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Daniel Iverson
Professor Goldman
English 110
December 9, 2004
Inflict Strain upon the Structure
Along the Yucatán Peninsula of southeast Mexico, hidden among trees and shrouded
with vines, lie the ruins of a once affluent civilization. Its palaces and temples have now
crumbled, and the air is silent except for the collective hum of tourists, but centuries ago—before
Cortés conquered the Aztecs, before Columbus reached America, and when the New World was
still in its infancy—the Ancient Maya lived and thrived here. Their cities were large, well
designed, and heavily populated. They enjoyed prosperity and relative seclusion for almost a
thousand years. Then, it seems, they disappeared. Technology stopped progressing, buildings
were left unfinished, and much of the population vanished. Explaining why this occurred is not
as simple as identifying a single cause and effect relationship, but instead requires exploring a
variety of factors and possibilities that collectively contributed to a devastating decline.
Before assessing the possible reasons for the decline, however, it is important to first
understand the circumstances behind it and establish why it is considered so mysterious. The
Ancient Maya—hereafter referred to as the Maya in the interest of simplicity—was a group
indigenous to Central America; particularly in what is now Mexico. Records indicate they began
to appear at approximately 500 B.C. with the rise of agricultural communities and the formation
of rudimentary social structures. Several centuries of development, universally regarded as the
Classic Period, saw the ascension of urban agglomerations including such now famous cities as
Tikal, Copán, and Piedras Negras.
Socially, the Maya were organized according to status and were separated, as many
ancient civilizations were, by a large chasm between the rich and the poor. Kings were generally
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the rulers of each polity, or local government, and were ascribed sacred qualities. Lords were
also high in the social structure, though they were not given the religious significance the kings
were. These groups formed the elite, and they held the vast majority of the wealth. Below them
were the peasants, who supported the society through agriculture and manual labor.
The period of greatest progression in many aspects of Maya culture began in about A.D.
625 and lasted for 200 years. Of all their technological advancements, the elaborate calendar
systems are perhaps the best known and reveal the most about their capabilities. Through
studying these calendars, it has become evident the Maya also excelled in astronomy. They
became so good at it, in fact, that they were able to predict such celestial events as lunar eclipses.
Making such calculations required a strong mathematical foundation, and they had that, as well.
In fact, they are among the few ancient civilizations to have the concept of zero.
These characteristics alone are enough to identify the Maya as a fascinating ancient
culture, but what adds to the appeal of studying them is the mystery of their disappearance.
Beginning around A.D. 800 and lasting for more than a century, everything the civilization had
worked to develop began to collapse. In this context, collapse and decline typically refer to
massive depopulation of urban centers and the decrease in construction, technology, and elite
activity. Societies have fallen before, but none so abruptly and completely as this.
By A.D. 925, the Classic period had ended. It was not entirely, however, the end of the
race.
Survivors of the collapse apparently moved north and continued to live in relative
obscurity. Except for the city of Chichen Itza, the “new” Maya did not construct massive urban
areas for which their ancestors were known. Their culture at this time was approximately
equivalent to the level of complexity it was when it was first forming. There were significant
differences, however, as more recent Maya architecture was different from its earlier form. They
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never again returned to their former glory, but their progeny still exists right where it has
throughout history, and its influence has shown itself in modern Mexico.
So how, then, did such a complex society disappear so competely and suddenly? In a
broad sense, it was an overall systematic failure. That is, all facets of the society expanded to a
breaking point. As archeologist David Webster described it, “Imagine an automobile that has
well-engineered individual components, but also serious flaws in overall design that place
unusual stresses on essential parts. When the vehicle finally breaks down, we might single out
the failure of wheel bearings, crankshafts, or whatever, but the real cause would be the general
structure of the automobile’s system” (259). Applying this example to the Mayan collapse, there
was no single factor that caused it, despite how convincing the claims may be. Instead, the many
factors composing the whole system led to its downfall. To be reasonable, however, just saying
the decline was caused by a number of things would be an oversimplification. Each factor
certainly contributed, but it was not the lone cause. The various factors that may have had an
effect typically fall under two main categories: natural and social change. The former refers to
any geographical feature humans cannot control, including but not limited to natural disasters,
disease, etc. Social change is used in a very broad sense, embodying any manmade conventions.
In terms of susceptibility to natural harm, the Maya were located in a very poor
geographical region.
The Yucatan Peninsula was—and certainly still is—vulnerable to
earthquakes, hurricanes, and volcanic eruptions. For as technologically advanced as they were,
the Maya were unable to predict such disasters. Although these occurrences have been attributed
to collapse, recent researchers have said disasters alone could not have such a strong impact as to
eliminate an entire civilization. Furthermore, these events tend to affect only small areas, and
there is little evidence to suggest they ever hit major populated locations. While the initial and
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direct effects of these disasters have not been cited as significant grounds to be considered a
major factor of decline, they may have had rather dramatic indirect effects on the environment.
The eruption of Popocatepetl around A.D. 822, for example, has been suggested by Richardson
Gill to have greatly contributed to the major droughts between A.D. 800–1000, which were so
severe that rivers and lakes dried up.
Climatic change has become a very popular theory recently, with the primary argument
being that volcanic debris may have compromised the soil and contributed to poor argricultural
conditions. Central America has a rather unpredictable climate, and the region can often go
several months with hardly any rainfall. While it is theoretically possible to stock enough food
in preparation for the period, it has sometimes been known to last for years or even decades at a
time, creating what has been called a “megadrought.”
J.E.S. Thompson, a noted archeologist whose work dominated Mayan research from the
1950s to the 1970s, was a strong believer in peasant rebellion as a significant factor contributing
to the society’s decline. Scientists have determined, based on the remaining structures, that the
Maya built almost incessantly. Peasants were directed by theocrats to construct ceremonial
centers and other such religious buildings, and Thompson suggested the peasants were willing to
do such hard labor because of their religious devotion and sense of collective enterprise.
Records indicate the greatest volume of construction occurred around A.D. 730-790, right when
the first signs of collapse began to show. The theory is that the demands the elite made
undermined the religious devotion and the peasants became oppressed by this burden to the point
of rebellion. The peasants were considered responsible for feeding and caring for the elite while
the general population increased dramatically. It would seem the revolts were quite successful,
too, because elite activity seemed to decline during this period, as well, and many buildings were
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left unfinished. Piedras Negras, located in Guatemala, has shown some of the most numerous
signs of revolt. There is a throne, for example, that is said to have been intentionally smashed
and other noble structures have shown deliberate destruction. One significant flaw in the theory
as identified by Webster is that it seems if the peasants were successful in overthrowing their
oppressive rulers, they would have flourished on their own. Instead, they disappeared.
Economic factors have not been explored much compared to the other possible reasons
for decline, but they may have played an important role. Many Maya kingdoms were part of the
Teotihuacan trade network, which included much of the region.
This network collapsed,
however, and was later restructured without Mayan involvement. While the Maya used to trade
many religious artifacts, their focus changed to more secular trade and in accordance with this
change, other civilizations closed the network to them. Teotihuacan, however, is now said to
have experienced its greatest influence earlier than previously believed. In fact, Maya elites not
only survived, but experienced great prosperity for another whole century. Based on older and
more recent research, warfare seems to have been a more valid problem than economics.
During the 8th century, there began to appear an increasing quantity of references to war
in Mayan writing. The prospect of internal warfare is certainly possible, because there was very
little unity among the different cities, but many of them were in close proximity. If conflicts
existed, they were most likely from the competition for natural resources. There is evidence of
destructive warfare, but it is sporadic and not considered significant enough to account for the
massive depopulation the Maya experienced. External warfare was not much different. Some
researchers have hypothesized, through the presence of foreign iconography appearing in
records, that invasions may have occurred. Further research has indicated, however, that such
iconography had been becoming more common at the time and was shared with other distant but
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similar cultures. If invasion did occur, it was “just as plausibly a symptom, rather than a cause,
of the disarray of western Maya kingdoms” (Webster 230), and few archeologists believe it was
a significant factor in the process of disintegration.
Although natural disasters and other geographical conditions would provide the simplest
explanation for the Mayan decline, there is little evidence such factors were ever strong enough
to significantly affect it. That is, simply saying the collapse was caused by drought would be
insufficient to accurately describe what happened.
While ecological changes were indeed
contributing factors, social conditions—particularly societal structure—were more likely the
primary causes. The civilization built itself up for several hundred years and established clear
patterns in all aspects of life. Employing such rigid conventions surely, over time, created a
strain upon the system as a whole. This principle of excessive expansion and strain has been
recognized in societies through history and is only just now being applied to the Maya.
Research recently conducted by Clifford Brown of Florida Atlantic University and
Walter Witschey of the Science Museum of Virginia suggests the Maya may have been victims
of their own progress. As the two archeologists studied more than a thousand Mayan locations,
they began recognizing fractal patterns—the repetition of shapes on increasingly smaller
scales—on maps of these locations. Through calculating the rate at which these scales change,
they were able to identify “self-organized criticality,” a behavior pattern characterized by its
tendency to make a system increasingly unstable until it eventually resets itself in the interest of
stability. Academic journalist Kate Ravilious describes this phenomenon by explaining how a
pile of sand may grow larger as individual grains are added, but one will eventually trigger a
collapse. This is what Brown and Witschey hypothesize happened to the Maya. As Ravilious
said, “some relatively common feature of [their] life may have finished them off” (42).
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Brown and Witschey understand the correlation they have discovered is not necessarily
equivalent to a causal relationship, but their hypothesis is compelling all the same. The only
question remaining is which of these relatively common features, which grain of sand, was
responsible for triggering the final collapse. Webster has wisely chosen to not choose just one,
because without substantial records from which to draw conclusions, any hypothesis is no more
than speculation. Even so, scientists have done their part to dispel the oversimplified perceptions
of Mayan demise that have run rampant throughout history. Though the mystery may never be
solved, the uncertainty is what has made this civilization so appealing, after all.