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12-2 Mayas and Aztec
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Aztecs | people who lived in the Valley of Mexico |
| Tenochtitlan | capital city of the Aztecs |
| Mayas | people who established a great civilization in Middle America (Yucatan Peninsula region) |
| slash-and-burn-agriculture | farming technique used by the Mayas in which trees are cut down and burned to clear and fertilize the land to grow maize |
| maize | corn |
| hieroglyphics | the signs and symbols that made up the Mayan writing system |
| Lake Texcoco | the lake the Aztecs built their city in the middle of |
| Olmec | group of people from the region we call Mexico today that are known for giant carved stone heads |
| What were two reasons maize was so important to the Mayans? | 1. their most common crop 2. they had a god of corn |
| What were Mayan cities the center of? | government and religion |
| Who ruled the Aztec empire? | one single powerful ruler |
| Who ruled the Mayan cities? | a different ruler for each city |
| Which group of people played pok-ta-tok? | Mayans |
| How did the Aztecs increase their available farm land? | they built chinampas |
| Name two achievements of the Mayan civilization. | created a calendar created a system of writing - hieroglyphics |
| Name the five theories the Mayan empire declined. | crop failure war disease overuse of natural resources people may have rebelled against their leaders |
| Name three achievements of the Aztec civilization. | calendar hieroglyphics schools and universities |
| Name two reasons the Aztec empire fell. | Spanish conquistadors invaded Spanish carried diseases the Aztecs had not been exposed to |
| What did the Aztecs believe affected the rise and fall of the sun each day? | human sacrifice |
| Name the order of the Aztec social classes from top to bottom. | 1. Emperor 2. royal family, nobles, priests, military leaders 3. soldiers 4. merchants and artisans 5. farmers (largest group) 6. slaves |