Meso-American Architecture

3 units

The first half of the course will trace the major civilizations of central Mexico from 1500 BC until the Spanish conquest after 1400 AD, focusing on developments in architecture and landscape, calendarics and cosmology, ceramics, the ballgame and sacrificial rituals, gods, myths and legends, language and hieroglyphics, and political, religious, and social organization. The survey will feature detailed and extended tours of specific sites by means of drawings, maps, slides, and digital images, we may even attempt a couple of virtual tours on-line. In the second half we will deal with the Mayan area, ranging from the lowland jungles of Chiapas and Yucatan to the Peten and the highlands of Belize and Guatemala. High points include the Jaguar dynasty of Yaxchilan, the reign of Pacal at the hybrid site of Palenque, and the demise of 18 Rabbit in the city of Copan, Honduras. Tikal will be featured as the culmination of Mayan culture, and the Chenes, Rio Bec and Puuc styles will also be examined. See a complete and independent cultural development going back at least 7000 years, and equal in greatness to Egypt, Greece, or Rome. This is also a chance to examine civilizations existing at the margins of ecology and sustainability, and how they may at times succumb when the limits have been reached. Students will be encouraged to focus on a particular area of interest for further inquiry, to be developed into a paper or a project.