These three peoples lived in a vast area of modern-day Central and South America which incorporates coastal strips, hot and steamy jungles, savannah grassland and cold windy highlands. Though they spoke different languages, they had broadly similar cultures and they worshipped many of the same gods (although they gave them different names). They all used digging sticks, ate maize and beans, respected the number 13 and practised human sacrifice. Interestingly, although they developed the wheel as a toy, for some reason they didn't adapt it for other purposes.
The Aztecs built their settlement in a swamp in what is now Mexico City and when the Spanish arrived they thought it more spectacular than Venice. The Aztecs were fantastic warriors but they were also excellent farmers: because they had stumbled on hydroponics, their floating fields produced an abundance of nutrients in the food they were growing.
The Mayas built some of the tallest buildings of the ancient world – without the use of the wheel, or even horses. The pyramid El Castillo in Chichen Itza is the Mayan calendar, literally set in stone. Each staircase has 91 steps which, when added to the single step at the main entrance to the temple, totals 365 steps. At sunset on the spring equinox, the great serpents' heads at the foot of the main staircase are joined to their tails by a "body" of shadow. They developed a very accurate calendar that could predict solar and lunar eclipses, transits of Venus and - most importantly - the coming of the rains and the time to plant.
These people - known collectively as Mesoamericans - have been processing rubber and latex for over 3500 years (imagine a world without rubber or chewing gum) and they also invented the rubber ball and used it in their deadly ball game where the losing team would be sacrificed.
As an alternative to iron these inventive people made their knives, spears and arrow heads from Obsidian, an extremely sharp stone. Nowadays, surgeons use Obsidian instead of steel scalpels.
They understood the healing power of the rainforest and its plants - amazingly three quarters of all our medicine comes from plants - and in their hands, the wild yam formed the basis of world's first birth control pill. They understood quinine and many European settlers preferred to attend the local Aztec healer rather than their own doctor.
More than half the foods we eat originated in the New World, including potatoes, tomatoes, maize and turkey. But there was one thing that the Aztecs loved above all: chocolate. To them, the cacao bean was so precious they used it as their currency.
Because the Incas lived in the mountains of South America and had to cross very deep ravines they invented the world's first suspension bridges espite not having hemp or sisal ropes. They made their bridges out of twisted fibres of long stemmed grass, another amazing feat of ingenuity from an inspired region.
First broadcast: Wednesday 16 Feb 2005 on BBC TWO
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Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
There seems to have been a lot about the Mayans and other South American cultures on the television this week, the round the world in eighty treasures was there, I think, and I'm sure I caught something of another programme on the subject. Otherwise this is a new subject to me and my favourite part of this episode was definately the grass bridge. Although, personally, I wouldn't have crossed it even if I'd seen the whole Spanish army, their horses and their canon cross ahead of me. Thats my own personal cowardice mind you, and you have to marvel at the thought that someone came up with the idea in the first place.
Anyway, I have started this thread for general reactions to the programme and I'm sure you have had plenty of food for thought this week.
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
how do the aztecs comunicate with each other?
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
Hi Dave,
i hope you can help - I'm writing an anthropology thesis using the grass bridge as a comparative example and need some information on the technical details of the structure, particularly the load bearing capacity of the grass rope. I missed the name of the person who had apparently looked into this, although the brick trick was a bit of a gimmick. Can you direct me towards any tests which have been done?
Thanks, Ian
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
Hi Ian,
I'll try to help. http://www.rutahsa.com/k-chaca.html is a good starting point for using the rebuilding of the bridge as a comparative example. It has recent accounts of the practice, a good bibliography, and also photos of the bridge. I'm afraid I can't remember the name of the person who looked into the load-bearing capacity.
Eleanor
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Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
Hi,
Another way the blocks might of been shaped, occurred to me a couple of years ago. You could have a row of sticks( horizontal and vertical), enough to fit the stone you want to match, the align them to the profile of the wall you fit the block into. Then put the stick profile on the stone to want to fit and trace the outline.
I have done this with cocktail sticks on foam blocks/wall, it works really well.
Steve Young
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
Hi Steve,
Do you envisage a system simlar to those boxes of pins you used to get in the eighties that you could press your hand or you face against pushing some through to make a relief on the other side? I can see that that would give you a portable representation of the stone surface you needed to mirror, one that potentially modelled the whole surface very accurately. How do you go about applying this to the second surface though? As with joseph's idea of a mould and ink I just need some help visualising the final shaping process.
Or perhaps I misunderstand you (and Joseph). Do you mean that you would trace the profile onto one side of the stone (not the surface you wanted to fit) and use that as a guide, cutting through the whole stone along that mark, like one of my very irregular slice of bread? For this I guess you would only need one vertical row of sticks rather than a whole bed of them.
I can see that a combination of the methods described in this thread could work together well. If I understand you correctly the method you suggest resembles, in principal, the method demonstrated on the programme, although it strikes me that yours, and joseph's gives a somewhat more reliable guide for the stone cutter(I think I misunderstood joseph's proposal initially and should have envisaged the ink being applied to the edge of the mould not the whole surface). However, in order to achieve the perfect fit I think Paul's method provides a very convincing and elegant solution for the final shaping and fitting processes.
Dave
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
Dave,
The way you get the profile, would be to align the edge of the sticks that you lined up against the wall to the block you would want to fit.
It's very quick to do, there is less likely of error when tracing, and the block does not neet to be anywhere near the wall you are fitting it to.
If you would like I could draw you a diagram / or create a 3D animation.
Steve
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
yes please, an animation would be great. I think I understand you much better now, but there's nothing like a visual aid.
Dave
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
Dave,
I have created a simple illustration as a guide. I will work on a 2D/3D animation for you.
[edit]
Steve Young
Moderator's note: As a policy, we don't allow messages to include poster's email addresses.
[Edited by: Simon (moderator) on 15-Mar-2005 13:04]
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
It puzzles me why everyone keeps reffering to them as Inca walls. They are pre-Inca, and known as Nahua. Inca was the ruling family, just like Bourboms, Valois, Habsburgs, and such. Anyway, enough pedantry for now. The bridges I think were got to the other side by shooting arrows. I imagine the people on the other side probably got up there by climbing.
bridges
One thing I didn't quite get - how did they get the bridge across the ravine? Presumably they threw it across? Or did they have some sort of scaffolding system which they used to shimmy across with it?
Re: bridges
Hi Space Monkey,
Personally I prefer not to think about it too much. I guess one option is that a sling or a bolas would be used to cast a shot or weight - a lump of iron or a stone - across the ravine. One end of a light-weight cord would be attached to the shot and this could be attached, in turn to the thicker, heavier rope allowing the main supporting ropes to be dragged accross. Then some hardy soul with a head for heights starts working his way across, building all those things that wimps like me would need like platforms and hand rails. What do you think, do you have any ideas yourself, there must be some budding bridge builders out there.
Dave
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
There are a few things i would like to coment on.
Firstly the mystry of how the inca blocks were made with such a perfect fit. I find the idea they used scribing tools as featured in the programme very unlikly as they were obviously very artistic and intelligent. I find it much more likly they would have made a relif of the positive surface of one block, either from a hardened latex or base metal then coverd it with a dye. Layed it on to the corresponding intended negitive block. Therefore giving a perfect mark of where they needed to chip material away to give a perfect fit.
secondly the desert art, why ? well they worsiped the sun as a god and as meny cultchers have thought of the possibility of beings other than us i.e. Extra terestrials. Is it not likly that seeing the sun and maby shooting stars they were trying to comunicate with them, just as we put placques on our space craft. As for how they got such straight lines all you have to do is light a fire at night and walk towards the light, marking your tracks as you go then go back in day light and finish the job.
Lastly the grass cables they made. I think they got the maths wrong on the programme as they didnt leave it very long between placing the bricks on the pallet. Not giving time for the rope to strech fully with each load applied. Also the friction and twist would shurly amplify the larger cables strength not diminish it.
I hope you can understand my points of view and get back to me. Thanks Joe
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
Hi Joseph,thanks for your comments.
Can you elaborate on your idea of how the blocks were shaped. I can see how someone would have been able to create a mould of the positive surface, ie the one the masons need to mirror on the adjacent block and I can see your logic as this would ensure that the two blocks married correctly across the whole contact surface, rather than just one edge. However, then I lose you a bit. How is the mould applied to the second block? do you mean that the mould would be repeatedly laid against the surface to be cut, depositing dye on the those portions of the surface that were standing too proud, gradually causing the stone to be cut back until the shapes married perfectly? Are you aware of this being done in any contemporary or historical period?
[Of course the advantage of pre dressing each stone as it is added is that the line of one edge can be counted on to be reasonably representative of the whole surface. This could support the programme's reconstruction, but I am interested in your hypothesis and just need to understand it a little better]
Regarding the lines, I too have heard various interpretations and I imagine that some sort of combination is likely. For example, the fact that the lines often point to water sources, the idea that they may have been processed along and that they were attempts to communicate with astral entities are all potentially compatible. If the lines were meant to be a means of sending a message to higher powers, we could ask what the message was and the fact that the long lines point to distant water sources may provide a clue to that. Then, when civilisations create monuments they are rarely just left as testimonials to their creator, they are frequently defined by the way they are used and a procession might have been one way of reinforcing or reasking the question posed by their original creation.
Of course i am just speculating and I have to say i am sure your thinking is sound. Of course we can keep speculating because we will probably never know for sure.
As to the experiment with the grass rope, I felt the same as you. Then again I have seen experiments that guage the strength of hair and silk etc and though they are much more high tech, there doesn't seem to be any system of intervals to see whether the material can support a load for a certain period of time. I don't know if you or anyone else can give some clarification on this.
Dave
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
I have had a close look at details on Inca walls and different types of Inca wall and can assure you that the accuracy of the joins are not a feat of miraculous measuring and craftsmanship. The only way I can see that it would be possible to create such seamless joins would be using the huge blocks themselves as a 'grinding tool' where the blocks would be slid backwards and forwards against the existing wall until they had ground a perfect seating for themselves. The next block would then be slid backwards and forwards, and up and down against this block until it too was a perfect fit. If you take a look at the Inca walls, some of them have nodules on the bottom of the blocks in order for them to be slid backwards and forwards, and up and down. My guess is that most of these nodules were cut off later for aesthetic reasons.
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
Thanks for that Paul, I have no specific grounds for contradicting what you say, but the method you propose, although it is an elegant solution, appears to raise a lot of questions. I mean how could such large blocks be manipulated so deftly? I take on board what you say about the 'nodules', but might they not have had a function in transporting the blocks or lifting them into place? Even were some crane and pulley system to have been contrived to take the wieght of the stone during the grinding process it would seem to me to be a very labour intensive way of shaping a block. Do you envisage that the stone would have been cut to a close approximation of its final shape and then ground, in the method you describe, to achieve that knife blade perfection that we see today? I hope you will reply to this, it may well be that you just need to expand a bit on your hypothesis - it really is ingenious.
Dave
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
Thanks for the feedback Dave. I think you have answered a lot of your own questions in that of course the blocks would be chosen for a rough fit, then shaped to a close fit using stone tools and then finally ground against each other for a perfect fit. I have produced an animation demonstrating how a simple lever and counterbalance would make grinding a much less labour intensive job. The animation only shows vertical movement, but horizontal would be just as easy. (www.filmcomposer.org.uk/wall) I am sure you will agree that whilst this is a lot of work it would be simpler and quicker than other methods. Look forward to your comments. Paul
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[Edited by: Simon (moderator) on 05-Mar-2005 11:36]
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
Thanks Paul, I loved the animation. So I assume the horizontal surfaces would be done first and then the vertical face as you depict it. Any ideas on how the first surface would be prepared? Do you see weight of the block being supported in the manner depicted in your animation and then being moved by ropes or by hand along the horizontal plane, on an axis perpendicular to the direction of the wall itself? As a way of achieving the detailed matching of stone surfaces, your proposal is certainly very persuasive. I wonder if there are any instances of this method being used either in the contemporary world or in historical accounts?
Dave
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
Hi Dave. I have had another close look at the details of the Inca walls. Although I am still sure that the final surface is obtained by grinding the new block against the existing blocks on the wall, I no longer think that any vertical movement was used to achieve this because of the bizarre shapes. However, a horizontal movement across the wall at right angles to it would be all that is needed for a knife edge finish and allow for complex irregular shapes. I have produced another animation to illustrate how this might have been done using counterbalanced levers and grass ropes. (www.filmcomposer.org.uk/wall2) Any comments much appreciated - Paul
The BBC and the Open University are not responsible for the content of external websites
[Edited by: Simon (moderator) on 07-Mar-2005 21:06]
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
Thanks again paul. This looks very convincing, the clips are great, and you've even found another application for grass ropes! Looking at it I think you show how the back and forth movement could be achieved and I am increasingly inclined to agree that grinding would provide an effective and efficient method of getting the final fit between adjacent stones. I also agree that movement along the horizontal plane makes more sense as it allows two surfaces to be worked simultaneously. Still, looking at your animation it would not seem that none of the weight of the stone appears to be supported and i wonder whether this needs to be considered. I am by no means an expert on these matters, but do you feel that rest of the wall could have withstood the forces involved if the entire weight of a large block was dragged in this way? I am prepared to be told my fears are groundless, otherwise I look forward to Wall3.
Dave
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
I've been wondering about the game the Maya played to settle battles etc. It didn't seem possible to score from the way they were playing the game on the programme. What does anyone else think?
For anyone interested in following up the programme, some good books are:
Blanto, R (1993) Ancient Mesoamerica: a comparison of change in three regions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
De La Fuente, B (1999) The pre-Columbian painting: murals of Mesoamerica. Woodbridge: Jaca Books
Miller, M (1999) Maya art and architecture. London: Thames & Hudson.
Re: Mayans, Incas and Aztecs
Hi guys,
I'm with you on the grass rope experiment - seemed rather unrealistic to test it with such a density of weight so quickly. I was also surprised the branch the palette was hanging from held (but forces aren't my thing!). As for the bridge, does anyone know how they fixed the ends (or did I miss that bit). I was fascinated by the rituals involved with the building and rebuilding of the bridge(s).
Ok, I knew about chocolate, but not that the Aztecs invented rubber - I'd like to try the wellies. Yes, please Joe, explain a bit more of your theory about the stone cutting - sounds plausible.
Overall, I was impressed by the variety of technologies used by these cultures that we in the west eventually caught up with (that's not supposed to sound patronising - which is the one thing that irritated me about the programme).
Eleanor