [to
build a fire large and hot enough] to make a plaster floor stone
that is about one square meter. In the earliest ruins, these
stones were a foot or more thick, but they progressively got
thinner. The most recently built ones were only a few inches
thick. Atmospheric scientist Bob Oglesby of Marshall Space
Flight Center, calls the Mayan deforestation episode “the
granddaddy of all deforestation events”. Dr. Hansen
studying
The Mirador Basin, believes
this also happen during the Pre Classic Maya Collapse. Studies of
settlement remains, show that this deforestation coincided with a
dramatic drop in the Mayan population. After two millennia
of steady growth, the Mayan population reached an all-time high.
Population density ranged from 400 to 600 people per square mile
in the rural areas, and from 1,800 to 2,600 people per square
mile near the center of the Mayan Empire (in what is
now
El Petén
Guatemala). In comparison, Los Angeles County
averaged 2,345 people per square mile in 2000. Yet by studying
remains of Mayan settlements, Sever found that by 950 A.D., the
population had crashed. “Perhaps as many as 90 to 95 percent of
the Maya died”.
There was also very
few remains in the domestic dumpsters of
large game like Deer, Tapir,
Jaguar and Cougar toward the end of Mayan rule in proportion to
smaller game, pointing to over-hunting of the favored animals.
The lower classes would give the best cuts of white-tailed deer
meat to the rich as a form of taxes, themselves eating small
game like rabbits and squirrels. The hunger at the end of the
Classic, has been documented in the skeletons of this era,
including those of the Royalty.
“If we
completely deforest an area and replace it with grassland, we
find that it gets considerably warmer—as much as 5 to 6 degrees
Celsius,” Oglesby said. Sunlight that normally evaporates water
from the rainforest canopy would instead heat the ground.
Although his model paints a more extreme picture than what
actually happened (the region was heavily, but probably not
completely deforested), Oglesby suspects that deforestation
contributed to a drought. Lake sediment cores indicate that the
Mayan deforestation appears to have coincided with natural
climate variability that was already producing a drought.
“Combined with the land-use changes, the drought was a double
whammy,” he said. By 950 A.D., the Mayan lowland cities were
largely deserted.
(NASA
-DAAC
Study, Michon Scott).
Guatemala’s sparsely populated Petén district stands in stark
contrast to the
stripped and tilled landscape of Mexico. Landsat NASA
Today the
Petén, geographically the
largest province in
Guatemala, has a population of
400,000, living
in isolated towns scattered through a forested wilderness. In the
eighth century, by some estimates, ten million people lived in the
Maya lowlands. In fact, settlements around centers like
Tikal
reached population densities of up to 2,600 people per square
mile. That’s more than half the population density of modern-day
New York City. The landscape was an almost unbroken fabric of
intensely cultivated farms, gardens, and villages, linked by a web
of trails and
Sacbe'ob, paved causeways connecting monumental city-states.
The Maize God in the upper register. A woman holding the baby
Maize God speaks to the Hero Twin Hunahpú,.
Behind the Twin is
his brother Xbalanqué, as God A-prime.
Some archaeologists focus on these complications and don't want
to recognize a Classic Maya collapse at all, due to the raise of
Maya cities in Yucatán, that where Toltec, that acquired some
Maya culture aspects. But this overlooks
the obvious fact that cries out for explanation: The
disappearance of between 90 and 99 percent of the Maya
population after A.D. 900, and of the institution of the
kingship, Long Count calendars, and other complex political and
cultural institutions. Before we can understand those
disappearances, however, we need first to understand the roles
of
warfare
and of drought
Maya farmers were well skilled in sophisticated techniques designed
to get maximum production from delicate tropical soils. But
beginning in the ninth century, studies of lake-bed sediments show,
a series of prolonged droughts struck the
Maya world, hitting
especially hard in cities like
Tikal, which depended on rain both
for drinking water and to reinvigorate the swampland (bajos), where
farmers grew their crops. River ports like
Cancuén might have
escaped water shortages, but across much of the Maya region the
lake-bed sediments also show ancient layers of eroded soil,
testimony to deforestation and overuse of the land.
Maya
warfare involved well-documented types of violence: wars
among separate kingdoms; attempts of cities within a kingdom to
secede by revolting against the capital; and civil wars
resulting from frequent violent attempts by would-be kings to
usurp the throne. All of these events were described or depicted
on monuments, because they involved kings and nobles. Not
considered worthy of description, but probably even more
frequent, were fights between commoners over land, as
overpopulation became excessive and land became scarce.
Late Classic site,
Punta de Chimino, in the
Petexbatún lake area, note the defensive
wall and the ditches
separating the site from mainland.
The other phenomenon important to understanding all of these
collapses is the repeated occurrence of droughts, as inferred by
climatologists from evidence of lake evaporation preserved in
lake sediments, and as summarized by Gill in "The Great Maya
Droughts". The rise of the Classic
Maya civilization
may have
been facilitated by a rainy period beginning around 250 B.C.,
until a
temporary drought after A.D. 125 was associated with a
pre-Classic collapse at some sites. That collapse was followed
by the resumption of rainy conditions and the buildup of Classic
Maya cities, briefly interrupted by
another drought around 600
corresponding to a decline at Tikal
and some other sites.
Finally,
around A.D. 750 there began the worst drought in the
past 7,000 years, peaking around the year A.D. 800, and
suspiciously associated with the Classic collapse. The area most
affected by the Classic collapse was the southern lowlands,
probably for the two reasons already mentioned: it was the area
with the densest population, and it also had the most severe
water problems because it lay too high above the water table for cenotes
or wells to provide water. The
Petén lowlands lost
more than 90 percent of its population in the course of the
Classic collapse.
When bad times came, there was little the
Ku'hul Ajau could do to help their people. Monoculture
farming, growing one staple food crop that could be accumulated and
stored for hard times or for trade, could not be sustained in the
rain forest. Instead, each city-state produced small quantities of
many different food items, such as maize, beans, squash, and
cacao.
There was enough, at least at first, to feed the kingdom, but little
left over.
Meanwhile, Maya society was growing dangerously top heavy. Over
time, elite polygamy and intermarriage among royal families swelled
the ruling class. The lords demanded
jade, shells, feathers from the
exotic
Quetzal bird,
fancy ceramics, and other expensive ceremonial
accoutrements to affirm their status in the
Maya cosmos. A king who
could not meet the requirements of his relatives risked alienating
them.
Machaquilá Altar
2 destroyed in
antiquity
The traditional rivalry among states only made matters worse. The
Ku'hul Ajau strove to outdo their
neighbors, building bigger temples and more elegant palaces and
staging more elaborate public pageants. All of this required more
labor, which required larger populations and, perhaps, more wars to
exact tribute in forced labor from fallen enemies. Overtaxed, the
Maya political system began to falter.
The greatest rivalry of all helped propel the Classic Maya to their
peak, and then tore their world apart. Beginning in the fifth
century, the city-state of
Tikal,
expanded its influence, enlisting allies and vassal states in a
swath southward through the Pasión River Valley, to Copán in what is
now Honduras, and eastward up to Palenque. A century later a challenger arose: The northern
city-state of Calakmul, in what is now Campeche, forged an
alliance of city-states throughout the Petén, and east to what
is now Belize. The two great alliances faced off in a rivalry that
lasted more than 130 years.
This period marked the golden age of Classic Maya civilization. The
Ku'hul Ajau were in full flower in these
two great alliances, competing in art and monuments as well as in
frequent but limited
wars. Calakmul
and Caracol, defeated
Tikal in a major battle
in 562 AD, but destroyed neither the city nor its population. Eventually
Tikal rebounded and defeated Calakmul, leaded by
Hasaw Chan Kawi'l, subsequently building many of
its most spectacular monuments, in the meantime,
Naranjo
a Tikal allied, defeated Caracol, for good, ca 700 AD.
Tikal, Temple I, Hasaw Chan
Kawi´l's Tomb
Simon Martin, with Nikolai Grube of the University of Bonn, compares
the Tikal-Calakmul rivalry to the superpower struggle of the 20th
century, when the U.S. and the Soviet Union competed to outdo each
other in fields ranging from weaponry to space travel. With neither
side ever able to gain the upper hand, the Cold War arguably brought
stability, and so did the standoff in the Maya world. "There was a
certain degree of destruction" because of the rivalry, says
Guatemalan archaeologist Héctor Escobedo. "But there was also
equilibrium."
Tikal Central Plaza
The unraveling began at the small
garrison state of
Dos Pilas, near the
Pasión River downstream of Cancuén.
In 630 Tikal, trying to reassert a presence along Pasión River trade
routes increasingly dominated by Calakmul, expanded an existing
outpost near two large springs, pilas, in Spanish. The site had
little else to recommend it. Dos Pilas
grew no crops and sold nothing. Scholars call it a "predator state"
that depended on tribute from the surrounding countryside. War, for
Dos Pilas, was not only a ritual to glorify kings and appease gods.
War was what Dos Pilas did to survive. He went to war with
Tamarindito,
Ceibal and Itzán
The kingdom's history of violence and duplicity began when Tikal installed one of its princes,
Balaj Chan Kawiil, as Dos Pilas's ruler
in 635. The garrison slapped together a fancy-looking capital for
the young prince, using carved facades to mask loose and unstable
construction fill. But in 658 Calakmul overran Dos Pilas and drove
Balaj Chan Kawiil into exile.
We know the next chapter thanks to a thunderstorm that toppled a
tree at Dos Pilas six years ago, exposing a carved stairway hidden
beneath its roots. Inscriptions on the stairway reveal that Balaj
Chan Kawiil returned two years after his exile, but as a Calakmul
surrogate. Dos Pilas's turncoat king helped Calakmul cement its
control over the Pasión Valley during the next two decades. Then
Calakmul delivered fateful news. Its rulers ordered Balaj Chan Kawiil to fight his brother
in Tikal itself.
In 679 he attacked his native city. "Mountains of skulls were piled
up, and blood flowed," the stairway records.
Balaj Chan Kawiil triumphed, and his brother died in the
battle. The victory brought Calakmul to apogee and transformed Dos
Pilas into the overlord of the Petexbatún, the southwestern part of
the Petén.
Tikal survived, rebuilt, and less than
20 years later attacked and defeated Calakmul. Stucco sculpture at
Tikal's central acropolis depicts a Calakmul noble awaiting
sacrifice. It was a defeat from which Calakmul never fully
recovered, but Tikal itself was never the same after the wars
finally concluded. "Even though Tikal wins in the end," says the
University of Pennsylvania's Robert Sharer, "it's never in shape to
control everything."
What happened next is not entirely clear. Calakmul's power was
broken, yet its allies, including Dos Pilas, continued to battle
Tikal in Calakmul's name. Dos Pilas consolidated its hegemony in the
Petexbatún
through alliances and war. Its rulers commissioned new
monuments and built a second capital,
Aguateca,
and Punta de Chimino, the last Petexbatún site to be
abandoned.
But in 761 Dos Pilas's luck ran out. Former allies and vassals
conquered the city and sent its ruler into exile. Dos Pilas would
never be resettled, and with its obliteration the Maya world crossed
a divide. Instead of reestablishing order, wars would create greater
disorder; instead of one ruler emerging triumphant from a decisive
battle, each conflict simply created more pretenders. Victories,
instead of inspiring new monuments and temples, were transient and,
increasingly, unremarked. Defeats spurred desperate citizens to rip
apart their
ceremonial buildings, using the stones and fill to build
redoubts in hopes of staving off future invaders. Cities no longer
rebuilt and rebounded. They simply ceased to exist.
Dos Pilas, Showing Defensive wall (B),
made with Main palace (D),
and temples, Elite housing in central Plaza (E)
Smaller states tried to assert themselves in the spreading chaos,
but none could. Instead, the warring states sought temporary
advantage in a land of dwindling resources. The commoners probably
hid, fled, or died.
For some time, fleeing nobles could find refuge in Cancuén, a quiet port at the headwaters
of the Pasión River. Even as downriver cities sank into chaos during
the eighth century, Cancuén prospered by trading luxury items and
providing sumptuous lodgings for elite visitors. The architect of
this golden age was
King Taj Chan Ahk,
who came to power in 757 at the age of 15. Cancuén had a long
history as a strategic trading post, but Taj Chan Ahk transformed
the city into a stunning ceremonial center. Its heart was a
270,000-square-foot (25,000 square meters), three-story royal palace
with vaulted ceilings and 11 courtyards, made of solid limestone and
elegantly placed on a riverside promontory. It was a perfect stage
for a Maya god-king, and Taj Chan Ahk was master of the role, even
as it was dying out elsewhere.
There is no evidence that Taj Chan Ahk ever fought a war or even won
a battle. Instead he managed to dominate the upper Pasión Valley for
nearly 40 years by coaxing advantage through patronage and
alliances. An altar monument at Cancuén dated 790 shows him in
action, engaged in a ceremonial ball game with an
Machaquilá noble,
perhaps to celebrate a treaty or a state visit.
Taj Chan Ahk died in 795 and was succeeded by his son
Kan Maax, who
sought to trump his father by expanding the palace. But pomp and
ritual—the old trappings of kingship—could no longer hold the Maya
universe together. Within five years the spreading chaos had reached
the gates of the city. In one terrible day its glory winked out,
another light extinguished in the world of the Classic Maya.
One day in
the year 800, the
peaceful Maya city of Cancuén reaped the whirlwind. King Kan Maax
must have known that trouble was coming, for he had tried to build
makeshift breastworks at the approaches to his 200-room palace. He
didn't finish in time.
The attackers quickly overran the outskirts of the city and streamed
into
Cancuén's ritual heart. The speed of the attack is obvious even
today. Unfinished construction projects lay in tumbled heaps.
Half-carved stone monuments littered the pathways. Pots and bowls
were strewn about the palace kitchen.
Cancuén: Broken Stelas
The invaders took 31 hostages. The jewels and ornaments found with
their remains marked them as nobles, perhaps members of Kan Maax's
extended family or royal guests from stricken cities elsewhere. The
captives included women and children; two of the women were
pregnant.
All were led to the ceremonial courtyard of the palace and
systematically executed. The killers wielded spears and axes,
impaling or decapitating their victims. They laid the corpses in the
palace's cistern. Roughly 30 feet (nine meters) long and 10 feet
(three meters) deep, it was lined with red stucco and fed by an
underground spring. The bodies, accompanied by ceremonial garments
and precious ornaments, fit easily. Kan Maax and his queen were not
spared. They were buried a hundred yards (90 meters) away in two
feet (0.6 meters) of construction fill intended for remodeling the
palace. The king still wore his elaborate ceremonial headdress and a
mother-of-pearl necklace identifying him as Holy Lord of Cancuén.
Cancuén Palace
No one knows who the killers were or what they sought. Booty
apparently did not interest them. Some 3,600 pieces of jade,
including several
Jade boulders, were left untouched; household
goods in the palace and ceramics in Cancuén's giant kitchen were
undisturbed. But to archaeologists who have dug up the evidence over
the past several years, the invaders' message is clear. By
depositing the bodies in the cistern, "they poisoned the well," says
Vanderbilt University archaeologist Arthur Demarest. They also
chipped the faces from all the carved stelas on Cancuén and pushed
them over, facedown. "The
site,"
says Demarest,
"was
ritually killed."
According to Arthur Demarest's work with the Petexbatún
Regional Archaeological Project in the
Dos Pilas area of Guatemala, the Mayan civilization began to
chew upon itself. Evidence of quick fortification within once
grand monumental areas indicates the terror that the people must
have gone through to strive to maintain their once great
civilization. Warrior kings not unlike some of today's
dictatorial leaders, began to invade the city states with
killing in mind. A lack of tradition and law-and-order began to
cut at the morals of the citizens. Survival of the fittest began
to set in. Preoccupation with war and neglect of their food
sources signaled that there were too many chiefs (and their
select clans) and too few Indians to work the lands. Social
fragmentation began to tear at the bonds that had held people
together for some 2000 years.
