Ancient and Contemporary Maya
In this Unit, we left the Caribbean and traveled to the Yucatan Peninsula to study the Mayan people. There are 7 million Mayans living in Central America today. They are mostly in Southern Mexico, Belize and Guatemala. Mayans have been living in this region of the world for thousands and thousands of years; they have left many artifacts of their ancient culture. Mayans lived in city states; this means each city was its own independent nation. This is why there are so many different Mayan dialects and languages today (in Belize alone there are 3!). The ruins of many of their ancient cities can be visited, such as Tikal and Xununtunich. Archaeologists are still making discoveries of the ancient Mayans today. We do know that each city was largely independent, but often one would go to war to expand control and influence over other cities. Ancient Mayan society was separated into strictly ranked groups. At the top were the supreme rulers who inherited their position. They trade