Pyramid of the Sun, Teotihuacan

About 2,000 years ago, a little known people who had settled in what was then a fertile offshoot of the Valley of Mexico about 400 years earlier, began to build a massive ceremonial complex north-east of modern Mexico City, which grew into the greatest city of Mesoamerica. At its height in the 6th century AD, it covered about 8 square miles, house over 100,000 people, and outposts of Teotihuacan’s empire eventually stretched to the Gulf Coast and Guatemala. The city was planned on a formal grid pattern, with even the streams channeled to conform to the rectilinear layout. The manner in which streets and buildings are aligned suggest some astronomical significance. The main north-south thoroughfare is called the Avenue of the Dead because the buildings that lined it, probably residences of the great, were once thought to have been tombs. It runs south from the Pyramid of the Moon, with the somewhat large Pyramid of the Sun standing to the east. Both date from the earliest period of construction.

Like all the temples of Teotihuacan, the Temple of the Sun has disappeared, but the gigantic ziggurat that supported it remains, along with its ceremonial plaza. It measure roughly 735 feet on each side and is 240 feet high, consisting of five great “steps” with sloping sides, the fourth stage being much smaller than the others. On the west, facing the Avenue of the Dead, a grand staircase rises from three stepped terraces. The core of the pyramid is earth – nearly 1 million cubic meters of it. It is faced with a red volcanic stone found locally and lime-plastered.

Teotihuacan began to decline after about 600 and it was sacked by the Toltecs, probably soon after 650. Later settlers, impressed by its grandeur, respected the place, though it never recovered its former power or population. The Aztecs, who would have recognized many of the gods portrayed in murals and sculpture, believed that the city had been built by the gods and made occasional pilgrimages there.

Machu Piccu

The dominance of Andean civilization by the Incas, whose empire at the time of the Spanish conquest extended over most of South America west of the Andes, from Ecuador to central Chile, was a recent achievement. Inca legends go back no further than AD 1200, and it was not until the mid-15th century that the power of the Incas, the “Children of the Sun”, was established in Peru. The greater empire was won in the last quarter of the century, only to be extinguished by the arrival of the Spaniards under Pizarro In 1532.

The Inca empire was a notable triumph over its topography, most of its cities, including Cuzco, the capital, being situated far up in isolated mountain valleys. Good roads, though never travelled by wheeled vehicles, connected the towns and outposts, although quite how the Incas managed to overcome the communications problem, there being no conventional written language, remains something of a mystery.

Another mystery surrounds the exact function of Machu Piccu, today the most-visited of the Inca sites, which is set in spectacular position on a high precipice surrounded by almost sheer mountain peaks. In fact the Spaniards never knew it was there: abandoned for centuries, it was first rediscovered by the American archaeologist, Hiram Bingham, in 1911. There may have been some religious association responsible for its location, and its architecture supports this supposition, as it seems too substantial to be merely a frontier strongpoint. A notable feature of the site, the carved, natural stone Intihatana, enclosed by curing walls, must have had some ritual significance, no doubt connected with the Sun god. The careful planning and orderly layout suggests that this was probably a state enterprise, perhaps organized from Cuzco, which is about 50 miles away to the south-east.

As well as fine stone buildings the city also combines extensive agricultural terraces. The extraordinary skill of the stonemasons and engineers is famous, for they worked with primitive tools and without mortar, yet managed to fit the stone blocks together with extraordinary precision, building on simple lines, generally based on squares and rectangles. They did not employ the arch, and the buildings of Machu Piccu are quite devoid of sculpture.

Mesa Verde

The Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado, south-west USA, was established in 1906 to protect the ancient dwellings of the Pueblo people, which had been cut into the sheer cliffs. Long deserted, they were rediscovered in about 1890 by cowboys. Nearly 2,000 years ago, the site was occupied by Basket Makers who were able to raise crops such as maize, beans and squash on the green table tops of the cliffs. The made circular pits for storage which, lined with stone and roofed, they later adapted as dwellings. Later they built stone houses, sometimes of two or more storeys, above ground.

The famous cliff dwellings were constructed by the descendants between the 12th and 14th centuries, probably as a defense against marauding Navajo and Apache. The ground floor had no doors or windows, and access to the higher floors could only be reached by ladders, easily removed when danger threatened. Access to the ground floor was through a hole in the ceiling, and upper storeys were reached by the same means. There were also sacred chambers, called kivas, below ground level.

The main construction material was hand-cut stone, fashioned with great skill, and adobe mortar. Ceilings were built by laying cross-beams which supported laths made from smaller branches, plastered over with adobe. Ascending storeys were recessed, creating a terraced effect, like a ziggurat. Living rooms average about 194sq ft. A large number of different groups combined to build these massive communal residences, the most spectacular of the ruined buildings being the so called Cliff Palace, which was inhabited between about 1100 and 1300. It contains about 200 rooms, plus 23 kivas.

The buildings were abandoned early in the 14th century, when the people moved farther south to construct smaller pueblos with better access to water. The move may have been prompted by the raids of nomadic tribes or dissension among the different tribal group, but archaeologists have identified a severe drought between 1272 and 1299 which may also have contributed to the abandonment of Mesa Verde.

Sources:

http://www.nps.gov/meve/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesa_Verde

http://www.sacredsites.com/americas/peru/machu_picchu.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teotihuacan

http://gomexico.about.com/od/ancientsites/ss/teotihuacan_4.htm