Why did the Mayan civilization collapse? Probably because of overpopulation, environmental damage, war, and extended drought.
The Mayan people lived in an area that is where southeastern Mexico and northern Central America are today. People started living there in about 8000 BC. By 2000 BC the Maya were settled and farming the land. From about 1000 BC, the villages began to clump together, and cities grew. By 250 AD there were about 40 Mayan cities and some of them had populations of more than 100,000 people. It is estimated that the Mayan population might have reached 10 million people at its peak. The cities had plazas, palaces, temples, and pyramids. Many of these structures still remain. Recent LIDAR technology has revealed the cities that surrounded these structures. They are mostly hidden by the trees, but LIDAR can see through the trees. Then, from about 800 AD to 900 AD, many of these cities were abandoned. These dates can be shown because the Mayans recorded the dates on monuments that they built and recorded the names and dates of kings. Over the hundred years from 800 AD, they stop dating buildings and they stop recording kings.
The Mayans may have abandoned their cities, but they didn’t disappear. There are still 7 million Mayans living in central America and Mexico.
So, why did the Mayan civilization collapse? As with anything, there is more than one theory. Let’s try and look at some of the most popular. One theory is that war was a factor. There is some evidence that the southern parts of the Mayan civilization were invaded by other tribes. The invasions started in the 9th century. However, it is very unusual for an invasion to cause the collapse of an entire civilization. The invasions of Rome didn’t cause the Roman Empire to collapse. An invasion could only have been part of the cause. It is possibly that an invasion happened because the invaders sensed that the Mayan civilization was weakening.
Another theory is overpopulation. By the peak of the Mayan civilization, there were about 2,000 people per square mile in some of the cities. That is a staggeringly high population density. The resources that they need are obviously limited and the amount of farming area is also limited. The Mayan people used a slash and burn farming method. This means that the farmers clear an area of rainforest, grow crops on it for 3 years and then leave it to go fallow for 15 years. Once the population reached such a high number, they would have needed more land and they would have ended up clearing larger and larger areas of the rainforest. It would have become increasingly difficult for then to feed so many people.
A third theory is directly connected to the last one. The need to deforest so much of the rainforest could have caused localized climate change. They obviously cut down trees to make room to grow corn, but they also cut down trees to make their buildings. They used a type of limestone that needed to be heated to make the plaster they used to make their buildings. They needed 20 trees to make 1 square meter of plaster. This localized climate change would have reduced the amount of rainfall in the area. Experiments have shown that removing so many trees caused a 3-5 degree rise in temperature and a 20-30 percent decrease in rainfall.
The fourth theory is currently one of the most likely, but it is a combination of all of these theories that are probably the ultimate cause. Any one of these things on their own would have been surmountable. The fourth theory is drought. The Mayan cities kept a reservoir that had a large supply of water. This water would be used for irrigation and for drinking. People would come to the city for water, and it was handed out. Analysis of stalactites and stalagmites in caves and the sediment at the bottom of lakes has shown that there was a prolonged drought that lasted from about 800 AD to 1000 AD. The drought would have hit water supplies hard and the rulers of the cities wouldn’t have been able to supply the citizens with water. If people don’t have water, they will move somewhere else to find it.
So, why did the Mayan civilization collapse? It was probably a combination of war, environmental damage, and drought. However, one thing to remember is that not all of the cities were abandoned and some Mayan cities carried on until they were overrun by the Spanish in the 15th century. And this is what I learned today.
Sources
https://www.livescience.com/why-maya-civilization-collapsed.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classic_Maya_collapse
https://allthatsinteresting.com/how-did-mayans-disappear
https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2009/06oct_maya
https://www.historymuseum.ca/cmc/exhibitions/civil/maya/mmc08eng.html