The post classic Mayan period is really underrated. I don't know why people keep buying the collapse myth, when instead of a regression, Maya society simply moved from classical divine and absolute monarchies to a more confederated feudal system. Seems like progress to me, not regression. Really makes you wonder what would've happened if this place had been left alone. Judging by how it took 200 years for the Spanish and how easy to defend it is, and its geographic convienence (gulf, pacific AND caribbean + middle position) a big warlord taking control of it all would've been interesting, without Spain just wiping it all out.
>>18761585>lose 90% of your population>social structure collases into small tribes and "city states" (large tribes)>even language is lost
>>18761587but enough about the conquest and modern latinx people
>>18761592The even langauge is lost, got replaced with Spanish, still goes to these days.
>>18761585>What if the Inca survived through the modern periodBig communist Iran except more aggressive and whiny. With good management, it has genuine superpower potential given its massive mineral deposits and size, as well as easily defensible position, but pacific access only hinders it long term and it would probably be a retarded commie iran.>What if the Maya survived through the modern periodAssuming some warlord united it all and it transitioned into some defensible long period; Imperial Japan tier chimp out by WW2 over all the Americas with war crimes that'd make Tojo blush. If not a middle power (or losing said status), probably just a glorified American bitch, but more exotic unlike the central american banana republics>AztecsNot making it past 1550 even without the Spanish>MapucheThey did survive very long and didn't do shit. Even assuming Argentina and Chile don't rape them, probably a British colony by 1890. Interesting nonetheless, its character would likely be that of Scotland, or Prussia but inside the British Empire. That assuming the Brits make it a protectorate like Egypt or Oman.>Anybody elseProbably nothing, irrelevant. Taino pirates maybe. The more organized northern natives don't need to answer this question, as it is what actually happened with them. America is just inevitable.
>>18761585Mayapan was certainly pretty interesting. I don't know why it gets ignored so much either.>>18761596There are Hispanics to this day with Maya surnames. I had to deal with them at one job I worked at. Many people speak Yucatec or other Maya languages.
>>18761585> more confederated feudal system.Reminds me of Athens more than of feudalism.>Seems like progress to me, not regression.Forms f government do not have a gradient from undeveloped to developed. >Judging by how it took 200 years for the SpanishThey conquered all the Mayan city states except Nojpetén in under forty years iirc.> a big warlord taking control of it all would've been interestingMeso-American politics did not work like that. They had clients and vassals, but they did not actually annex defeated nations into 'states' like those in Eurasia. The only Meso-American state even close to the Eurasian model was the Purepecha empire.>>18761587You live in a large tribe. What they had was civilization.
>>18761759You have strong dissenting points, but I can certainly argue that it was less like Athens and more like a feudal system. It is not a 1:1 match to either, but I think the latter is a closer match.
>>18761784European Feudalism was kind of set in stone in a way Maya politics was not, right? The king may change, but you cannot dissolve the kingdom of France as a legal entity.
>>18761806Yeah, but Mayan peasants of the kingdom weren't quite like Hellenic free citizens who could vote and had the right to speak in court. The comparison to the Delian League is stronger, but I would still call it closer to feudalism than to it. They lived within a system called the multepal (multiple pals, coincidence?) where multiple families of vassal cities were forced to stay within Mayapan itself just so the ruling Cocom dynasty had stronger control over them. This is where it resembles feudalism more than it does resemble ancient greek politics. Commoners were also obligated to give part of their agricultural goods, as well as labor and other services, to their local ruling batab. It was not a fixed taxation for every single kuchkabal (although they probably did have fixed amounts in different kuchteels), but for all intends and purposes it was a form of feudal due. When the Spanish arrived, they simply took this system and put themselves at the top; removing the Mayan ruling class, and replacing it with their own (through encomiendas).
>>18761842I mean technically the average Citizen of a Polis during the classical age could hardly be called a peasant either.
>>18761585do you think Pedros today could build something like that, like, properly
>>18761635>Aztecs not making it past 1550 even without the Spanishidk they kinda had the mandate of heaven, and they were by far the biggest population center. I think they had a few hundred years in them
>>18761866latrinxs are cucked as fuck and wouldn't even want to attempt building in a precolumbian architectural style, and if they did, they would make it look tacky as fuck most likely
>>18762291Well, there's some revivalist projects in the Yucatan going on where they make buildings somewhat resemble the Puuc style, although I'm not sure if it's pure latinx Pedros doing it or just Mayan ones coping about their lack of continuity
>>18761587>>lose 90% of your populationDidn't happen, most people from the big Central Yucatan cities that collapsed probably just migrated rather than dying en masse>>social structure collases into small tribes and "city states" (large tribes)They were always organized into city-states. The only thing that changed is that the city-states were now usually ruled by oligarchs instead of a very specific kind of king-priest>>even language is lostLiterally all 4 surviving Maya books are from after the collaspe and the entire reason the Maya writing system could be deciphered is because it was still in use when the Spanish conquered them
I think the only tangible improvement the Spanish brought to the region was formal education for commoners. Although I'm not sure to what extent. Was it worth the disease, destruction, erasure, suppression and (worst) latinxfication? Weighing the advantages and disadvantages, also assuming the once rigid social mobility wouldn't have been further blurred by the merchant class
>>18761585I read this book about the Maya last month. It talks a little bit about how Maya archaeology was born, and something that caught my eye is how the first westerners who came across Maya ruins would speculate that they must've been built by some mysterious people from the old world. Part of it is racism, but a more interesting aspect of it was the fact they thought that Maya ruins were awe-inspiring even within the context of pre-columbian civilizations. There were westerners at the time who knew about Aztec and Inca ruins and accepted that they were built by the natives, but even they thought that the newly discovered ruins in the Yucatan were way superior.That made me think that the reason western society fell in love with the Classic Maya in particular is because they just so happened to develop in a way that led them to build things that appeal to westerners. The Maya were never an empire, they were always a bunch of squabbling polities, thus making them more comparable to more obscure Mesoamerican societies like the Zapotecs, and yet today they are usually considered a part of a triumvirate with the Aztecs and Inca, two actual empires whose conquests were some of the most important events in world history.This is ironic, because the Maya were really not THAT big of a deal within Mesoamerica. If anything, they were consistently on the receiving end of cultural and political exchange with other Mesoamericans. If you went back in time to when the Classic Maya were at their "peak" and asked an educated Mesoamerican what they thought about the people of the Yucatan, they'd probably tell you they're a bunch of barbarians with long heads and overly tyrannical kings. If you asked them if they were greater than Teotihuacan, they'd tell "of course not". If you asked a Maya if they were better than Teotihuacan, or later on the Aztecs, they could very well have told you "no". And yet, they are the ones the West thinks are the high culture worthy of respect.
>>18761585>>18763275 So, to answer your question OP, I think part of it is because of material reality; There are fewer preserved postclassic Maya sites, because a lot of the major ones at the time of the conquest ended up suffering the same fate as Tenochtitlan, thus by default, giving off the impression that the postclassic Maya were less impressive and built less, which when submitted to the long game of telephone known as pop-history, would eventually even morph into a complete civilizational collapse in the eyes of many. Also, while postclassic Maya society was by no means inferior to their predecessors', they did abandon the practice of carving text onto large public monuments, which was objectively very useful for archaeology.But, a large part of it however is this alignment between the western definition of sophistication and the Classic Maya. The Postclassic Maya, probably in virtue of being integrated to an even more well-connected Mesoamerican world and international elite culture, were much more similar to their fellow Mesoamericans in most ways. This means they went from a highly regarded culture to a less well-regarded culture in western eyes, thus creating the illusion of decline. There's also the fact that most mayanists become mayanists because they wish to study the big mysterious pyramids lost in the jungle, thus creating more information on the Classic Maya and more people who wish to study them in particular thus causing postclassic Maya archaeology to continue on being rather neglected.And again, this is all very ironic, since the Maya were usually the ones who sought to emulate their neighbors, not the other way around.
>>18761585When you read into it, you realize they were significantly behind technologically, but not so much socially.
>>18763275There's no people or culture on earth that was not tought to be of old world (usually jewish) origin by Anglo-Saxon storians.
>>18763275>>18763318I think Western society simply has really liked whatever fullfills their standards of what is civilized versus what is not, which are largely shaped by what the West has at home, and plus with an exotic presentation. Since the Classic Maya appear to have had writing, monumental ruins, science, philosophy, art, and important people, it checks all the boxes for what the West considers civilization, and then viewed through an exotic lens, it will never not be interesting.There's also the fact the West also likes to make comparisons. When they saw all of this about the Maya, it stood in stark contrast to, say, the Caribbean natives which some used to be cannibals. So for most of the time there was the perception that the Maya were a beacon of civilization among barbarians.
>>18761585Mayan pyramids are pure fucking kino, I love them
>>18763275Tbh I think a lot of it simply has to do with the fact the important Mayan sites were abandoned prior to the conquest. You can't really see how great Mexican Tenochtitlan was or wasn't because Mexico City is built on top of it.That said, in old (1950s) Maya scholarship from the pre-decipherment period there was a huge tendency to contrast the pure and civilized Maya (who sacrificed no humans whatsoever) with the brutal human sacrificing Aztecs.Ironically, the archeologists form this time derived these theories from looking at Mayan art, which we now know contains images of human sacrifice.
>>18764481>>18765043>the Maya were a beacon of civilization among barbarians.they still are
>>18765051I believe it.
>>18764953My favorite one is the magician one, it looks tall and steep as fuck plus the name makes me think a literal wizard lived there
>>18765107If you get to thirty years old without having sex you get one of these.
>>18765043It's also the specific way the Classic Maya did things. The highly detailed art and architecture, occasionally naturalistic statues, etc. I've seen archaeologists specialized on the Classic Maya who feel that Teotihuacan's architecture is dull and brutalist in comparison
>>18765107I like these temples with fake pyramids in their facades
>>18765205
>>18765207I also like the recurring motiffs in mayan architecture like the monster mouth portals
>>18765209
Anyone else get this feeling of sadness and pseudo nostalgia when seeing these ruins, wondering what it must've looked at its prime and how life was?Almost seems alien honestly the way how distant it feels from contemporary old world life at that time
>>18765205Is this a Rio Bec one?>>18765209Iirc there are also some of those in Zapotec sites.
>>18761585Yeah there is a possibility that the cactus witch religion & spirituality might have gotten that far north eventually given enough time
>>18765241I went to Tikal like 15 years ago and I got the same feeling, all of those monuments were once the most important things for the people that lived there, now they're in ruins
>>18765290
>>18765242>Is this a Rio Bec one?Correct>Iirc there are also some of those in Zapotec sitesReally? I haven't seen that particular motiff in zapotec architecture
>>18765043Yeah, before the decipherment of the Maya script and improvements in archaeological techniques the tendency among Maya researchers from the first half of the 20th century was to think of the Classic Maya (or "the old empire" as it was sometimes called back then) as an idyllic peaceful society of stargazing time worshippers ruled by wise philosopher priests whose cities were actually big temple complexes rather than actual urban centers, and who got corrupted by the bloodthirsty militaristic Aztecs into the "new empire", which was what they called the state of affairs until Spanish conquest. Of course, we now know they were just an urban society like any other.
>>18765241>how life wasLife was the same as it has always be: rich people ruling society and then the rest working for them and barely surviving. The major difference was that at that time the workers were totally illiterate and believed in gods, magic and sacrifices.
Artist rendition, picked it up from plebbit. Artists tend to forget the buildings were painted at the time
>>18761585theres the red mayans people, but look at all the whited in there and the nignogs/brownoids. do you think vikings who arrived in there were already BBC sluts by then?
>>18765386Those are all natives. Notice how the darker people are all warriors. It's well-documented cultural practice that mesoamerican warriors wore black body paint during war and a couple other contexts. Those murals also aren't reliable since they were already weathered and damaged upon their discovery nearly 100 years ago and have since deteriorated even further.
>>18765345They also thought the cities were literally just the ceremonial urban centers. The Blood of Kings has an introduction talking about all of this.If anything, it's really sobering to me and tempers my expectations about the accuracy of archeological reconstructions in general. Or just cultural reconstruction that hinges mainly on one thing.
>>18765308>CorrectIt's a really weird style. Just odd.>Really? I haven't seen that particular motiff in zapotec architectureYeah, I think I may have gotten mixed up. Sorry for that.
did their maize also have different colors by then
>>18763210>brought to the region was formal education for commoners.mesoamericans had universal education before the europeans
>>18765366I never said it was a paradise retard, but aren't you curious how day to day life was back then, especially in those temple cities?How the people were dressing, how they spent their time, what events in the city looked like and so on
>>18765855>temple cities?Not a thing. They were just normal cities. The concept of a "temple city" comes from very outdated 20th century Maya archaeology.
>>18765860Fair enough, the temples still were the centre of the city though
>>18765861Just like Cathedrals are at the heart of European cities? Your point?
>>18765129Mayans went above and beyond with their art, definitely the most detail-oriented mesoamerican civilization
>>18765870>Your pointThat you're being a pedantic retard
>>18761587>even language is lost??? did they regress to grunting?
>>18765855>How the people were dressingIsn't that already known? For example you have this paintings >>18765386>how they spent their timeRulers chilling in their palaces and then taking some decisions, the warriors killing or collecting tributes, the priests doing their thing, the craftsmen making tools and the rest working on the fields.>what events in the city looked likeThere was royal, religious and military events. Then some festivity, sacrifices...
>>18766859Dont forget the merchants living in luxury and travelling along the coast
>>18765386I love how it all looks ancienty-mundane every day life stuff, then suddenly there's a fucking feathered flying giant serpent right there. Took me by surprise when I first saw this. Makes me wonder if there were really supernatural things going on back in the day. Too many cultures have flying giant godlike serpentine creatures.
>>18765107I'm almost certain they originally deforested the surrounding area so that you could see it better from a distance. It's exactly the sort of autistic shit you'd expect from bronze age god-king worshippers.
>>18766381he is but i think you are also overromanticising it, i imagine the temples were very awe inspiring for people once they first got into the city and so on but then they became just another part of the landscape. but as with cathedrals in europe, people just lived their lives and looked up at them from time to time, and the ceremonies there were much more impactful but life was pretty normal otherwise. human life is basically the same in every civilization
