Sonia Benson – Early Civilizations in the Americas (4 Volumes)

Автор: Sonia Benson
Название книги: Early Civilizations in the Americas (4 Volumes)
Формат: PDF
Жанр: История Америки, Австралии, Океании
Качество: Изначально компьютерное, E-book

Early Civilizations in the Americas: Almanac presents the story of the development of early American civilizations from the earliest known societies to the Spanish conquest—the dates, locations, sites, history, arts and sciences, religions, economies, governments, and eventual declines of the great ancient American civilizations. Volume 1 features an overview of ancient civilization in general and a brief summary of modern theories about the earliest immigrants and early life in the Americas. The remainder of the volume focuses on the rise of the Andean civilization from the early urban centers to the Inca empire. Volume 2 focuses on the rise of the Mesoamerican civilizations from the Olmecs through the Aztecs.

Many American history books begin with the year 1492
and the discovery of the Caribbean Islands by Spanish
explorer Christopher Columbus (1451–1506). For the great
civilizations of Mesoamerica and South America, though,
1492 proved to be the beginning of the end of their civilization.
The products of thousands of years of history—the great
cities, the architecture, markets, governments, economic systems,
legal systems, schools, books, holy shrines—even the
daily prayers of the people—were about to be willfully eliminated
by the conquering European nations. The rupture
would prove so deep that many aspects of pre-Hispanic American
culture and tradition were forever deleted from the
human memory. Fortunately, some of the important history
of the early civilizations has survived and more is being recovered
every day.
The three-volume Early Civilizations in the Americas
Reference Library provides a comprehensive overview of the
history of the regions of the American continents in which
two of the world’s first civilizations developed: Mesoamerica
(the name for the lands in which ancient civilizations arose
in Central America and Mexico) and the Andes Mountains region
of South America (in present-day Peru and parts of Bolivia,
northern Argentina, and Ecuador). In both regions, the
history of civilization goes back thousands of years. Recent
studies show that the first cities in the Americas may have
arisen as early as 2600 B.C.E. in the river valleys of present-day
Peru. The earliest evidence of civilization in Mesoamerica
dates back to about 2000 B.C.E.
When the Spanish conquistadores (conquerors) arrived
in Mesoamerica and the Andes in 1521 and 1531, respectively,
they found many native societies, but they were
most amazed by two great empires–the Aztecs and the Incas.
In the early sixteenth century the Aztecs and the Incas had
spectacular cities that could rival those of Europe in size, art
and architecture, organization, and engineering. These capital
cities ruled over vast empires—the Aztecs with a population
of more than 15 million and the Incas with a population
of about 12 million—with remarkable efficiency.
The Spaniards at that time could not have understood
how many civilizations had preceded those of the Aztecs and
the Incas, each one bringing its own advances to the empires
they witnessed. In the Andes, many of the key ingredients of
civilization were in place by 2600 B.C.E. in early urban centers.
From that time forward, the Andean culture was adopted, developed,
and slowly transformed by the societies of the Chavín,
the Moche, the Nazca, the Wari, the Tiwanaku, and the Chimú,
among many others, before the Incas rose to power. Mesoamerican
civilization apparently had its roots in the early societies of
the Olmecs and Zapotecs, whose ancestors were living in present-
day central Mexico by 2000 B.C.E. The Mayas skillfully
adopted the calendars, glyph-writing, art and architecture, astronomy,
and many other aspects of these earlier civilizations,
adding greatly to the mix. The people of the great city of Teotihuacán
and later the Toltecs created vast empires that unified
the Mesoamerican culture. Later the Aztecs created a government
that encompassed all of these early civilizations.
Early Civilizations of the Americas: Almanac presents
the story of this development—the dates, locations, sites, history,
arts and sciences, religions, economies, governments,
and eventual declines of the great ancient American civilizations.
Volume 1 features an overview of ancient civilization in general and a brief summary of modern theories about the
earliest immigrants and early life in the Americas. The remainder
of the volume focuses on the rise of the Andean civilization
from the early urban centers to the Inca empire. Volume
2 focuses on the rise of the Mesoamerican civilizations
from the Olmecs through the Aztecs.
A note about the use of the word “civilization” in
these volumes. The word “civilization” is used here to convey
the type of organization and the size of a society, and certainly
not to make a quality judgment about whether the society
was sophisticated or refined. Besides the civilizations
that arose in Mesoamerica and the Andean region, there were
thousands of indigenous (native) societies throughout the
two American continents with varying levels of the kind of
organization experts call “civilization.” The civilizations featured
in Early Civilizations in the Americas Reference Library
are the New World civilizations that developed around the
same time and with some patterns similar to the first civilizations
of the Old World: Mesopotamia, Egypt, the Indus Valley,
and China. Their history has been little known until the
last century; indeed, only recent studies have included the
Americas in the list of the world’s first civilizations.
Features
Early Civilizations in the Americas: Almanac contains numerous
sidebar boxes that highlight people and events of special
interest, and each chapter offers a list of additional sources
that students can consult for more information. The material
is illustrated by 192 black-and-white photographs and illustrations.
Each volume begins with a timeline of important events
in the history of the early American civilizations, a “Words to
Know” section that introduces students to difficult or unfamiliar
terms, and a “Research and Activity Ideas” section. The volumes
conclude with a general bibliography and a subject index
so students can easily find the people, places, and events discussed
throughout Early Civilizations in the Americas: Almanac.