The Maya Empire, centered in the tropical lowlands of what is now Guatemala, reached the peak of its power and influence around the sixth century A.D. The Maya excelled at agriculture, pottery, hieroglyph writing, calendar-making and mathematics, and left behind an astonishing amount of impressive architecture and symbolic artwork. Most of the great stone cities of the Maya were abandoned by A.D. 900, however, and since the 19th century scholars have debated what might have caused this dramatic decline.
The Maya civilization was one of the most dominant Indigenous societies of Mesoamerica (a term used to describe Mexico and Central America before the 16th century Spanish conquest). Unlike other scattered Indigenous populations of Mesoamerica, the Maya were centered in one geographical block covering all of the Yucatan Peninsula and modern-day Guatemala; Belize and parts of the Mexican states of Tabasco and Chiapas and the western part of Honduras and El Salvador. This concentration showed that the Maya remained relatively secure from invasion by other Mesoamerican peoples.
Within that expanse, the Maya lived in three separate sub-areas with distinct environmental and cultural differences: the northern Maya lowlands on the Yucatan Peninsula; the southern lowlands in the Peten district of northern Guatemala and adjacent portions of Mexico, Belize and western Honduras; and the southern Maya highlands, in the mountainous region of southern Guatemala. Most famously, the Maya of the southern lowland region reached their peak during the Classic Period of Maya civilization (A.D. 250 to 900), and built the great stone cities and monuments that have fascinated explorers and scholars of the region. Continue reading from History
The Maya, An Introduction (Khan Academy)
Maya: People, Language, and Civilization (Encyclopedia Britannica)
The Maya (The Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian)
Mayan Civilization (World History Encyclopedia)
The Maya (MesoAmerican Research Center)
The Collapse of Mayan Civilization Was Not Caused by Drought (Earth)
While most Maya cities were abandoned following A.D. 900, the Maya civilization and people did not disappear. Some cities, such as Chichen Itza, did continue to grow for some time after this date, and some cultural practices and religious elements survived the displacement of the Maya people.
The Spanish conquest of the Americas decimated the remaining Maya people, however, and the survivors of the conquest were ravaged by the spread of foreign disease and cultural/religious eradication efforts by colonizing forces further impacted this population. Today, the descendants of the Ancient Maya number in the millions and can be found all across Central and South America. Continue reading from Live Science
