The Maya civilization was once one of the most splendid and mysterious civilizations on Earth. The fall of the Maya civilization often triggers the ancient thoughts of future generations, and people can't help but wonder when they look back at the past: How did the Maya civilization collapse? Why do some societies prosper and continue, while others decline and eventually disappear into the long river of history?
To answer this question, Jared Diamond, author of the classic gun, germs and steel, continues his framework of thinking, focusing on the relationship between the ecological environment and human civilization. In the new edition of Collapse: How Societies Choose to Succeed or Fail, Diamond points out that civilized societies face similar crises — behind pollution, plague, war, and famine, the devastated ecological environment is the prelude to the downfall of society, and the choices of different societies to deal with environmental problems determine their very different endings.
The Maya civilization can be compared with other ancient human societies. Diamond believed that human societies were much smaller than the Maya, fragile, isolated, and technologically inferior to other societies of their time. The Mayan society was very different, in the pre-Columbian America, it was not only one of the most developed societies, but also the only one that left a large number of writing, and it was located in one of the two heartlands of the New World civilization. By world standards, the Mayan civilization's environment was not particularly fragile, at least better than the ancient Easter Island, the Southwestern United States inhabited by the Anaxaki Indians, Greenland, or modern-day Australia.
Diamond writes that the collapse of the Maya civilization tells us not to think that only small, marginal societies with fragile ecologies have a crisis of collapse, and that the demise of the Maya warns us that even the most advanced and creative societies could perish.
Written | Jared Diamond
Excerpt from | Li Yongbo
The following is an excerpt from "Collapse: How Society Chooses Success or Failure", authorized by the publishing house, by Jared Diamond, translated by Liao Yuejuan, CITIC Publishing Group, January 2022.
01
The most creative society in the New World
How did it end up in collapse?
Millions of modern visitors have visited Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula and neighboring Central America today to see the ancient Mayan civilization that became a masterpiece more than 1,000 years ago. The Maya is one such place that people tend to yearn for mysterious and legendary places, and for Americans, it is close at hand, right on the doorstep, almost as close as the Anasazi ruins. To visit the ancient city of Maya, you only need to take a direct flight from the United States to Merida, Mexico, get out of the airport, rent a car or take a minibus, and run on the highway in about an hour.
To this day, many Mayan ruins, along with their magnificent temples and stone tablets, are still hidden by dense forests and away from people. However, before the Arrival of the Europeans, the most splendid civilization of the New World was born here. Of all the mysterious ancient civilizations, only the Maya left a large amount of writing, and many of them have been deciphered. Today, in this wild land, there are very few peasants, how did the ancient Maya build such a complex city? The charm of the ancient Mayan city is not only in its mystery and magnificence, but also in its location in the inaccessible jungle, thus becoming a "pure" archaeological site – the original appearance is more or less there, unlike many ancient cities that have long been lost in the architecture of later generations. For example, Tenochtitlan, the capital of the Aztec Empire, has been buried under modern-day Mexico City, and similarly Rome.
Ruins of the Mayan civilization.
The ancient Mayan city was unknown for centuries in the jungle, and it was not known until 1839, when the American John Stephens and the Englishman Frederick Catherwood joined forces to explore and discover the ruins. Stephens, who had been a wealthy lawyer, gave up his profession and roamed the worlds, while Casewood was an artist who excelled in drawing and drawing. They had long heard of mysterious ruins in the Jungles of Central America, and Stephens managed to persuade President Martin Van Buren to appoint him consul of the United States to the Federation of Central America. In fact, the so-called Central American Union had long since disintegrated in 1838, covering areas ranging from modern-day Guatemala to Nicaragua. So Stephens undertook an archaeological expedition under the cover of this title. Stephens and Caserwood visited 44 Mayan ancient cities and found breathtaking architecture and art. They realized that this was by no means the work of barbarians, but represented a highly developed civilization that had passed away. They also saw that some of the inscriptions on the stele might be written, and speculated that the inscriptions were related to historical events, some of which were personal names. Upon his return to New York, Stephens wrote two books about the expedition, along with Illustrations by Casewood, both of which were best-sellers.
The romance and charm of the Maya is evident in Stephens' description in the book: "This ancient city was lost in the jungle, but there was no descendant of the city's citizens wandering here, nor any cultural traditions passed down from generation to generation." This ruined city is like a broken ship in the sea, the mast is gone, the name of the ship is unrecognizable, the crew has been destroyed, no one can tell us the story of the ship: when it set off, whose ship it was, how long it drifted at sea, what misfortunes it encountered... Architecture, sculpture and painting, all the art that has made life beautiful has shined in this dense jungle; debaters, warriors, politicians, beauties, many people who have been born here, but now they have passed away, and all ambitions and glory have turned to dust. Now, no one knows the story here, and no one can tell the story... This is the ruins of a civilized, elegant and special ethnic group. They have experienced the rise and fall, and after reaching the pinnacle, they have retreated from the stage of history... As we step into mossy temples and altars, we find great taste and artistic skill everywhere... The walls are carved with many strange figures, vivid, staring at us with sad eyes. We imagine them dressed in splendid costumes and feathers, climbing up the stairs in front of palaces and temples... The spectacle in front of me, this great and beautiful city that disappeared into the jungle, deeply shocked me. There is no place in the history of the world that compares to this place... We don't even know what to call this ruin in the depths of the dense forest. "Travelers to the Ruins of the Maya today feel the same way, which is why the fall of this civilization is so fascinating.
The Maya civilization offers several excellent perspectives that allow us to peek into the collapse of prehistoric human societies. First of all, the Maya civilization has written down, although incomplete, and difficult to interpret, but it can still be used to reconstruct the History of the Maya, and the History of the Maya reconstructed accordingly is much more detailed. This is incomparable to the Easter Island civilization and the Anasazi civilization that used tree wheels to set the year and used the forest rat shell mound to study and reconstruct history. If the Maya were merely hunter-gatherer communities without writing, sheltering in simple shacks, what archaeologists could study would be lackluster. But the Maya left behind magnificent art and magnificent architecture, and archaeologists can show their skills. Second, climatologists and paleoecologists have recently looked at ancient climate and environmental change data to find out why the Mayan civilization collapsed. Finally, there are still Mayans in Central America who live in their ancestral homelands and speak the Mayan language. Although the ancient Mayan city is in ruins, many of the ancient Mayan cultures have survived to this day. The first Europeans to come to Central America have many records of the Mayan society at that time, which is also of great help to our understanding of the ancient Mayan society.
The earliest contact europeans had with Mayan society was in 1502, 10 years after Columbus discovered the New World. During his fourth (and final) expedition, Columbus intercepted a canoe for trade, most likely the Mayans. In 1527, the Spaniards began to conquer the Maya, but did not surrender to its last city-state until 1697. Thus, the Spaniards had nearly two centuries to get a closer look at independent Mayan societies. In particular, the Spanish bishop Diego de Landa, who was stationed in the Yucatan Peninsula as a missionary in 1549-1578, sought a large number of maya manuscripts in order to eliminate "paganism", and burned them to the ground. This was the greatest disaster in the history of Maya culture, with only 4 volumes surviving. However, this person also recorded everything in Maya society in detail, and found someone who knew the Mayan script to roughly interpret the Mayan hieroglyphs for him. Because of this clue, it took nearly 4 centuries for the Mayan script to be deciphered.
Jared Diamond, professor of physiology at the University of California, Los Angeles School of Medicine, a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and the National Academy of Sciences, is one of the few contemporary thinkers to explore human society and civilization. Diamond's research has led him to numerous awards, including the National Science Prize, the Burr Prize of the American Geographical Society, the Taylor Award for Environmental Contribution, and the Japan International Environmental Harmony Award. His representative works include "Guns, Germs and Steel", "The Third Chimpanzee", "Collapse", "The World Before Yesterday", "Upheaval", "Why Some Countries Are Rich, Some Countries Poor" and so on.
02
History of the Mayan Civilization
Now let's briefly review the history of the Maya.
The Mayan culture was part of the ancient Mesoamerican culture. The Maya and other Central American societies had a lot in common, not just having the same things, but also lacking the same things.
Many elements of the Mayan civilization were introduced from other parts of ancient Mesoamerica. Ancient Mesoamerican agricultural, urban, and writing systems all originated in river valleys and coastal lowlands in the west or southwest. Corn, beans and pumpkins were also domesticated there. Two complementary calendars— the solar calendar of 365 days a year and the divine calendar of 260 days of the year— also originated outside the Maya. Ancient Mesoamerican cultures had no metal tools, no machinery such as pulleys, and no wheels (some regions treated wheels as toys rather than tools). Their ships had no sails and no domestic animals to carry goods or pull plows. All Mayan temples were also built by hand using stone or wooden tools.
In the Mayan region, villages and pottery appeared around 1000 BC or later, with solid houses appearing in 500 BC and writing systems in 400 BC. Ancient Mayan inscriptions can be found in stone or pottery, totaling about 15,000, recording kings, nobles, and their exploits without a single word about commoners.
Stone carvings of the Mayan civilization.
The so-called classical period of the Mayan civilization began around 250 AD, when the first kings ascended the throne and the first dynasties appeared. Scholars of Mayan script have identified dozens of scripts from inscriptions on stone tablets, each concentrated in a specific geographical area, only to discover that these scripts were related to the names of dynasties and kingdoms. Each Mayan king had hieroglyphs and palaces representing his name, and many nobles had their own inscriptions and palaces. The kings of the Mayan society, like the highest priests, could observe the celestial signs and sacrifice the gods according to the divine calendar in order to bring the people good weather and rain and peace. The king prides himself on being a descendant of the gods, and therefore claims to be able to call the wind and rain. Thus, there was an unspoken exchange of conditions between the monarchs: the peasants were willing to offer corn and venison to the king and his courtiers, to build palaces for them, and to let them live a life of wealth and luxury, while the king wanted to ensure that the peasants were prosperous. However, if a great drought comes, the land is thousands of miles away, the people are not happy, and the king loses his trust in the people, his throne will be in jeopardy.
Beginning in the 250s, the population of the Maya (extrapolated from the ruins of houses that can be examined), the number of stone tablets and buildings, and the number of long calendars inscribed on stone tablets and pottery grew almost exponentially, reaching its peak in the 8th century. Then, the indicators of these three complex societies began to decline all the way in the 9th century, meaning that the Maya classical period went from brilliant to bleak.
Stills from the documentary Cracking the Mayan Code.
03
The prosperity and collapse of the city of Copán
To study the collapse of the Mayan classical period, we can take the example of the ruins of the city of Copán, located in western Honduras.
Copan is just a small town, but the houses are dense and the streets are long. In Copán, the most fertile area is the 5 flat plots of land formed by the alluvial soil of the river valley, which are only 10 square miles in total, and the largest of them is called "Copan Land", which is only 5 square miles. Coppan is surrounded by steep hills, with nearly half of them having a slope of more than 16% (about twice the slope of the steepest U.S. road). Compared to valley soils, hilly soils are poorer, more acidic and contain less phosphate. In today's situation, the corn yield in the valley is about 2 to 3 times that of the corn produced in the hills. In addition, the soil on the hills will soon have the problem of erosion, and in less than 10 years, only 1/4 of the original productivity will be left.
In terms of the number of houses, Copán's population growth began to climb sharply from the 5th century to 750-900, with a population of about 27,000 at its peak. Copan's written history begins in 426 (according to the Mayan Long Chronology), and later inscriptions on the stele also recount the visits of the Tikal and Teotihuacan nobles. Stone tablets of praise for the king appeared in large numbers in 650-750. After 700 years, the royal relatives and nobles other than the king built their own palaces. By 800, there were about 20 such palaces, one of which had 50 buildings and could accommodate 250 people. Due to the large number of nobles, coupled with the king and his retinue, the burden on the peasants was bound to be great. Copán's last large building was built around 800 years ago, with an unfinished altar with the name of the king and a long calendar year, which is estimated to be 822.
Archaeological surveys of the different living environments in the Copan Valley show that the first land reclaimed is the largest Copan in the valley, followed by the other 4 plots in the valley. The population had begun to grow at that time, but the hilly land remained uninhabited. In order to feed the growing population, intensive agriculture was inevitable in the valleys, or the fallow period was shortened and the system of two-cropping a year was adopted, perhaps with the help of irrigation systems.
By 650, the slopes of the hills were inhabited, but the development of these hills was only 100 years old. The Copan Hills were at their peak about 41% of the total Kopan population, then this proportion gradually decreased, and finally the population was concentrated in the river valley land. What is the reason for the population to return from the hills to the river valley? Scientists have conducted archaeological excavations of the foundations of the valley floor buildings and found that the soil here accumulated a lot of sediment in the 8th century, indicating that the hillside has a problem with soil erosion, perhaps soil fertility has been lost. The hilly, barren acidic soil was washed away into the river valley, covering the original fertile soil, and crop yields in the valley were reduced. In the end, the ancient Maya had to abandon the hilly land. In fact, the modern Mayans suffered the same problem, with the fertility of the hilly soil quickly depleted and unable to cultivate.
The cause of hilly soil erosion is obvious: the hilly trees are cut down and the soil below is not protected. By examining the age of pollen samples, it was proved that there was originally a pine forest above the hilly slope, which was later cut down. Most of these cut down pine trees are used as firewood, while the rest are used for construction or stucco. The walls of pre-classical Mayan sites were often painted with thick stucco, and in order to produce stucco, large areas of mountain forests had to be cut down.
The population of the Copan Hills skyrocketed after being occupied, but then people abandoned the land here, which means that the population that originally depended on the hills for crops now had to rely on the food produced on the 10 square miles of farmland. This inevitably led to more monks and less porridge, and peasants were in conflict in order to grab the best farmland, even just to grab land, just like in modern Rwanda. By studying hundreds of skeletons excavated from the Copan site, scientists found that people at that time had diseases and malnutrition problems, such as osteoporosis. These skeletal studies show that in 650-850, the health of the inhabitants of Copán deteriorated, not only among the commoners, but also by the nobility, and of course the health of the commoners was even worse.
Because King Copan failed to summon timely rain during the great drought, the farmland dried up and faced a harvest, and the great calamity befell him. This may explain why there is no longer a record of King Copan in 822, and his palace was burned down around 850.
Judging by the age of obsidian fragments excavated at the site, it is clear that the total population of Copán is gradually decreasing. In 950, Coppan estimated that there were still 15,000 people, about 54% of the peak of 27,000. Thereafter, the population continued to wither, and by 1250 the Copan Valley was uninhabited. Pollen from the forest trees that reappeared later showed that the valley was empty and the forest was finally given a chance to regenerate.
04
The confusion of the Maya's collapse
From the brief history of the Maya and the changes in The Copan area, we can see the beginning of the decline of the Mayan civilization. But this story is particularly intricate, for at least five reasons.
First, in addition to the Great Collapse of the Maya in the Classical Period, there were two smaller collapses: one was the decline of cities such as El Mirador around 150 (the so-called collapse of the pre-classical period), and the other was the interruption of Maya civilization in the late 6th and early 7th centuries. In the ancient city of Tikal, which archaeologists have studied quite thoroughly, not a single stone monument has been erected for some time. After the collapse of the Mayan society in the classical period, some societies still survived, and the population even increased slightly, rebuilding prosperous cities. However, some cities were not able to escape the fate of collapse, such as Chichen Itza, which was abandoned around 1250, and Mayapan, which was emptied around 1450, which is the so-called collapse of the post-classical period.
Second, the collapse of Mayan society in the classical period was clearly incomplete, and there were still thousands of Maya who survived and later fought against the Spaniards. This population, though far inferior to that of the classical period, is already larger than the population of other ancient societies discussed in this book. The surviving Maya were concentrated in areas with stable water sources, especially in the north, where there were many natural wells, in the coastal lowlands with artificial wells, in the lands near the lakes in the south, and in the lowlands with rivers and lagoons. By this time, the southern region, the heart of classical Maya civilization, had fallen completely silent.
Third, in some cases, the population (estimated in terms of the number of houses and obsidian tools) has declined more slowly, not as dramatically as the number calculated in the long calendar, as discussed earlier. It can be seen that the rapid collapse of the classical period is not only the royal power, but also the long calendar. Fourth, the decline of many cities is actually the result of the rise and fall of power, that is, the rise and decline of cities, the conquest of other cities, to the rise and re-emergence of neighboring cities. In the process of power replacement, the total population did not change much. For example, in 562, Tikal was attacked by his rivals, the city-states of Karakol and Karakmur, and the king was captured and killed. However, Tikal later grew stronger and stronger, eventually conquering his opponents in 695. It took more than 200 years for Tikal and other Mayan city-states to decline along with the Classical period (the last date of the Tikal Stele was 869). Similarly, Coppan flourished in the 6th–7th centuries, and by 738 King Vasaklahun Uba Cavel (the more familiar mayan name for today's Mayan lovers is "Eighteen Rabbits") was captured and beheaded by the rival city-state of Kirigua. After the death of eighteen rabbits, Copan strove to become stronger under the administration of the successor king and continued to glory for 50 years.
Fifth, the rise and fall of cities in the Maya varied. For example, the Puke region in the northwestern Yucatan Peninsula was almost empty in 700, but from 750 (that is, after the decline of the southern cities), the population exploded, peaking in 900-925 and decreasing sharply in 950-1000. The pyramids of El Mirador, the largest city in the central Maya, were inhabited in the world in 200 BC and abandoned after 150 years, with the rise of Copán much later. Chichen Itza in the northern Yucatan Peninsula began to rise after 850 years and became the center of the north around 1000, but was destroyed by civil war around 1250.
For the above 5 reasons, the collapse of the Mayan civilization is complex and incomparable, and some archaeologists do not even acknowledge the so-called great collapse of the classical period. But if the so-called Great Collapse of the Classical Period did not exist, how to explain the obvious fact that after 800 years, the Maya population disappeared by 90 to 99 percent, especially in the previously densely populated southern lowlands, where kings, the long calendar, and other complex political and cultural systems disappeared. This is why we discuss the collapse of the Classical Maya period: the Maya of this period suffered not only the loss of population, but also the loss of culture. How to explain the sudden death of this glorious civilization?
05
Maya's revelation to future generations
Archaeologists studying the Maya have different opinions on the causes of the Maya collapse, and there is no consensus yet. The reasons are: first, the Mayan region is very complex, and the reasons for the collapse of the may not be generalized; second, only a few sites have been archaeologically studied in detail, and many sites have yet to be studied; finally, there is still a puzzling mystery in the heart of the Maya - why is there still no one in the land when the collapse has become a thousand years old and the forest has returned to its lush appearance? Still, we can try to find 5 clues to the collapse of the Mayan classical period.
The first is the problem of overpopulation and shortage of resources. This dilemma is as the view of demography put forward by Thomas Malthus in 1798. Today's places like Rwanda and Haiti are also experiencing overpopulation crises. As archaeologist David Webster put it, "There are too many farmers, too many fields, and planting all the places that should not be planted." ”
Secondly, deforestation and erosion of slope soils have led to fewer available agricultural lands, while the population needs more agricultural land. This exacerbates the problem of population and resource imbalances. In addition, drought caused by human deforestation, depletion of soil fertility, and human competition with nature for land to prevent fern growth have exacerbated the problem.
Pyramids built by the Mayan civilization.
Third, the fighting is intensifying. More and more people are robbing fewer and fewer resources. The Mayan city-states were already militaristic, and the flames that preceded their collapse were even more fierce. Imagine the tragic situation of more than 5 million people crammed into a land smaller than Colorado (104,000 square miles) and with so little available farmland? In addition, because of the war, even if some land is suitable for farming, but because it is located at the junction of two city-states, it has become a place of contention between soldiers, how can farmers plant with peace of mind? Fourth, climate change has led to a greater crisis in the region. The drought that occurred in the classical period, although not the first drought suffered by the Maya, was the most serious. When the drought arose, many parts of the Maya were uninhabited, so residents who suffered from severe droughts could go to other places to start a new stove. But during the Mayan classical period, places suitable for human habitation were overcrowded, and there was no place to start another stove. The few water sources that are secure cannot accommodate all the population.
Fifth, there are problems that are clearly in front of them, but the kings and nobles of the Mayan city-states turn a blind eye and are only concerned with expropriating themselves from the peasants, accumulating their wealth, waging wars, erecting stone monuments, and competing with each other. In fact, it is not only the Mayan kings and nobles who are so short-sighted and short-sighted, but also such leaders in human history.
Looking back at other ancient human societies and comparing them to Mayan societies, there are some similarities that are shocking. Like easter islands, mangarewa islands, and anasazi Indian tribes, the environmental and demographic problems of Maya society gradually evolved into wars and internal conflicts. Like Easter Island and Chaco Canyon, Maya society flourished and declined, and after the population peaked, it suffered a total political and social collapse. Just as farmers on Easter Island gradually moved from the coastal lowlands to the highlands, the Anasazi Indians expanded their crops from the flood plains of Membres to the hills, and the inhabitants of Copán, under demographic pressure, also developed agriculture from the valleys to the more fragile hilly lands, with the result that they faced greater demographic pressures after the collapse of agriculture in the hilly areas. Just as the chiefs of Easter Island raced to erect stone statues, one taller than the other, with the addition of Pukao on their heads, the chief of Anasazi wore a necklace strung with 2,000 turquoise stones, and the Mayan kings also desperately built the most magnificent temples, and the stucco became thicker and thicker—which in turn reminded people of the extravagance of today's American big business owners, let alone more. If you think of the Easter Island chiefs and Mayan kings who can only sit back and wait for a major crisis like the Great Drought, what are the smart responses when faced with a serious ecological catastrophe?