Me, being an atheist with an open mind to philosophy has asked this question in my spare time on several different occasions. It's a big mystery to me how suddenly the Mayan cities had just turned into ghost towns. Don't you find it interesting as well? Common theory that I found through textbooks at my school lead me to beleive that it was the soil that became less fertile, due to fires and erosion or a riot from farmers. However, I somehow doubt that's the case.
Seeing as I'm extremely superstitious, here's my theory, call it stupid or what you will, just say why you think it's stupid:
Well, the Mayan Civilization was a Theocracy, which is a civilization ruled by religious leaders. Like high priests and whatnot. So from that I think that they learned too much, which is where a few other ideas come into the theory. Their calender, yes, stops on 2012. Since I could find no time of when the calendar was finished, I'll continue. I beleive that the theocracies gods punished the Mayans for finding the ending of time. This is just a crackpot supernatural theory though that includes only a dabble of logic to piece these things together. But this is my current opinion should it be relating to philosophy in any way.
My more "believable" idea is a full on full out riot against the theocracy for a reason not known to us. I remember seeing a theory of a massacre in the several different cities on the History channel. I think that for some reason, the theocracy caused a riot, and the people became uncontrollable and killed each other during the heat.
So what's your opinions? And why do YOU think the Mayans disappeared?
No alt...he was referring to the Mayan civilisation itself, which vanished mysteriously, leaving nothing but the great stone cities they built....
Many sound theories have been thought up and abandoned. For instance, some say it was warfare between the city staes...Tikal and ...I forgot the other. More people died..., lesser peasants to grow food...which is just the beginning to the overall decline and collaspe.
There was even a wild theory how the Mayan rulers were so lethargic and lazy that their hearts stopped beating one day...
Any remnants left, vanished into the forests, city life being impossible. Then the Spaniards came....
The problem is, the Mayans had little written records and the large and gigantic rainforests hide their ancient cities...
A good deal of that was the Conquistadores, and also disease.
The Conquistadores didn't wipe out the Mayans. Yes they did conquer the Aztecs, Incas and the other tribes...but not the Mayan. They disappeared of their own accord.
That's why its such a big mystery. What happened to them? Why? How? Who? These questions are very central to Mayan study.
My theory is the one on warfare, leading to an economic and social collapse. One things for sure...The Maya were one hell of an awesome people. Stone pyramids with nothing more than manpoweer, sheer will power and human ingenuity. Brilliant.
i thought they were aliens and they left earth, at least thats to coolest theory.
Anyway(in all cerealness) i think famine might be one of the big reasons, they did use slash and burn so eventually they were going to run out of land. Second might have been war, they were a very bloody people, kind of like what started the dark ages in Europe maybe. But im sticking with the alien theory. :P
From what I know (which is unfortuneatly little compared to the other great civilisations of south/central America) the Mayans seemed to have exceeded population allowance for that area leading to agriculture suffering as well as overhunting. Mind you pollen evidence shows a 200 year drought in the area which can't have helped.
Could be anything. They could have ran out of food, or were killed by another people group. Or they just died off, and didn't produce enough offspring. It could be any of those things or something else O.o
Ok, so i looked in my history book and it says that their cities were 'ghost town' by the 1100s ce. So it wasnt the conquistadores that killed them off. I know that were and still are Mayans but around the 900s their civilization started to decline and by the 1100s it was gone.
