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Well, as many of us know, Gibson's new movie Apocalypto comes out in theaters this friday. While it certainly isn't a religous movie, or at least a Christian one for the Christmas season, it certainly is brutal and still holds religious themes specifically about the ancient Mayans of southern Mexico and the Yucatan whose civilization spanned over a 1500 years. The Mayans developed advanced mathematics and a calendar so sophisticated that it is still more accurate than our modern calendar by a certain percentage!
However there was a darker side to their culture. Like many Native Americans of the Central American region, the Mayans believed mankind owed a blood debt to their gods for they believe thier gods used their own blood to create the world and mankind. Usually blood sacrifices in Mayan culture were more mild in comparison with their neighbors but Gibson's movie is said to take place during the decline of the Mayan city-states where the priests incurred more brutal sacrifices with a greater number of victims.
I am very interested in seeing this historical based movie, for I believe it is the first one of its kind that takes place in ancient American civilization (unless anyone knows of others like it). However, I can't help but get the feeling that Gibson whether wittingly or not is using this movie to deomonize this ancient culture. As a way of somehow saying, "It's a good thing the Europeans came and converted these heathens!" I don't know. We probably wouldn't know who he'll demonize unless he's drunk, and definitley if they're Jewish! LOL
[ 09. December 2006, 08:08 PM: Message edited by: Horus_Den_1 ]
Posts: 26252 | From: Atlanta, Georgia, USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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I think more movies of this calibur should be made. It seemslu like an interesting scenario. I wonder what he will use to "end" the Mayians...
Posts: 40 | From: Chicago | Registered: Nov 2006
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Has anyone other than me noticed a trend with recent jungle movies and creepy indigenous children? First King Kong has that Melanesian girl who bites Carl Denham/Jack Black, than Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest has that Amerindian boy with the knife and fork. Now in this movie we have this little boy who whispers those strange words.
quote:Djehuti: The Mayans developed advanced mathematics and a calendar so sophisticated that it is still more accurate than our modern calendar by a certain percentage !
Then why isn't it used instead?
Posts: 1420 | Registered: May 2005
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This 30-by-3-foot long mural was painted around the year 100 B.C. A detail from a sacred Maya mural at San Bartolo - the earliest known Maya painting, depicting the birth of the cosmos and the divine right of a king - shows the son of the corn god, patron of kings, floating with a pair of birds tied to his woven hunting basket, letting blood and offering a sacrificed turkey before one of five cosmic trees.
The first part of the mural illustrates the Maya creation story. Four deities represent the creation of water, land, sky and paradise. At the center, the maize god crowns himself king. Archaeologists said they were having trouble deciphering the glyphs of the much earlier Mayan script.
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Posts: 1549 | From: California, USA | Registered: Jan 2006
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However, I can't help but get the feeling that Gibson whether wittingly or not is using this movie to deomonize this ancient culture. As a way of somehow saying, "It's a good thing the Europeans came and converted these heathens!" I don't know. We probably wouldn't know who he'll demonize unless he's drunk, and definitley if they're Jewish! LOL
...in which case, it would be interesting to produce a movie of Europeans, particularly the Northern ones, that places time at about when the Mayan complex came about. Producers certainly wouldn't want to use Greco-Roman sources as a guidance, for a movie about 'contemporaneous' Europeans to their north. Posts: 5964 | Registered: Jan 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Djehuti: However, I can't help but get the feeling that Gibson whether wittingly or not is using this to deomonize this ancient culture. As a way of somehow saying, "It's a good thing the Europeans came and converted these heathens!"
Evergreen Writes:
I just finished watching the film. It is of interest that the main character is 'saved' from his enemies by the coming of the Europeans....literally! His enemies are about to kill him, they look up and see Europeans docked offshore and loose their train of thought.
It was a good movie however.....
Posts: 2007 | From: Washington State | Registered: Oct 2006
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The funniest part about the whole "discovery" of America is that Europe is referred to as the OLD world and America is the new. But actually it is the OTHER way around. When Columbus and the conquistadors came the Mayans had already abandoned their cities after having thrived as a civilization LONG before Western Europe KNEW what civilization was. In fact 1492 marked the BEGINNING of Western Europe as a "civilized" culture on the world stage. In fact this is when Western Europeans DISCOVERED the that the world was round and that there were continents and people outside of Europe. Something everyone ELSE know before them. Yet they have the GALL to claim they discovered something AFTER finding out about it from the African and Muslim empires that came before them and GAVE them civilization. Western European civilization is NEW compared to most MesoAmerican, African and Asian civilizations that they came to DECIMATE. Europe is the NEW world and America and everywhere else is the OLD world. The nonsense just doesnt stop.
Posts: 8895 | Registered: May 2005
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It is a human story within a Mayan context but the 'pageantry' is very good. I think it may be safe to say that is exactly how civilizations fall, OR get reborn. One man trying to save his family, or a group of people doing the same thing, they get together, ovethrow or move away to another landmass and create their own civlization! Mayan culture extends from Southern Mexico to Belize and they recently found ruins within the Belizean jungle of Mayan? origin
Posts: 1290 | From: usa | Registered: May 2005
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However the "fall" of Mayan civilization as portrayed by Mel Gibson is FAR from fact. The Mayans had ALREADY fell by the time Columbus got there. The fall of Mayan civilization has NOTHING to do with human sacrifice on a grand scale. This is a MYTH being perpetuated as fact. NO ONE knows for sure WHY Mayan civilization fell.
However, EVERYONE SHOULD know why the Aztec and Inca empires fell, which is DIRECTLY because of European aims of conquest and plunder:
quote: Through the interpreter, Valverde delivered the "Requirement," indicating that Atahuallpa and his people must convert to Christianity, and if he refused he would be considered an enemy of the Church and of Spain. Atahuallpa refused the Spanish presence in his land by saying he would "be no man's tributary".
"Be advised that I, being free, do not have to pay tribute to anyone, nor do I believe there is a king greater than I. However, I will have the pleasure to be the friend of your emperor, since he should be a great prince to send his armies throughout the world. But this Pope does not interest me; much less will I obey him, I being in the kingdom of my father and our religion being good and I and my subjects are happy. However, despite my being a son of Huayna Capac I cannot discuss anything so wise and old. The Christ that you speak of died, the Sun and Moon never die, besides how do you know your god created the world?"[1]
The Spanish envoys returned to Pizarro, who prepared a surprise attack against Atahuallpa's army in what became the Battle of Cajamarca on November 16, 1532. According to Spanish law, Atahuallpa’s refusal of the Requirement allowed the Spanish to officially declare war on the Inca people. When Atahuallpa coldly asked the priest Valverde by what authority he and his people could say such things, Valverde offered him a Bible, saying that the authority derived from the words in it. He examined it and then asked why did it not speak to him. He then threw it to the ground. That gave the Spaniards the excuse they needed to wage war on the Incas. They opened fire, and over the course of 2 hours more than two thousand Inca soldiers were killed. The Spanish then imprisoned Atahuallpa in the Temple of the Sun.
Atahuallpa still could not believe the Spanish intended to take control of his kingdom. He thought that if he gave them the gold and silver they sought they would leave. In exchange for his release, he agreed to fill a large room with gold and promised the Spanish twice that amount in silver. Although he was stunned by the offer, Pizarro had no intention of releasing the Inca because he needed the ruler's influence over the native people to maintain order in the surrounding country or, more to the point, he meant to depose Atahuallpa, placing the entire empire under the rule of Spain's King Charles I (Holy Roman Emperor Charles V), with himself as viceroy.
So in all actuality it was the SPANISH and the fact that they sacrificed THOUSANDS of Native Americans in the name their God Jesus Christ, that were responsible for the fall of MesoAmerican civilization. Not the Maya or Mayan sacrifices as they were ALREADY GONE when the Spanish got there.
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Mayans still exist in Central America with both their language and religious traditions still intact. Their religious traditions know are heavily synchrinized with Catholcism.
Posts: 8675 | From: Tukuler al~Takruri as Ardo since OCT2014 | Registered: Feb 2003
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Sure'd be nice to have "Indio-latino" forum member's input.
Posts: 8014 | From: the Tekrur in the Western Sahel | Registered: Feb 2006
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quote:Oh, and just in case you thought that the only controversy surrounding this movie was Gibson himself (and his penchant for onscreen barbarity), think again. Guatemalan human rights activists are now expressing anger over what they see as a scary, racist depiction of the Mayan culture, with their formidable bone piercings and proclivity for beheadings.
"Basically, the director is saying the Mayans are savages," human rights activist Lucio Yaxon told Reuters this week.
quote: Mel Gibson Criticised For Apocalypto 'Stereotypes' By WENN Dec 8, 2006
New Mel Gibson movie Apocalypto has come under fire from indigenous Guatemalans for "stereotyping" the Mayan Empire as "savage" and "brutal".
Apocalypto is set in the twilight years of the Mayan civilisation, which peaked in the eighth century, and although only the movie's trailer has been shown in Guatemala, human rights activists are up in arms.
Lucio Yaxon, who works to help the 50 per cent of Guatamalans descending from the Maya, says, "The director is saying the Mayans are savages."
Ignacio Ochoa, director of the Nahual Foundation that promotes Mayan culture, adds, "Gibson replays... an offensive and racist notion that Maya people were brutal to one another long before the arrival of Europeans and thus they deserved, in fact, needed, rescue."
But Richard Hansen, who worked as consultant archaeologist on the project, insists Gibson went to extreme lengths to ensure his film was historically accurate.
quote: Tittle-Tattle™ Dishing Hollywood Dirt Daily
Mel Gibson = Native American 'Hero' By Staff Dec 9, 2006
Mel Gibson and his latest film offering, Apocalypto, have given him a much-needed personal boost. Mel Gibson filmed Apocalypto to chronicle the end of the Mayan civilization, and used a number of actors from amongst the native populations. Native American leaders have come out to say they love the film.
Chickasaw Nation Governor Bill Anoatubby leads the praise, stating, "It serves as an inspiration to Native American actors who aspire to perform relevant roles in the film industry."
"It is very important to note that Mr Gibson has gone to great lengths to cast indigenous people in this film."
The film, which chronicles the end of the ancient Mayan civilisation, has been praised by Indian leaders because Gibson successfully chose to cast indigenous actors for the project, reports WENN.
Gibson and his casting team found people from the Yucatan, Mexico City, Oaxaca, Xalapa, Veracruz and other areas to star in his ambitious new film, which is told in the ancient Mayan tongue with subtitles.
And after screening the movie to Native American community groups on Friday, Gibson has been hailed a hero to the indigenous people of America.
quote: Maya Mistake Mel Gibson's Gory Action Film Sacrifices a Noble Civilization to Hollywood
By William Booth Washington Post Staff Writer Saturday, December 9, 2006; Page C01
LOS ANGELES
The world audience is very familiar with the deeds of the overachievers of the ancient world, as told through the movies, the tales of the rise and fall, et cetera, et cetera, of your celebrity civilizations, such as the Egyptians, Greeks and Romans.
Now it is time for the Maya to shine, but they are a more mysterious, less overexposed people who finally get star billing on the big screen in Mel Gibson's new film "Apocalypto." How do they do as a civilization? Not so nice. Let's say you had a time travel machine? You definitely would not want to dial back to Mel's Maya, not without superior body armor. They would stick a fork in you.
The "Apocalypto" director got the tattoos and weaponry right, but scholars say he did a hatchet job on an advanced people.
Photo Credit: By Andrew Cooper -- Icon Distribution
"Apocalypto" depicts the Maya as a super-cruel, psycho-sadistic society on the skids, a ghoulscape engaged in widespread slavery, reckless sewage treatment and bad rave dancing, with a real lust for human blood. Think: Caligula of the Yucatan. Follow the bouncing heads!
This is a problem because most scholars, while acknowledging the violence of this pre-Columbian society, universally applaud the Maya as among the New World's most sophisticated and subtle civilizations. They were, especially at their height around A.D. 800, remarkable Stone Agers who erected avant-garde cities and towering pyramids in the jungles of Mexico and Central America, created sumptuous art, practiced a precise astronomy and (yes, there's more) developed not only a written language, but a heady cosmology of time and space, built around a complex, ordered society of maize, kings and gods. The Maya flourished for a thousand years. They were winners.
But "Apocalypto's" focus on the more, shall we say, extreme hobbies of the Maya (i.e., removal of still operating body parts) is giving the community of Maya researchers the fits. The archaeologists are shouting: slander! They're circulating statements and editorials and e-mails.
"It is a shocking movie to us," says Stephen Houston, professor of anthropology at Brown University, and like the other Mayanists quoted in this article, a scientist who has spent years excavating sites in Mexico and Central America.
Houston and his colleagues say they are not just engaging in the predictable academic nitpicking about the historical accuracy of a potential Hollywood blockbuster -- though they are also happy to point out the alleged goofs (the famous Bonampak murals are altered to show a warrior holding a dripping human heart when nothing was in his hand before) -- and, in fact, they applaud the things Gibson and his designers got generally right (the groovy tattoos, facial scarification, colorful textiles, nasty weaponry, punky ear plugs, etc.)
The main gripe, says Houston, is that "Apocalypto" will make a bad impression on the general public. "For millions of people this might be their first glimpse of the Maya," he says. "This is the impression that is going to last. But this is Mel Gibson's Maya. This is Mel Gibson's sadism. This is not the Maya we know."
Some of the scientists have seen the movie, others have watched the trailers, read reviews or summaries. David Stuart, professor of Mesoamerican art and writing at the University of Texas, saw a rough cut of the film with Gibson and penned an unpublished editorial with Houston that suggests Gibson's Maya are so evil that they were "a civilization . . . that deserves to die."
Arthur Demarest, anthropology professor at Vanderbilt University, says, "I don't care about some minor historical inaccuracies. That's Hollywood. What I'm very worried about is how the Maya themselves will perceive the film."
As Demarest points out, the Maya are not a extinct lineage. Their descendants, 6 million or more, are still living in Mexico and Central America. (The film does not open south of the border until next year).
"I can promise you that there will be a massive repudiation of this film, not only as a work of fiction, but as a systematic and willful misrepresentation of the Maya," says David Freidel, archaeology professor at Southern Methodist University.
Tough talk, but Gibson has taken heat in the past and come out way ahead. As he did in "The Passion of the Christ," which employed spoken Aramaic, Gibson's players in "Apocalypto," many of them indigenous people and non-actors, speak an ancient language. In this case, it's one of the extant Maya languages called Yucatek, which along with Gibson's skill as a filmmaker, may enhance the verisimilitude of "Apocalypto."
Gibson declined to be interviewed by The Washington Post, but in production notes, the writer-producer-director states that his initial goal was to create a "high-velocity action-adventure chase film" and that he then sought an ancient culture in which to set his go-fast story. The Maya appealed to him, Gibson says, because he sees parallels between the collapse of the ancient Maya civilization and our own. "It was important for me to make that parallel because you see these cycles repeating themselves over and over again," Gibson says. "People think that modern man is so enlightened, but we're susceptible to the same forces."
Gibson's consultant on the project was Richard Hansen, a respected Mayanist and professor at Idaho State University, as well as the president of the Foundation for Anthropological Research and Environmental Studies, which does preservation work and study in Guatemala. Gibson, a generous contributor to the group, now serves on its board of directors.
Hansen defends the film, believing that his fellow Mayanists will be "pleasantly surprised." He says, "For the most part it is very accurate," and "I was amazed at the level of detail, the stone tools, gourds, iguana skins, strung up turkeys, just amazed." Yet, he adds, "there were things I didn't like that they went ahead and did anyway," and he agrees "there was a lot of artistic license taken," and that there is a mash-up of architectural styles, art, costume and ritual from different time periods during the millennium-long Maya reign.
And the sacrifice, the gore, the Maya as savage? The film does "give the feeling they're a sadistic lot," Hansen says. "I'm a little apprehensive about how the contemporary Maya will take it."
"Apocalypto" tells the story of Jaguar Paw, a young hunter who lives in a primordial forest, and is taken captive by a raiding party, marched to the city, slathered in blue paint and hauled up to the blood-soaked altar at the top of a pyramid to have his heart and skull removed by a shaman for his slit-eyed king. But wait! Jag Paw escapes -- and then it's a chase movie.
So where do the Maya end and where does Mel begin?
Gibson shows grisly human sacrifice. And yes, indeed, the Maya were into it. Let us count the ways: decapitation, heart excision, dismemberment, hanging, disembowelment, skin flaying, skull splitting and burning.
But: The humans being chopped into nibbles were more likely to be royals and elites, not common forest dwellers like the film's Jaguar Paw and crew. "They didn't run around rounding up ordinary people to sacrifice," Houston says.
The film depicts human sacrifice on a large scale and shows an open-pit grave filled with hundreds of headless dead, like something out of the Cambodian killing fields or the Nazi death camps.
But: "We have no evidence of mass graves," says Karl Taube, professor of anthropology at the University of California at Riverside. At times the film appears to confuse the Aztecs (who engaged in mass sacrifice) and the Maya. "We know the Aztecs did that level of killing. Their accounts speak of 20,000," says Taube. But the Maya appear to have been more into quality (long, slow torture and death of kings) than quantity. Freidel says, "They disassembled the defeated kings as carefully as if they were a thermonuclear device, because they were dangerous enemies, capable of inflicting real harm."
Gibson includes what appears to be widespread slavery. Masses of gloomy, starved captives are seen toiling under heavy loads, making lime cement and stucco, to build ceremonial centers.
But: "We have no evidence of large numbers of slaves," Taube says. Rather, most Mayanists suspect the pyramids and the like were built by free Maya who saw it as a civic duty, perhaps forced upon them, labor as tax, or perhaps voluntary, as the medieval cathedrals were built by European guilds.
Finally, the Mayanists say the film appears confused about when events take place. One of the great mysteries of the Maya is why their civilization "collapsed" around A.D. 900, when many of the great ceremonial cities, such as Tikal, were simply abandoned. The current thinking is that collapse had many fathers: drought, deforestation, disease, overpopulation, warfare, social disruption. And Gibson's movie includes a little riff on them all, and indeed the film begins with a quote from historian Will Durant about the Romans: "A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself from within."
But Gibson sets his film not during the era of Maya collapse in A.D. 900, but at the time of European contact in the early 1500s, when the first Spanish expeditions arrived on Maya shores. What wiped out the Maya in the 1500s was not internal rot, it was the Spanish, who brought European disease and fought for decades to pacify the Maya.
"Every society is violent," says Demarest. "And the Maya were no more cruel than any other, especially if you look at their entire history. What if you told the story of our history and didn't mention Pascal or Mozart or science or medicine and just focused on MTV and mass genocide?"
Or as Houston put it: "What if you showed the ancient Maya 'The Passion of the Christ'? They'd freak out."
Posts: 8014 | From: the Tekrur in the Western Sahel | Registered: Feb 2006
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quote: read this review (http://www.archaeology.org/online/reviews/apocalypto.html) from Traci Ardren who is assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Miami:
"In "Apocalypto," no mention is made of the achievements in science and art, the profound spirituality and connection to agricultural cycles, or the engineering feats of Maya cities. Instead, Gibson replays, in glorious big-budget technicolor, an offensive and racist notion that Maya people were brutal to one another long before the arrival of Europeans and thus they deserve, in fact they needed, rescue."
UPDATE: (09-12-2006)
Mysteriously, a report from Reuters used the above quote we pulled out three days ago on this blog, and attributed it to Ignacio Ochoa, director of the Nahual Foundation that promotes Mayan culture. These articles appeared in The Guardian, BBC, Channel 4, and ITN under the title 'Mayans slam film'. Now the BBC appears to have corrected this and quoted Traci Ardren directly -and changed it to 'film angers Mayan groups'. The BBC even links directly to Traci's article. Slow papers like the Independent are way off the pace and using the old attribution for the 'racist' quote (09-12-2006).
Ignacio Ochoa kindly responded to us and has categorically denied this is his quote. Ochoa doubts the film will increase stereotyping of the Maya beyond what it is already. Ochoa's concern is that the "ancient Maya civilization" commonly referred to is more an ideological construct. This constructed concept has been used by the likes of the Guatemalan State as a kind of systematic colonialism to control indigenous movements in Guatemala during the civil war up to the present day. The real danger for the present day Maya is that Guatemalan politicians are blocking their participation in local development. Ochoa cites the COCODE system as an example of this. Ochoa agrees that any hint by Gibson in the film, just as in the school books many Guatemalans have to read, that it took the Spanish conquest of the Mayas to 'civilize' them is totally unacceptable.
Wouldn't it be great if the media could go beyond the mudslinging (the need for controversy) and examine the issues at stake for a change? They might even check with the people they're quoting- rather than just recycling the news.
quote: Is "Apocalypto" Pornography? December 5, 2006 by Traci Ardren A scholar challenges Mel Gibson's use of the ancient Maya culture as a metaphor for his vision of today's world.
Traci Ardren, an assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Miami, knows the Maya well. She has studied Classic Maya society for over 20 years while living in the modern Maya villages of Yaxuna, Chunchucmil, and Espita in the Mexican state of Yucatan. Her credentials include contributing to and editing Ancient Maya Women (2002) and The Social Experience of Childhood in Ancient Mesoamerica (2006). Ardren's reaction to the new film "Apocalypto," follows. Scholars are well aware that some aspects of Maya culture were violent, but Ardren finds fault with what she sees as a pervasive colonial attitude in the film.
With great trepidation I went to an advance screening of "Apocalypto" last night in Miami. No one really expects historical dramas to be accurate, so I was not so much concerned with whether or not the film would accurately represent what we know of Classic period Maya history as I was concerned about the message Mel Gibson wanted to convey through the film. After Jared Diamond's best-selling book Collapse, it has become fashionable to use the so-called Maya collapse as a metaphor for Western society's environmental and political excesses. Setting aside the fact that the Maya lived for more than a thousand years in a fragile tropical environment before their cities were abandoned, while here in the U.S, we have polluted our urban environments in less than 200, I anticipated a heavy-handed cautionary tale wrapped up in Native American costume.
What I saw was much worse than this. The thrill of hearing melodic Yucatec Maya spoken by familiar faces (although the five lead actors are not Yucatec Maya but other talented Native American actors) during the first ten minutes of the movie is swiftly and brutally replaced with stomach churning panic at the graphic Maya-on-Maya violence depicted in a village raid scene of nearly 15 minutes. From then on the entire movie never ceases to utilize every possible excuse to depict more violence. It is unrelenting. Our hero, Jaguar Paw, played by the charismatic Cree actor Rudy Youngblood, has one hellavuh bad couple of days. Captured for sacrifice, forced to march to the putrid city nearby, he endures every tropical jungle attack conceivable and that is after he escapes the relentless brutality of the elites. I am told this part of the movie is completely derivative of the 1966 film "The Naked Prey." Pure action flick, with one ridiculous encounter after another, filmed beautifully in the way that only Hollywood blockbusters can afford, this is the part of the movie that will draw in audiences and demonstrates Gibson's skill as a cinematic storyteller.
But I find the visual appeal of the film one of the most disturbing aspects of "Apocalypto." The jungles of Veracruz and Costa Rica have never looked better, the masked priests on the temple jump right off a Classic Maya vase, and the people are gorgeous. The fact that this film was made in Mexico and filmed in the Yucatec Maya language coupled with its visual appeal makes it all the more dangerous. It looks authentic; viewers will be captivated by the crazy, exotic mess of the city and the howler monkeys in the jungle. And who really cares that the Maya were not living in cities when the Spanish arrived? Yes, Gibson includes the arrival of clearly Christian missionaries (these guys are too clean to be conquistadors) in the last five minutes of the story (in the real world the Spanish arrived 300 years after the last Maya city was abandoned). It is one of the few calm moments in an otherwise aggressively paced film. The message? The end is near and the savior has come. Gibson's efforts at authenticity of location and language might, for some viewers, mask his blatantly colonial message that the Maya needed saving because they were rotten at the core. Using the decline of Classic urbanism as his backdrop, Gibson communicates that there was absolutely nothing redeemable about Maya culture, especially elite culture which is depicted as a disgusting feast of blood and excess.
Before anyone thinks I have forgotten my Metamucil this morning, I am not a compulsively politically correct type who sees the Maya as the epitome of goodness and light. I know the Maya practiced brutal violence upon one another, and I have studied child sacrifice during the Classic period. But in "Apocalypto," no mention is made of the achievements in science and art, the profound spirituality and connection to agricultural cycles, or the engineering feats of Maya cities. Instead, Gibson replays, in glorious big-budget technicolor, an offensive and racist notion that Maya people were brutal to one another long before the arrival of Europeans and thus they deserve, in fact they needed, rescue. This same idea was used for 500 years to justify the subjugation of Maya people and it has been thoroughly deconstructed and rejected by Maya intellectuals and community leaders throughout the Maya area today. In fact, Maya intellectuals have demonstrated convincingly that such ideas were manipulated by the Guatemalan army to justify the genocidal civil war of the 1970-1990s. To see this same trope about who indigenous people were (and are today?) used as the basis for entertainment (and I use the term loosely) is truly embarrassing. How can we continue to produce such one-sided and clearly exploitative messages about the indigenous people of the New World?
I loved Gibson's film "Braveheart," I really did. But there is something very different about portraying a group of people, who are now recovering from 500 years of colonization, as violent and brutal. These are people who are living with the very real effects of persistent racism that at its heart sees them as less than human. To think that a movie about the 1,000 ways a Maya can kill a Maya--when only 10 years ago Maya people were systematically being exterminated in Guatemala just for being Maya--is in any way okay, entertaining, or helpful is the epitome of a Western fantasy of supremacy that I find sad and ultimately pornographic. It is surely no surprise that "Apolcalypto" has very little to do with Maya culture and instead is Gibson's comment on the excesses he perceives in modern Western society. I just wish he had been honest enough to say this. Instead he has created a beautiful and disturbing portrait that satisfies his need for comment but does violence to one of the most impressive of Native American cultures.
Traci Ardren is an assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Miami.
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Djehuti, It is a good thing the europeans came alsong and rescued the heathens you speak of. These were some of the bloodiest, most barbaricc people that history reveals. How anyone would think that the Spanish conquest was not an overwhelming positive is beyond civil thinking people. Its not a matter of their race, its a matter of almost total evil. The Spanish could not match them on their worst day times two.
Posts: 904 | From: Texana | Registered: Aug 2006
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quote:Originally posted by ARROW99: Djehuti, It is a good thing the europeans came alsong and rescued the heathens you speak of. These were some of the bloodiest, most barbaricc people that history reveals. How anyone would think that the Spanish conquest was not an overwhelming positive is beyond civil thinking people. Its not a matter of their race, its a matter of almost total evil. The Spanish could not match them on their worst day times two.
Actually the Europeans WERE the heathens and never RESCUED anyone from anything. IN FACT, the Europeans never DID anything POSITIVE except kill and rape and pillage and enslave people because of their INNATE desire to CONQUER everyone in the name of European savagery. NOTHING done by ANY civilization matches the barbarity and savagery done by Europeans to Native Americans, Africans and Asians in the name of MONEY. The ONLY PROGRESS that has come about as a result of this ADVANCEMENT in technology is a GREATER displarity between rich and poor, MORE suffering, MORE starvation and MORE people dying from BASIC illnesses. All of it is a RESULT of the European CONQUEST of most of the KNOWN world and their CONTINUED attempts to be the WORLD's ECONOMIC RULING POWER, backed by the OVERWHELMING might of the military juggernaught that can DESTROY the planet with the number of conventional and unconventional weapons in its stockpile. This is NOT progress or civilization it is SAVAGERY and BARBARITY in its PUREST FORM.
But of course, these Europeans HAVE to lie about it, because they want you to BELIEVE that they INTRODUCED civilization to America, Africa and Asia. How is that when Asia, America and Africa ALREADY HAD civilizations THOUSANDS of years PRIOR to the BEGINNING of ANY Western European civilizations and even mediterranean European civlizations owe a debt to their forebears from Africa and Asia. Europeans came to conquer pure and simple and that is why they were called CONQUISTADORS. They werent trying to CIVILIZE anyone, they werent trying to teach the TRUE nature of GOD to anyone and they CERTAINLY werent trying to EDUCATE anyone to any HIGHER knowledge. They came to TAKE what they saw in the name of the King and NOTHING else. So stop trying to turn the EXPLOITATION of native peoples all over the world into some sort of NOBLE cause, because IT WAS NOT.
In fact, it was the Europeans who BENEFITTED from the fact that these things ALREADY existed and were developed by those SO-CALLED savages that they conquered. European history is nothing but one big atrocity after another. Start with 1492, the near genocide of millions of Native Americans, the African Holocost of Slavery, the genocide in Australia and Tasmania, the murder of Millions in Congo, the murder and pillage in Asia, the forced entry into China and Japan, Apartheid, the exploitation of Inda, the 1st world war, the Second World War, the Jewish Holocaust, the Korean War, the Vietnam War and on and on. ALL at the hands of so-called CIVILIZED Europeans whose WHOLE concept of progress is based no MILITARY might and the genocide of NATIVE populations. Europeans have NEVER represented TRUE civilized society, democracy, human rights or FREEDOM in ANY sense. They have ONLY represented the PURE desire for MATERIALISTIC gain and pleasure at the EXPENSE of INDIGENOUS rights and the FREEDOM of those who suffer in order to ALLOW Europeans to live a lifestyle that is UNMAINTAINABLE. It is the Europeans who have a DISTORTED concept of reality, which says that CIVILIZATION was INTRODUCED from Europe to the world, when it wasnt. Religion, civilization, culture and everything ELSE was INTRODUCED to Europe FROM everywhere else.
Bottom line, this FAKE history of Europe being such a BENEFICIAL presence for native people and the planet is just an attempt to HIDE from Europeans OWN savage nature, which EVERYONE ELSE takes for granted. That is why their B.S. history is the LAUGHING stock of the world. The MesoAmericans, Africans, Asians and everyone else UNDERSTOOD that the cycles of life, death and new life were a NATURAL part of nature and TRIED to live according to it. They did not HIDE it and try to sugar coat LIFE for what it is or human nature for what it is. It is EUROPEANS who try and DENY their OWN humanity which INCLUDES the SAME savage traits that they frown on in everyone else, but everyone else understands that this is PART of what makes us HUMAN. No amount of technology, mathematics, science or any other sort of MATERIAL thing is going to CHANGE man from being the CREATURE of nature that he is, no matter how COMFORTABLE he tries to make himself and no matter how many PLEASURES he creates for himself to enjoy. THIS is the ULTIMATE folly of modern civilization, that NO MATTER HOW ADVANCED they become with MATERIAL things, they are STILL fundamentally HUMAN and STILL have their INNER savagery INTACT and it is that INNER savagery that will ULTIMATELY determine MAN's FATE on this planet, pure and simple.
Posts: 8895 | Registered: May 2005
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quote:Originally posted by ARROW99: Djehuti, It is a good thing the europeans came alsong and rescued the heathens you speak of. These were some of the bloodiest, most barbaricc people that history reveals. How anyone would think that the Spanish conquest was not an overwhelming positive is beyond civil thinking people. Its not a matter of their race, its a matter of almost total evil. The Spanish could not match them on their worst day times two.
Actually the Europeans WERE the heathens and never RESCUED anyone from anything. IN FACT, the Europeans never DID anything POSITIVE except kill and rape and pillage and enslave people because of their INNATE desire to CONQUER everyone in the name of European savagery. NOTHING done by ANY civilization matches the barbarity and savagery done by Europeans to Native Americans, Africans and Asians in the name of MONEY. The ONLY PROGRESS that has come about as a result of this ADVANCEMENT in technology is a GREATER displarity between rich and poor, MORE suffering, MORE starvation and MORE people dying from BASIC illnesses. All of it is a RESULT of the European CONQUEST of most of the KNOWN world and their CONTINUED attempts to be the WORLD's ECONOMIC RULING POWER, backed by the OVERWHELMING might of the military juggernaught that can DESTROY the planet with the number of conventional and unconventional weapons in its stockpile. This is NOT progress or civilization it is SAVAGERY and BARBARITY in its PUREST FORM.
But of course, these Europeans HAVE to lie about it, because they want you to BELIEVE that they INTRODUCED civilization to America, Africa and Asia. How is that when Asia, America and Africa ALREADY HAD civilizations THOUSANDS of years PRIOR to the BEGINNING of ANY Western European civilizations and even mediterranean European civlizations owe a debt to their forebears from Africa and Asia. Europeans came to conquer pure and simple and that is why they were called CONQUISTADORS. They werent trying to CIVILIZE anyone, they werent trying to teach the TRUE nature of GOD to anyone and they CERTAINLY werent trying to EDUCATE anyone to any HIGHER knowledge. They came to TAKE what they saw in the name of the King and NOTHING else. So stop trying to turn the EXPLOITATION of native peoples all over the world into some sort of NOBLE cause, because IT WAS NOT.
In fact, it was the Europeans who BENEFITTED from the fact that these things ALREADY existed and were developed by those SO-CALLED savages that they conquered. European history is nothing but one big atrocity after another. Start with 1492, the near genocide of millions of Native Americans, the African Holocost of Slavery, the genocide in Australia and Tasmania, the murder of Millions in Congo, the murder and pillage in Asia, the forced entry into China and Japan, Apartheid, the exploitation of Inda, the 1st world war, the Second World War, the Jewish Holocaust, the Korean War, the Vietnam War and on and on. ALL at the hands of so-called CIVILIZED Europeans whose WHOLE concept of progress is based no MILITARY might and the genocide of NATIVE populations. Europeans have NEVER represented TRUE civilized society, democracy, human rights or FREEDOM in ANY sense. They have ONLY represented the PURE desire for MATERIALISTIC gain and pleasure at the EXPENSE of INDIGENOUS rights and the FREEDOM of those who suffer in order to ALLOW Europeans to live a lifestyle that is UNMAINTAINABLE. It is the Europeans who have a DISTORTED concept of reality, which says that CIVILIZATION was INTRODUCED from Europe to the world, when it wasnt. Religion, civilization, culture and everything ELSE was INTRODUCED to Europe FROM everywhere else.
Bottom line, this FAKE history of Europe being such a BENEFICIAL presence for native people and the planet is just an attempt to HIDE from Europeans OWN savage nature, which EVERYONE ELSE takes for granted. That is why their B.S. history is the LAUGHING stock of the world. The MesoAmericans, Africans, Asians and everyone else UNDERSTOOD that the cycles of life, death and new life were a NATURAL part of nature and TRIED to live according to it. They did not HIDE it and try to sugar coat LIFE for what it is or human nature for what it is. It is EUROPEANS who try and DENY their OWN humanity which INCLUDES the SAME savage traits that they frown on in everyone else, but everyone else understands that this is PART of what makes us HUMAN. No amount of technology, mathematics, science or any other sort of MATERIAL thing is going to CHANGE man from being the CREATURE of nature that he is, no matter how COMFORTABLE he tries to make himself and no matter how many PLEASURES he creates for himself to enjoy. THIS is the ULTIMATE folly of modern civilization, that NO MATTER HOW ADVANCED they become with MATERIAL things, they are STILL fundamentally HUMAN and STILL have their INNER savagery INTACT and it is that INNER savagery that will ULTIMATELY determine MAN's FATE on this planet, pure and simple.
Maybe when they ventured out and saw all the stuff that they were "missing out on" while in Europe, they didn't/don't "know how to act" so-to-speak.
Northern Europeans come from a harsh enviroment where barbarity is a way of Life. It might just seem like "business as usual" so to speak.
Poor people act the same way in the hood and ghettos with limited resources therein.--They take and steal and kill up other people who have more.
What I don't get tis that racism sh1t. Maybe is was a way of differentiatiin themselves from the "haves" and it's an acting out of the resentment towards people of color for "having" and an overcompensation for not having resources and advancements. Racism basically boils down to "I'm better than you becuase of my skin color". They couldn't use classism because that's ever-changing. Racism is a way to always be "superior" no matter WHAT. It's just some psychotic sh!t.
Posts: 290 | Registered: Apr 2006
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posted
Bait and fish that's all this guy does and he catches fish all the time. So who's really the wiser one? The known substanceless fisherman or the deep water fish he reels in time after time?
He successfully keeps many in reactionary mode instead of proactively present data facts and information on any of the topics we delve into.
In essence he wins everytime since his only aim is to take us off the path and like dogs keep us chasing our tails presenting and re-presenting the exact same counterstrokes ad infinitum to the exact same non-knowledge based pablum.
Just stick 'im wit da url from the last time he showed his ass and let's move on keeping the forum in the positive direction it's taken these past weeks instead of devolving it into what he's trying to take it back to.
(He noticed our leap forward and steeled himself to the task of distracting and attention grabbing, one of the oldest dirty yet sly tricks in the book to -- excuse my English -- **** up progress.)
quote:Originally posted by ARROW99: Djehuti, It is a good thing the europeans came alsong and rescued the heathens you speak of. These were some of the bloodiest, most barbaricc people that history reveals. How anyone would think that the Spanish conquest was not an overwhelming positive is beyond civil thinking people. Its not a matter of their race, its a matter of almost total evil. The Spanish could not match them on their worst day times two.
[ 11. December 2006, 06:26 PM: Message edited by: Horus_Den_1 ]
Posts: 8014 | From: the Tekrur in the Western Sahel | Registered: Feb 2006
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Elaborate offerings were recovered from a vaulted stone tomb from about 150 B.C., probably the earliest known burial of a Maya king. Near the chest of the deceased lay a jade pectoral, at front—a symbol of Maya royalty. The trove also included a mysterious figure of green stone, at right, which stood inside a large incense burner, at left, likely portraying Chac, the Maya god of rain and lightning. "Today the Maya still burn incense to create rain," says project iconographer Karl Taube, "with the rising smoke symbolizing rain clouds."
Mayan Incense
The Mayan Copal (pom) is gathered by hand from native pines existing in the high mountain valleys, and sundried as it has been for over 2000 years. This incense plays a vital role in the traditional Mayan religious ceremonies of offering and purification. Known as Gum Copal, White Copal, and Copal Blanco, this resin incense comes from a family of trees known as Bursera. These are small trees that are related to both frankincense and myrrh. This Copal can be found growing in North, South, and Central America and is considered sacred to many peoples of South and Central America, including the Mayans.
Copal smoke may have been employed for trance induction by shamans of Mesoamerica, but all the facts are not in yet. However, copal was definitely used by the shaman for divination purposes. "The shaman picks up fourteen grains of corn and holds them in incense smoke. He then chants, asking the sacred hill spirits to guide him. Next, he casts the grains (of censed maize) onto the cloth and interprets where they fall" (Sandstrom-Corn is Our Blood-1991:236).
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Posts: 1549 | From: California, USA | Registered: Jan 2006
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posted
I've read both good and bad reviews for this movie. If you go here you'll see that it's getting more good reviews than bad. I haven't seen the movie yet, so I can't pass judgement on it. But from what I've read, it's violent just like every other Mel Gibson flick. I mean, let's not pretend mass sacrifices didn't happen...it's a historical fact they did. But maybe Gibson was wrong in just focusing on that and not the other aspects of the culture....I don't know.
Posts: 1219 | From: North Carolina, USA | Registered: Jul 2004
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posted
And note that none of the major characters are actually Mayan--even though Gibson had many to choose from. Comments?
Posts: 5492 | Registered: Nov 2004
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I have read that the lead characters are North American Native Americans who learnt the Mayan language. The impression I get is that they were more "presentable"--assumedly to the American public--being lighter and taller with faces less round than the Mayans themselves.
I realise that the chroniclers of the supposed Mayan and Aztec bloodletting were the Spaniards themselves. Were there any indigenous chroniclers of these events? Sure the murals depicted such but that does not tell us why, the extent and how often.
Posts: 5492 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
As in the above reviews, this is why the interviewed Native Americans love the movie whereas the Maya Guatemalans despise it.
Posts: 8014 | From: the Tekrur in the Western Sahel | Registered: Feb 2006
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quote:Originally posted by alTakruri: As in the above reviews, this is why the interviewed Native Americans love the movie whereas the Maya Guatemalans despise it.
Gibson Criticized For Apocalypto 'Stereotypes'
Hispanic Business, Inc. December 7, 2006
New Mel Gibson movie Apocalypto has come under fire from indigenous Guatemalans for "stereotyping" the Mayan Empire as "savage" and "brutal."
Apocalypto is set in the twilight years of the Mayan civilization, which peaked in the eighth century, and although only the movie's trailer has been shown in Guatemala, human rights activists are up in arms.
Lucio Yaxon, who works to help the 50 percent of Guatamalans descending from the Maya, says, "The director is saying the Mayans are savages."
Ignacio Ochoa, director of the Nahual Foundation that promotes Mayan culture, adds, "Gibson replays… an offensive and racist notion that Maya people were brutal to one another long before the arrival of Europeans and thus they deserved, in fact, needed, rescue."
But Richard Hansen, who worked as consultant archaeologist on the project, insists Gibson went to extreme lengths to ensure his film was historically accurate.
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Posts: 1549 | From: California, USA | Registered: Jan 2006
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The 2nd review I posted has quotes from Native Americans who love the movie due to exposure for their actors not for any accuracy of the movie's content.
Rather than repost it, just scroll up to read it (and an archaeologist's critique who's not on Gibson's payroll as is the anthropologist Hansen who pleads its historically accurate, what else would he say since he's the one paid to provide the factual input?).
Anyway a movie's a movie and what's been done to the Maya differs little from the historical and literary hatchet jobs done in all historical novel type films including ones on white/Euro cultures.
I pity the viewer who can't separate fantasy from documentary (and yes recently there's a spate of these docu-dramas) and believes a movie is a time capsule peep into the past instead of a couple of hours worth of "entertainment."
But then 1/2 the PBS/A&E/DSC/HIST etc. documentaries are full of (expletive deleted) too, and I don't find that very entertaining.
Posts: 8014 | From: the Tekrur in the Western Sahel | Registered: Feb 2006
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posted
The ancient Maya came in various complexions and the actors were fairly accurate in my opinion. In fact there are some modern Maya (and other Indian groups all over America) who are dark and there are some who arent. But the point about using NON Mayan actors is a good one. They probably used them because REAL Mayans may not have appreciated participating in a slander against themselves and their history.
But I swore I read somewhere that Mr. Gibson used Mayan actors as part of the general masses of people in the film.
Posts: 8895 | Registered: May 2005
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But I swore I read somewhere that Mr. Gibson used Mayan actors as part of the general masses of people in the film.
Oh yeah, that's also in one of the above reviews.
Originally posted 10 December, 2006 02:20 PM
quote:Mel Gibson filmed Apocalypto to chronicle the end of the Mayan civilization, and used a number of actors from amongst the native populations. . . . . "It is very important to note that Mr Gibson has gone to great lengths to cast indigenous people in this film." . . . . Gibson and his casting team found people from the Yucatan, Mexico City, Oaxaca, Xalapa, Veracruz and other areas to star in his ambitious new film ...
Posts: 8014 | From: the Tekrur in the Western Sahel | Registered: Feb 2006
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posted
The Maya are a diverse group. You have those in Yucatan, Guatemala and those in Belize. That being said, although they inhabited a contiguous area, their present nation/state status determines political agenda in now addressing the movie! There are probably "native community activists' stirring the pot (they learnt from USA) to gain some benefit from the misrepresentation of Maya in the cinematic sphere.
I am saying that you have Mexican Maya, Guatemalan Maya, and Belizean Maya! so the agendas will assert themselves. Don't we all look alike per our group!
Posts: 1290 | From: usa | Registered: May 2005
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posted
It's been a while, but I almost forgot about this thread. I saw the movie just last week after I my finals, and I must say I have mixed feelings about the movie.
I agree with all the articles that Tarkruri posted:
I'm glad they casted the 'right people' as in real Native Americans for all the roles which most people would assume to be a given and have forgotten that back in the old days Hollywood simply used white actors who are either tanned or with dark-makeup. The lead character Jaguar Paw was played by Rudy Youngblood a Native American from the US of Comanche, Cree and Yaqui descent. And I totally understand how happy and proud many Native Americans are that Hollywood is casting their people in starring and leading roles, or even better-- movies entirely about Native American people with no particular relevance to white people as you see in many movies featuring Native Americans like Western or Pioneer films.
The movie was also pretty accurate in terms of wardrobe showing the right clothing, hairstyles, make-up, tatoos, and piercings etc.
But of course all the above is the accuracy ends and Hollywood fantasy begins. I was somewhat disappointed with the way Mayan society was portrayed as sadistic bloodthirsty people who would pillage villages, raping women and raiding them for slaves and sacrifices. The way the society was depicted as corrupt and I dare say somewhat depraved is what I've been fearing though kind of expecting so I wasn't really surprised. It's true that Mayan blood sacrifices were usually not as gory and bloody as the movie depicted though these days blood and gore seem to be a common feature in Hollywood films. And I was very disappointed with the image that the Maya were mass murderers with that scene of the mass piles of bodies!
Mel Gibson had a couple of themes in mind when making this movie. The first is that with every end there is a new beggining hence the title of the movie. What's little known is that this theme actually reflects Mayan religious beliefs and cosmology about destruction and rebirth of everything in the universe even the universe itself. Gibson's second theme was that great civilizations are destroyed not by other civilizations but by the peoples within it and that corruption and decadence can be bred from the arrogance and might from mankind and the great civilizations he creates, hence the way Mayan society was depicted in the movie. Although the movie was suppose to be a lesson for people in today's Western civilization, I am just a little bothered that Gibson had to "sacrifice" the image of the Maya (pun intended)!
Of course the are a couple other inacuraccies in the movie. The very ending of the movie which shows Spanish arrival is blatantly historically inaccurate because as we know by now the Europeans arrived centuries after the collapse of Mayan civilization. As for the "jaguar" in the movie, it wasn't really a jaguar but a black panther (of African origin). I can understand that getting a live jaguar from captivity (if there is one) let alone one that's trained would be etremely costly, and of course jaguars are an endangered species so it would be much easier using some other large cat. Although it would have been better if they used a spotted leopard instead of a black panther. The resemblance would be alot closer to the jaguar which is also spotted. Jaguars were considered sacred
jaguar
Achievments of the Mayans
I definitely agree that movie failed to show just how advance Mayan civilization was. Their mathematics at the time was superior than that of contemporary Europe. For one thing, they had the concept of zero which Europeans at that time didn't have although Arab and Indian civilizations had it. With zero, one is able to perform a greater number of calculations and compute more precise numbers. With better mathematical skill came better science and engineering. Combining their math with their religious astrological beliefs, the Maya became expert astronomers who mapped the stars and other celestial bodies. Again, they developed an advanced calendrical system, a system that beats our own modern one in accuracy. Just as the Egyptians were characterized as a civilization 'obsessed with death' (actually with the after-life), the Mayans like many Meso-Americans such their successors the Aztecs, were obsessed with time. This obsession stemmed from their religious belief that the universe ran in cycles of destruction and rebirth.
And talk about 'Apocalypto', one main reason why the Mayans created their great calendar was to help calculate the end of the world. According to their predictions the end of the world will be December 21, 2012! Is this true? I certainly hope not. Sounds like a good enough idea for a movie (they've used the theme in various sci-fi shows).
quote:Yonis asked: Then why isn't it (Mayan Calendar) used instead?
I would think the only reason why we don't use the more accurate Mayan calendar is that it would be too much of a hassle to go and change and re-arrange everything including our schedules that we've been using for centuries. Our calendar system, even though not as accurate still works and it would be too hectic to change everything now. Maybe in the future(?)
And of course the Mayans made excellent engineering feats with complex cities including temples and other important buildings. In the opening week of the movie Apocalypto, the history channel ran some pretty interesting series on the Maya like 'Engineering an Empire'. I learned so many things I didn't know before, like archaeo-engineer James O'Kon theorizes that the Maya were the first to build the largest suspension bridge in the world. This bridge linked the capital Mayan city of Yaxchilan to land across the Usumacinta River. It was the longest suspension bridge until the Italians build one over the Adda River!
The Mayans also build a sophisticated system of irrigation for their crops as well as running water for human use and consumption including fountains. What's even more surprising is the way they engineered their pyramid temples, so that if you clap your hands, the sound waves that bounce off the temple are strikingly similar to the chirp of their sacred bird the quetzal or kuk which symbolizes their cheif god Kukulcan! (the same one they were sacrificing to in the movie)
Yes, the Mayas were a fascinating people and still are as Ausar has mentioned, their living descendants are still there in southern Mexico. Some of their ancient customs and beliefs have also survived and and synchronized to Christian Catholocism similar to Sa'idi Egyptians with Coptic and Islam.
Today's Mayans Posts: 26252 | From: Atlanta, Georgia, USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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B.C. 11,000 The first hunter-gatherers settle in the Maya highlands and lowlands.
3114 or 3113 The creation of the world takes place, according to the Maya Long Count calendar. 2600 Maya civilization begins.
2000 The rise of the Olmec civilization, from which many aspects of Maya culture are derived. Village farming becomes established throughout Maya regions.
700 Writing is developed in Mesoamerica.
400 The earliest known solar calendars carved in stone are in use among the Maya, although the solar calendar may have been known and used by the Maya before this date.
300 The Maya adopt the idea of a hierarchical society ruled by nobles and kings.
100 The city of Teotihuacan is founded and for centuries is the cultural, religious and trading centre of Mesoamerica.
50 The Maya city of Cerros is built, with a complex of temples and ball courts. It is abandoned (for reasons unknown) a hundred years later and its people return to fishing and farming.
A.D. 100 The decline of the Olmecs.
400 The Maya highlands fall under the domination of Teotihuacan, and the disintegration of Maya culture and language begins in some parts of the highlands.
500 The Maya city of Tikal becomes the first great Maya city, as citizens from Teotihuacan make their way to Tikal, introducing new ideas involving weaponry, captives, ritual practices and human sacrifice.
600 An unknown event destroys the civilization at Teotihuacan, along with the empire it supported. Tikal becomes the largest city-state in Mesoamerica, with as many as 500,000 inhabitants within the city and its hinterland.
683 The Emperor Pacal dies at the age of 80 and is buried in the Temple of the Inscriptions at Palenque.
751 Long-standing Maya alliances begin to break down. Trade between Maya city-states declines, and inter-state conflict increases.
869 Construction ceases in Tikal, marking the beginning of the city's decline.
899 Tikal is abandoned.
900 The Classic Period of Maya history ends, with the collapse of the southern lowland cities. Maya cities in the northern Yucatán continue to thrive.
1200 Northern Maya cities begin to be abandoned.
1224 The city of Chichén Itzá is abandoned by the Toltecs. A people known as the Uicil-abnal, which later takes the name Itzá, settles in the desolate city.
1244 The Itzá abandon Chichén Itzá for reasons unknown.
1263 The Itzá begin building the city of Mayapán. 1283 Mayapán becomes the capital of Yucatán.
1441 There is a rebellion within Mayapán and the city is abandoned by 1461. Shortly after this, Yucatán degenerates from a single united kingdom into sixteen rival statelets, each anxious to become the most powerful.
1511 A Spaniard named Gonzalo Guerrero is shipwrecked and washed up on the eastern shore of Yucatán. He defects to the Maya, tattooing his face, piercing his ears and marrying into a Maya noble family. Guerrero later becomes an implacable foe of the Spaniards and does much to help the Maya resist Spanish rule in Yucatán.
1517 The Spanish first arrive on the shores of Yucatán under Hernandez de Cordoba, who later dies of wounds received in battle against the Maya. The arrival of the Spanish ushers in Old World diseases unknown among the Maya, including smallpox, influenza and measles. Within a century, 90 per cent of Mesoamerica's native populations will be killed off.
1519 Hernán Cortés begins exploring Yucatán.
1524 Cortés meets the Itzá people, the last of the Maya peoples to remain unconquered by the Spanish. The Spanish leave the Itzá alone until the seventeenth century.
1528 The Spanish under Francisco de Montejo begin their conquest of the northern Maya. The Maya fight back with surprising vigour, keeping the Spanish at bay for several years.
1541 The Spanish are finally able to subdue the Maya and put an end to Maya resistance. Revolt continues, however, to plague the Spaniards off and on for the rest of the century.
1542 The Spanish establish a capital city at Mérida in Yucatán.
1695 The ruins of Tikal are discovered by chance by the Spanish priest Father Avedaño and his companions, who had become lost in the jungle.
1712 The Maya of the Chiapas highlands rise against the Mexican government. They will continue to do so off and on until the 1990s.
1724 The Spanish Crown abolishes the system of encomienda, which had given Spanish land barons the right to forced Maya labour, as long as they agreed to convert the Maya to Christianity.
1821 Mexico becomes independent from Spain. In general, life becomes more tolerable for the Maya than it had been under Spanish rule.
1822 An account of Antonío del Río's late eighteenth-century explorations of Palenque is published in London. The book raises a great deal of interest in further exploration of the "lost" Maya civilization and settlements.
1839 American diplomat and lawyer John Lloyd Stephens and English topographical artist Frederick Catherwood begin a series of explorations into Maya regions, revealing the full splendour of classical Maya civilization to the world for the first time.
1847 The Yucatán Maya rise up against the Mexican government, rebelling against the miserable conditions and cruelty they have suffered at the hands of the whites. The rebellion is so successful that the Maya almost manage to take over the entire peninsula in what has become known as the War of the Castes.
1850 A miraculous "talking cross" in a village in central Quintana Roo predicts a holy war against the whites. Bolstered by arms received from the British in Belize, the Maya form into quasi-military companies inspired by messianic zeal. The fighting continues until 1901.
1860 The Yucatán Maya rebel again.
1864 Workmen digging a canal on the Caribbean coast of Guatemala discover a jade plaque inscribed with a date of A.D. 320. The plaque becomes one of the oldest known objects dated in the Maya fashion.
1880 A new tide of government intervention in Maya life begins as governments attempt to force the Maya to become labourers on cash-crop plantations. This destroys many aspects of Maya cultural traditions and agricultural methods preserved over 4,000 years. Towns which had been protected for the Maya soon become a haven for mixed-race ladinos who prey economically on the indigenous Maya and usurp all positions of social and economic power.
1910 Rampant government corruption leads to the Mexican Revolution.
1946 American photographer Giles Healey is taken to the Maya city of Bonampak by the native Lacandón who live nearby. Healey becomes the first non-Maya ever to see Bonampak's stunning wall-paintings, which reveal new details about Maya civilization.
1952 The Priest-king Pacal's tomb at Palenque is discovered and excavated by Mexican archaeologist Alberto Ruz, marking the first time a tomb has been found inside a Maya pyramid. Prior to this, Maya pyramids were believed to be temples with a purely religious or ceremonial purpose.
1962 Maya hieroglyphic signs are first catalogued. Uncontrolled looting of Maya tombs and other sites begins around this time in the southern lowlands, continuing until well into the 1970s.
1992 A Quiché Maya woman from Guatemala named Rigoberta Menchu, who has lost most of her family to the death squads and is known for speaking out against the extermination of the Maya, wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
I still hate the term old world versus new world, especially when used in reference to Europe. Europe is the NEW WORLD, as in NEW WORLD ORDER, whereas the Maya and Mesoamerica represent the OLD world and OLD world order, that existed LONG before Europe became a CIVILIZED state.
Also note how the LATINOS are seen as the enemies of the INIGENOUS people like the Maya. Most here in the U.S. assume that Latino means EVERYONE "South of The Border" but that is NOT the case and the term latino is only one of the many terms used to describe populations in the stratified caste system of South and Central America.
posted
Tip o tha hat to Djehuti and Doug M for the Maya education, a most welcome line of posting most relevant to this thread.
Posts: 8014 | From: the Tekrur in the Western Sahel | Registered: Feb 2006
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posted
Thanks to everyone for an informative thread.
In addition I would like to add the following:
quote: Comparative morphological studies of the earliest human skeletons of the New World have shown that, whereas late prehistoric, recent, and present Native Americans tend to exhibit a cranial morphology similar to late and modern Northern Asians (short and wide neurocrania; high, orthognatic and broad faces; and relatively high and narrow orbits and noses), the earliest South Americans tend to be more similar to present Australians, Melanesians, and Sub-Saharan Africans (narrow and long neurocrania; prognatic, low faces; and relatively low and broad orbits and noses). However, most of the previous studies of early American human remains were based on small cranial samples. Herein we compare the largest sample of early American skulls ever studied (81 skulls of the Lagoa Santa region) with worldwide data sets representing global morphological variation in humans, through three different multivariate analyses. The results obtained from all multivariate analyses confirm a close morphological affinity between SouthAmerican Paleoindians and extant Australo-Melanesians groups, supporting the hypothesis that two distinct biological populations could have colonized the New World in the Pleistocene/Holocene transition.
Budgeted at $40 million, Apocalypto enjoyed a $15 million opening weekend, topping the Leonardo DiCaprio vehicle Blood Diamond and Nancy Meyers' The Holiday. The following weekend, it dropped 46.6% to land in sixth place. It dipped another 50% over the four-day Christmas frame and fell out of the top 10 altogether.
Gross 4th weekend: $44,015,337
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Posts: 1549 | From: California, USA | Registered: Jan 2006
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posted
Let me just state that this movie was excellent...except for the last five minutes.....LOL.
In truth, the movie was excellent. A spiritual interpretation can help bring about clarity concerning the significance of the historical events that were dramatized in the movie. Salaam
Posts: 826 | From: U.S.A. | Registered: Jun 2006
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posted
To me, the persuers realized getting back to the city with an intelligence report on the "phenomena" was much more important than sport and vengeance.
I mean there was this prophecy from that child and bit by bit they witnessed every ominous piece of it as it actualized starting with the eclipse. Those things in the sea with strange men upon them was definitely the cherry on top so to speak.
The strong ending words and decision was to go the forest, not to the men coming from the sea, for a new beginning.
I enjoyed the movie but hated some of the cinematography. It didn't seem any better or worse than any other historical fiction movie.
quote:Originally posted by Evergreen:
quote:Originally posted by Djehuti: However, I can't help but get the feeling that Gibson whether wittingly or not is using this to deomonize this ancient culture. As a way of somehow saying, "It's a good thing the Europeans came and converted these heathens!"
Evergreen Writes:
I just finished watching the film. It is of interest that the main character is 'saved' from his enemies by the coming of the Europeans....literally! His enemies are about to kill him, they look up and see Europeans docked offshore and loose their train of thought.
It was a good movie however.....
Posts: 8014 | From: the Tekrur in the Western Sahel | Registered: Feb 2006
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