Maya history and religion
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
Maya history and religion
(The civilization of the American Indian series, v. 99)
University of Oklahoma Press, c1970
Available at 8 libraries
  Aomori
  Iwate
  Miyagi
  Akita
  Yamagata
  Fukushima
  Ibaraki
  Tochigi
  Gunma
  Saitama
  Chiba
  Tokyo
  Kanagawa
  Niigata
  Toyama
  Ishikawa
  Fukui
  Yamanashi
  Nagano
  Gifu
  Shizuoka
  Aichi
  Mie
  Shiga
  Kyoto
  Osaka
  Hyogo
  Nara
  Wakayama
  Tottori
  Shimane
  Okayama
  Hiroshima
  Yamaguchi
  Tokushima
  Kagawa
  Ehime
  Kochi
  Fukuoka
  Saga
  Nagasaki
  Kumamoto
  Oita
  Miyazaki
  Kagoshima
  Okinawa
  Korea
  China
  Thailand
  United Kingdom
  Germany
  Switzerland
  France
  Belgium
  Netherlands
  Sweden
  Norway
  United States of America
Note
Includes bibliographical references and index
Description and Table of Contents
Description
Believing that Maya studies today are ""suffering from imbalance,"" J. Eric S. Thompson here approaches Maya history and religion from the standpoint of ethno-history. Present-day archaeologists often tend to restrict their curiosity to their excavations and social anthropologists to observe the modern Maya as members of a somewhat primitive society in an era of change. In this volume, a distinguished Maya scholar seeks to correlate data from colonial writings and observations of the modern Indian with archaeological information in order to extend and clarify the panorama of Maya culture.The shock of the Spanish Conquest was devastating to the Maya. Not only were they placed under the domination of a people uninterested in their ancient ways, but their religion was proscribed, they were removed from their familiar settlements into new areas, and new diseases were introduced which ravaged their civilization. In spite of these ordeals, the Maya have clung closely to the old ways, and Maya culture is still very much alive, though slowly giving way before modern technology and influences.
Topics discussed include Putun Maya expansion in Yucatan and the Pasion drainage, the depopulation of the Maya Central area at the time of the Conquest on account of newly introduced diseases, the location of the controversial eastern boundary of the Maya area, trade relations between the highlands and the lowlands, the use of hallucinatory drugs and tobacco, lowlands Maya religion, and the creation myths of the Maya in relation to those of other Middle American cultures.
Mr. Thompson's approach to Maya life will prove thought-provoking to archaeologists, ethnologists, historians, and all others interested in the ancient Maya civilization.
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