Religion and festivals

y Religion was an extremely important part of the Mayan life, and festivals, games, music and dance were all part of religious ceremonies. y The Maya worshipped many gods y The beekeeper, the corn-grower, the fishermen, the warrior, the traveler, the merchant, even the comedian and the dancer had their own gods. y All gods had to be treated with respect, for they ruled the forces and gifts of nature y This was done by making sacrifices of crops, animals and humans, which were carefully regulated by the priests.

Sacrifice
y Blood was the most valuable sacrifice of all, and particularly an offering of a throbbing human heart. y The victim was spread on his back across a sacred stone in the temple at the top of a pyramid. y The victim s heart was held in a special stone container and placed in front of an image of the god they wish to satisfy y Another form of sacrifice is they would weigh down the victim with ornaments and stones and then throw the victim in a well to drown.

Music
y The main rhythm came from a large wooden drum or tunkul. y Some dancers included up 800 performers who danced in formation with streamers and decorations

The collapse of the Maya

y The nobility exploited the peasant farmers y The farmers were forced to provide food and goods and to go to war and defend their state. Everything depended on the success of their crops. y At the same time there was the constant fear of drought y As the Mayan states developed there were too many people for the land to support. Too many farmers planted too many crops on too much of the land. y As more and more land was needed for farming, the forests were cut down. Deforestation took place across the land. The hills eroded , the soil was weakened, crops failed to grow y There was a climate change the rains failed to come and the periods of drought became longer. People began to die from starvation. The Mayans felt that king-priests and their gods had let them down. y The collapse of the Classic Maya came quickly, taking place from about 800 AD to about 900 AD.

The Aztecs
y Each tribe controlled a different zone and trade or fought with others. From time to time, one tribe would emerge as the most powerful and gain control over the others. y The tribes of the Yucatan Peninsula are: Olmecs, Mixtecs, Huaxtecs, Totonacs, Toltecs, Zepotecs, Tlaxcalans and the Mexica, or Aztecs.

The Mexica/Aztec takes over

y The last tribe to take over these lands was the Mexica, but today they are more often called the Aztecs. y After years of war and struggle, the Aztecs made their capital on a small island I Lake Texcoco, which lay in the centre of the valley. This was in about AD 1250. y According to Aztec legends, the tribal elders had been guided to the place by their good Huitzilopochtli.

Building a city on water

y The Aztecs expanded the capital of Tenochtitln by building out into the lake y Extending the land until the city took up a large section of the lake and housed 200,000 people y The Aztecs were powerful warriors and were gradually able to defeat most of the other tribes around them. y They were the strongest tribe in this Triple Alliance. Another reason that the Aztecs rose to power in so short period was because they adopted most of the culture and learning of the tribes they had conquered.

y They were the leaders in government, religion and trade and controlled the lives of all the people living in the Valley of Mexico and beyond

The emperor and his court

y Like the ruler of the Mayan city states, the supreme ruler of the Aztec empire was a chief as well as a priest-king. y He was elected by a powerful council of chiefs and priests and chosen for his wisdom and his record as a warrior and leader. y The ruler of the Aztec had as his title the One Who Speaks , because the people believed that once he was elected he became a priest-king who could understand the messages of the gods and relay on them to the people. y Whereas the many Mayan city states were under separate rulers, the Aztec alliance was one Empire under one ruler. y The lords wore the best clothes and walked in sandals made of gold. y When they travelled round the city or across the country they were carried on litters by their servants y The people feared the priests, for they were men of great knowledge who studied the stars, took care of the temples and were in charge of sacred human sacrifices. y But the Aztec religion demanded human victims in far greater numbers. y To supply this need, men were captured and brought from all parts of Mexico. The priests matted their own hair with blood to satisfy the gods, and drew their own blood to smear over the statues. y Next in rank were the officials y Next were the merchants y After were the craftsmen y After were the commoners/peasants farmers who plant corn, beans, peppers and fish

y And lastly were the slaves. But Aztec slaves were allowed to marry whom they pleased and their children were free citizens from birth

The community
y There were many aspects of life that made it very peaceful and orderly place to live.

Markets and Cities

y The city in each state of the Aztec empire was the centre of religion and trade. y The articles for sale included gold, silver, jewels, feathers, mantles, chocolate, skins and leather, sandals and other handmade products manufactured from roots and fibres. y Land was divided equally among the clans of the Aztec people

Maize
y The milpa or cornfields were most important farmlands. The gods of rain, the goddesses of young corn and ripe corn were worshipped as the corn grew. y The Aztec farmer would also plant beans, squash, pumpkins and peppers y To send messages from one city to another the Aztecs had a system of runners who ran relays in this way covered long distances.

Religion
y Religion and war were closely linked in the Aztec empire. The Aztecs believed their gods had to be fed with human sacrifices. Blood was needed for the gods, and victims were needed to provide the blood. y The god who demanded the most human sacrifice was Huitzilopochtli, or Lord Smoking Mirror , the Hummingbird Wizard and God of the Sun y It is estimated that some 3,500 people were sacrificed for this purpose every year y The Aztecs also worshipped another important god, Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Serpent . He was the god of learning and taught men agriculture, arts and industry.

Warfare
y y y y Every able-bodied Aztec was a warrior Women tended to the crops while the men were at war Aztec armies were, like the Mayan, very colorful The most feared weapon was the maquahuitl, a sword with several blades of sharp stone. There was also a sort of tomahawk. Bows and arrows, javelins and spears were also used. Like the Maya, the Aztec soldiers wee experts at slinging stones.

Writing
y Paper was made from the bark of the wild ficus tree. y The bark was cut in large strips and beaten into rolls of paper and then folded to make books y Writing was in the form glyphs, or symbols y There were records of dates, of families, trials and tributes.

The calendar
y The Aztec calendar was very much like that of the Maya y Spanish conquerors came to Mexico from across the sea. These people had powerful guns and carried terrible diseases that the Aztecs had never experienced.

The Incas

y Far to the south of Mexico, almost in the centre of the Andes mountain range, along the west coast of south America, in the area where the nations of Bolivia, Peru and Chile are today, there was another early American empire: the Inca y But by the strength of their armies, the Incas overcame these earlier people and developed an empire which stretched for more than 2,500 miles along the west coast of South America. It was the biggest empire in the Americas and was bigger than most empires in Europe and the Middle East. y For years these tribes had built houses and cities and developed their own systems of government and religion y They planted potato and maize in fields on these terraces y They tamed and domesticated the largest animal that lived in this part of South America. It was called the llama and it was trained to carry loads, or was kept for its meat. y Their first ruler, Manco Capac, founded the capital city, Cuzco. y The Incas believed that the first Inca, Manco Capac, had been created by the Sun God. y God was the supreme god, but there were many lesser gods who were worshipped by different groups of Incas. Human sacrifices in the form of mummified bodies, like those of ancient Egypt, were placed on cold mountain tops as offerings to the gods y The supreme Inca was both a king and a god y The gold called the tears of the sun and silver the tears of the moon , also belonged to him y There were inspectors of roads, keepers of records, officers for the up keep of bridges and governors of each district. y Men and women worked together in teams, farming potatoes and corn. Each community was a clan or ayllu which was ruled by an elected leader, mallen, directed by a council of old men who gave advice to the clan.

y Corn, potatoes and dried llama meat were set aside in the storehouses in case of emergency. Woven cloth, jars, bowls, gold and silver were also packed tidily in storerooms. y The Incas were great builders. The Inca system of government made sure that people were working all the time trading goods, farming, making handicrafts and buildings roads, bridges and houses. y Like the tribes before them the Incas made terraces to prevent the soil being washed away by the rain. y To connect these towns there was a vast network of roads reaching to all parts of the empire y Rope were strung across from each group of pillars to create a swing bridge y Pontoons, made on wide rivers using boats made of reeds tied together y Stone stabs placed together over smaller streams y The Incas had a system of sending messages that was faster than any other such system in America. Runners were stationed at points along each road. They ran in relays and passed on messages for hundreds of miles. y The tax system ensured that every Inca got his or her share of food and clothing, and in this way order was kept for many years. y To travel over larger areas of water the Incas used reed boats made of lengths of swamp reed tied firmly together. y Unlike the Maya and Aztecs, they had no form of writing. There was, however, a very clever method of recording figures and amounts. All the Inca records were kept on bits of knotted string. Each knot meant something and represented a certain amount. These strings were called quipu. y Once in 1527, a civil war broke out between two sons of the Supreme Inca over which of them should control the empire. This seriously divided the Inca people y But at the same time European explorers and conquerors were moving south from that part of central America where Panama is today y But worse still were the diseases that the Europeans brought with them.

Miss Effita
Miss Effita went into a state of silence because of two reasons which are: embarrassment and grief. Miss Effita was embarrassed when she gave a wrong call of death. Miss Effita was the death announcer in the district. Chisel Bwoy shoot Marlene s cousin Melwyn who was very important to the district. She went as usual crying and screaming throughout the village. She was corrected by Miss VeenAnn and there and then she sat down and began to cry. She was accused of lying and making mischief and carrying news. For days after people were laughing at her. The death of Son Son took a big tool on Miss Effie. She did not announce the death of her nephew. Miss Effie was unusually quiet for the whole funeral but as the casket went down into the grave she let out a scream so loud it was fit enough to wake the dead and then tear off her hat and shoes and jumped down into the grave. You could see she really did love the boy. It really affected her. After that Miss Effita was quiet for a long time because she personally experienced the sense of loss and grief.

The poem I have selected is the Dreaming Black boy . It was written by James Berry. In this poem through both literary and figurative meanings are explored and developed. Prejudice takes the form of racial discrimination. The boy is discriminated against the colour of his skin in school and travel. The persona s words I wish my teacher s eyes wouldn t go past me today, and he also says It s okay to give me hug when I kick a goal these two lines tells us and shows us how he feels and how he is treated in school. When he travels he is treated with a sense of hostility and greeted by people who make everything seem a constant struggle. He also said a bit about the Ku Klux Klan. Ku Klux Klan otherwise known as KKK was a group of people who dress in white and wishes for the demise of black people and the supermise of white people. The persona s response can be described in many words. He feels fearful, discourage and resentful. The persona shows fear when he says I wish only boys were scared behind bravados, for I could suffer. He shows resentment because even though he attained his education or some masses of success he is still looked down upon and ignored and he wishes for freedom. Through the use of literary techniques throughout the poem the theme of prejudice is developed and it gives more meaning to the poem. The persona uses literary technique of repetition. The persona repeats the phrase I wish throughout the poem and in the last stanza he repeats I could suffer and big to reinforce the horrors he experiences in society. This particular device highlights the theme of prejudice because as said before prejudice is formed through racial discrimination. To conclude, it can be seen that in this poem the use of literary techniques assist in the development in the theme of prejudice. It is noted that through the use of these techniques the poem becomes extremely meaningful

Trade and the cities

y Writing and the development of a calendar made it possible to keep records. It helped to keep accounts of what was going on and what was produced and traded by the Mayan people. y With all of the goods being made and crops being grown, there was a brisk trade between the Mayan city states and even further afield into lands which were not part of the Mayan empire. y There were many Mayan cities. y The largest and most famous were Uxmai, Chichn Itz, Tikal, Copn, Mayapn and Palenque. y These cities were also the main religious centres of the area, where the lords and priest-kings lived.

Pyramids and other buildings

y The massive pyramids were made of stone, cemented together with powered limestone. y Each city had a pyramid at its centre. They were built to be as high and impressive as possible high to be closer to the gods, and impressive to fill the farmers from the district with awe and respect for the power of the rulers.