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What Happened to the Mayans

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What Happened To the Mayans?
Michelle Boseman
Professor Sisson
Humanities 111

Many historians have questioned “how” or “why” the Mayan civilization disappeared after the 10th century; however there is no definitive answer to this question. One possible theory is the Mayan’s population and heavy environmental consumption may have lead to deforestation and soil exhaustion grew to such an extent that they deforested so much of the region thereby forcing the Mayan people to immigrate to other regions, this theory has some scientific background, and scientists have used satellites to study the topsoil of Central America. Scientist have found that right before the civilization collapse, the sediment had changed from tree pollen to weed pollen, suggesting there were no more trees in the area. The result of a treeless environment is the erosion of fertile topsoil, warmer climate, and a possible reduction of precipitation. Since the Mayans depended on water reservoirs from precipitation, this would have had a detrimental effect. Initially the Mayan civilization prospered throughout the lowlands. From 300 B.C. to 900 A.D. the Mayans developed a relatively productive agriculture-based economy based on the surrounding terrains, which lead to expansions in population. Mayan agriculture suffered from various limitations, which made their level of stability somewhat fragile. The Mayans relied heavily upon a narrow range of crops including corn, which made up 70% of their diet, as well as beans, squash and maze (Diamond, 2003), (McNeill & McNeill, 2003). There is some dispute about the population density but many estimates put the range between 250-750 and even as high as 1500 people per square mile in main urban areas of the lowlands (Diamond, 2005, p163). Researchers believe these huge increases in population pushed practices of stripping the forest cover and

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