In the deep depths of the Yucatan Peninsula, covered in thick dense rain forest, lies the remnants of a lost civilisation that once thrived. The Maya; located in Central America would build the iconic temple tombs. But to build them they would require a large population.
People were key in constructing these massive temples. But the Maya would have to support each over by possessing the essentials all humans need: food, water and shelter. The Maya didn’t have very impressive houses, as they had to focus on building the temple. The Maya would live with all their relatives in a compound, which is a group of houses, their houses would be made out of adobe. It is a technique for building houses out of mud. It is made out of mud, clay water and thatch. First they would make mud bricks and let them dry out in the heat of the sun. Next the bricks are mortared together with mud mixtures. Then the building is covered in a final layer of mud. Because they lived in rain forest they would have to thatch the roofs of the houses. It was done so that water would bounce off of the roof and onto the ground. If the water hit the mud then it would damage the house, families in compounds would have a dedicated job. Farming was one of the most important jobs they would have had.
The Mayans had two ways of farming, it all depended on if you lived in the highlands or in the lowlands. The way in the lowlands was ‘slash and burn’, however in the highlands volcanic soil was used. With ‘slash and burn’ they would slash down trees and set them alight, this would only last for 10 years so afterwards they would have to find another plot of land. In the highlands that’s where the volcanoes were located and they were lucky to have deep nutrient rich soil that will last even till today. The type of crops they grew varied: Squash, beans tomatoes avocados, chilli peppers, cacao, vanilla, tobacco and maize. Maize was the staple food for the Mayans as they had so much of it, they also had a maize god named Hun Hunupu. To eat maize they had to cook it in limestone; a very common stone in the Yucatan Peninsula.
To get the limestone they would have to quarry it, a quarry is a place where people cut stones out from the ground, but they would need tools so they relied on a tool smith to make them. In the Yucatan Peninsula they did not have any beasts of burden, a beast of burden is an animal that is used for transportation. Because of that they had to transport the stone by hand, but if they were lucky they would have canoes. To build the temple a large quantity of stone was required, to build it they would make a small temple and build on top of it to make it bigger. Then they would build the stairs by making a large mould of stone. When it was finally finished they would coat it in a layer of stucco which is limestone, water and sand. Then they would get it painted for extra decoration.
To get paint they would have to dig up minerals from the earth and mix it with mud. Not only would they need paint and stucco, but they would also like having intricate sculptures. They would need professional scribes to write down glyphs, but to have the scribes they needed schools and teachers. The Mayans were the first ever civilisation to have a literate reading and writing system, it was mainly pictographs and phonetic symbols. They had glyphs for their kings and gods because they were so important. Although we had discovered the writing quite long a go we still don’t fully understand the language.
When you look at a Mayan temple you think of stone the resources that it took, but it was all thanks to the people that they were made. The people had to farm for food to feed the builders and the sculptors.