The Fall of the Ancient Maya: Solving the Mystery of the Maya Collapse

by David L. Webster

Book Overview

Ancient Maya civilization thrived in the tropics of Central America for more than a thousand years and produced some of the world's finest architecture and art. Then it mysteriously vanished, leaving a landscape of ruins smothered by forests. The Classic Maya collapse is one of the great puzzles of history, ranking alongside the Fall of Rome as an enigma that has intrigued scholars for generations.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0500051135
• ISBN13: 9780500051139
• Release Date: May 2002
• Publisher: Thames & Hudson
• Length: 368 Pages
• Weight: 2.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.7" x 6.6" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

Non-technical agrarian economies can't escape Malthus' observations

Webster's book seems as if it was a reaction to downgrade the latest "fad" theory on the demise of the Maya,specifically the "Superdrought" theory and I must admit he succeeds well.First he defines what period of Mayan history he is adressing reminding the reader that anyone attempting to explain "the Ancient Mayans" must be very careful on the use of dates and phases as well as geographic locations since Mayan influence encompassed thousands of square miles with radically different climates.Here's some beef,(which Mayans never ate),according to Webster, the Mayans were comprised of 80% peasantry and their diet about 70-80% maize. The time period that Webster addresses is the aprox. 7-8th centuries AD when the "Ancient" Maya and their warrior/priest hierarchy ,complete with the grandiose building projects,collapsed in a span of about 2 centuries. The chapter I particularly enjoyed was "Many Kingdoms,Many Fates" where Webster breaks down and analyzes the different Mayan cities and puts them in chronological order.Alot of these ruins are separated by hundreds of years and the evidence shows most of them were in conflict with one another over status and influence.In short,Webster offers no "one theory" explain it all solution,but numerous interconnected reasons for the collapse. Alot of these Mayan cities reached populations that could have been as high as 20,000 then suddenly became more or less,"ghost towns".So what happened according to Webster. He basically says that Mayan agrarian success set the stage for the collapse.The populations of these cities grew to a point where the agrarian economy could not support the urban and outlying residents.As it was,the Mayan cities were "very fragile economies" and as the population grew,nevermind a megadrought,just a simple one month drought could be devastating.Remember the Mayan did not have the plow,or the wheel,and was strictly labor intensive.Webster invests alot of effort in describing what agrarian technologies the Mayans had and which techniques they were sadly lacking in.If you're looking for a simple one theory explanation,this wouldn't be your book.Simply put the Mayan peasantry lost faith in their warrior/priests and left the cities abandoned as they could no longer support a growing urban population.I take it from reading Websters book that "no tears were shed" in regret as they packed up with their empty bellies.While it doesn't say so in the book,I figure that the ecological refugees took along the "best" of the urban culture,such as the art,medicine,and rituals and discarded alot of practices they disagreed with.Thereby,moving into a new phase.I've heard this same phrase so many times to explain a lost civilization.They're never "lost" but just move into another phase,hopefully a better one!

Why was Tikal abandoned?

About 800 A.D. the great classical Mayan centers in the Petun region of northern Guatemala and southern Yucatan were suddenly abandoned, never to recover. Maya civilization continued, in a reduced form, in the northern Yucatan which is where the Spanish discovered the Mayas in the early 16th century. If you're going to name the seven wonders of the world -- as some magazine is doing -- the spectacular Mayan ruin of Tikal should be on the list. The jungles around Tikal, the greatest of all the classical Mayan cities, are uncongenial to a large human population and the mystery has always been how the Maya were able to create a civilization in such an environment and why the civilization after six centuries disappeared suddenly. The author examines about a dozen different theories as to why Tikal, Copan, and other Mayan centers abruptly ceased to be populated. This is a book that begins slowly and gets better as you progress. I zipped through the first few chapters, which included long definitions of civilization, urbanization, etc. and finally began to get interested with chapter Six (page 178) in which the author finally gets down to discussing what he promised: the decline and fall of Maya civilization. The remainder of the book is good. The author discusses the factors that led to the decline of Tikal, Copan, La Milpa and other centers. I won't reveal his conclusions -- other than to say that he comes down heavily on environmental degradation. That is in accord with current popular and politically-correct wisdom on the subject. The book is complemented by a number of good photographs drawings and graphs, and ample maps showing the locations of the many, many Mayan ruins in Middle America. Unfortunately, our understanding of the Maya will always be deficient because of the destruction of nearly all their written records and culture by their Spanish overlords. Our assumptions and conclusions regarding this mysterious civilization may be wrong -- and the paucity of solid data gives rein to the most interesting of speculations. Smallchief

A not so mysterious mystery

Mr. Webster does not make it easy for those who want to read about flying saucers sweeping down and doing/undoing the Maya. His tale is a little bit more down to earth as he undertakes to make sure that the reader understands first a few parameters on how cultures grow and meet their demise. Eventually when you read the sections that actually try to explain how the Maya fell, you sort of guess stuff before he tells you. Probably this comes from a Socratic style of teaching from Professor Webster. It also does not help that he can be tongue in cheek sometimes, and deliberately challenging when he confess that he cannot read Mayan glyphs. Is he serious? After a while this has a salutatory effect: the reader realizes that there is no magical mystery to the Maya: they were just like any other civilization, just a little bit odd. They were humans first and that explains very well why they became great and why they also harbored the seeds of their decline. The only mystery here is the mystery of human genius that made this people build such exquisite ensembles as Tikal, or the author's favorite Copan. Definitely a clear book on what are the current thoughts on Maya history based on recent archaeology, a non sentimental look on the Maya, and the best exposition so far to demonstrate that the Maya demise was not as sudden as people would like to think. Also a very salutary reminder that today natives are the descendents of these fabled rulers and that if they stopped building pyramids it was not because they became stupid and degenerated. The truth might be that they just saw the light and kicked the ruling class out when they realized that they had become a burden they could not afford anymore. Clearly, in spite of serious political and ecological problems, the Maya that "greeted" Cortez were the heirs of the ancient Maya.

A very good synthesis

Webster's book is extremely well written and should appeal to the general reader regardless of their knowledge of Mesoamerican cultures. As opposed to limiting himelf to Late Classic, he relates this to Mayan Civilization at the conquest, what is meant by the collapse of the Mayan "Civilization" and its relations to other ancient civilizations (although I think he missed the analog to the post-fall city-states of Italy and the possible implications). His evidence is excellent and his agruments eloquent. Readers looking for simple answers are warned - you will not find one answer. On the other hand, for those who want a well-thought out argument by a researcher steeped in the Mayan culture, this is your book.