Artistic Expressions

The Mayan art is a reflection of their lifestyle and culture. This art was manifest in drawings and paintings on paper, low and high reliefs in stone, wood, pottery, jade, bone, and clay figures. Music was highly appreciated and there is evidence plays, which were conducted in public ceremonies. The Mayan nobility responsible work fine for their palaces, and to accentuate his greatness, among them, Jade jewellery and Obsidian. thrones engravings, paintings and polychrome ceramics with scenes of life in the courts, and of course, stelae with texts to be remembered for his feats in battle. Most figures of a wide variety, have been found in royal tombs. The Mayan art, it was not just for royalty, as evidenced by the many findings in the homes of ordinary people. On the other hand, it is important to know a bit more about the different forms of expression of the Mayans where on many occasions wished to translate their feelings: first, sculpture, identified by the most famous are the stelae, stone monoliths with engravings of rulers or gods and texts that have helped to understand their culture. Second, ceramics, it was something very anecdotal and left to fly the imagination of the artist Maya, which helped it to be changed.Thirdly, painting, the Mayans were great painters, especially in ceramics, but the murals on buildings and caves, they were very important to them, they used many vegetable dyes and minerals for their artworks. Finally, music, theatre and dance, for the ancient Maya, performing arts were integrated at all levels of society, from involving hundreds of people, to an individual playing a pito going to camp. The Murals show processions bands with drums, flutes, trumpets, while the nobles dressed in their best finery dancing. The Mayans are in one way or another something extraordinary, but it is vitally important to know about them to say.


By Diana Paola Palacios Chacón

Work in the Mayan civilization

Work in the Mayan civilization.

The Mayan´s people were worker people, and their economy was based in the agriculture, they, also, hunts, fished, tamed animals, and worked the stone that they used to build weapons, decorations and work instruments, they also worked the pottery.

The Mayan civilization is considered like a very advanced cultural group because they achieved a great development in many areas like the astronomy, architecture, mathematics sculpture, ceramics, painting, and others.

Furthermore, the Mayan civilization had a particular style in its art, because they represent the human person in a real way, with perfect proportions of the body in movement. The principal fear of their art was the sacred thing, the ritual thing, the daily life, fishes, turtles, jaguar, bat, etc.

The stone was one of the raw materials, and with it they built sculptures, buildings, but, they, also, were interested in the personal aesthetics and for this reason, they made jade decorations, as necklaces, earrings, slopes and masks, so they deformed their skulls and noses, and they were hung a decoration in the forehead. These decoration pieces make part now of the Pre-Columbian art.

About education, it was received depended on the social class of the person. The lower social classes received basic education, while nobles received a higher education because this needed scientific knowledge to occupied administrative charges. To future priests, additionally, they learned astronomy secrets; they were obligated to have an honest private and public life, because they had to be good models to people

By Paula Fernanda Fortoul.

The Mayan’s family

The Mayan’s family

The family in the Mayan ancient civilization was sacred, because it was the center of the all ceremonies and rituals.

Firstly, the typical Mayan’s family had five or seven members and they woke up before the dawn. The morning started with a chocolate cup or a corn cup and a tortilla, which they ate in a bedroom at side of the chimney, in their wooden homes.

The family’s members had each one a role, so, the more important members was the father; he was the authority of his children only until they were eighteen years old, but before the father was the boss of the family, and he worked in the agriculture, like sowing tomatoes, fruits, pepper, paprika, etc., and construction, like sculptures, monuments, buildings, etc., and while the mother was at her home, knitting, cooking or cleaning the house.

On the other hand, children, dependent of the gender, were at their home or went out with their father, in other words, the girls were at home with their mother, for learning to cook, to knit, etc., and the boys went out with their father for learning about agriculture and construction.

Is important to mention, that the Mayan civilization was organized for hierarchies, so firth were urban people, in this the directing class, priests, artisans and merchants, and second rural people, in this social class peasants were located

For this reason, the family couldn’t to go up in the social classes, neither to progress, because the rights were very strict.

Secondly, the family in the Mayans, were very united and were necessary that all members were together in the morning and on the night, because they had some rituals, for example, the most important rituals was dedicated to gods, so on the night, all members of the family, were together for praying and scarifying, because their life was governed by gods, and their maximums god was Hunab Ku. They, also, went to ceremonies and weddings in family.

By Paula Fernanda Fortoul.

Family Member Roles

The Mayan society was organized on the basis of a social stratification, at the head of which was the nobility, almenehoob. This privileged group had the power and authority to hold political posts and religious. The supreme ruler of the province was, Halach Uinik (or Halach Wíinik) who lived in absolute power on matters earthly and spiritual, and it was while Batab or local boss. The group of priests, known generically ahkincob, I had the same status as the heads or Bataboob. The supreme priest received Ahuacán name, which means "Mr snake." The merchants professionals (Ppolom) on the social ladder. They were members of the nobility, not only because of their descent from mariners putunes conquerors of this land, but because they have their hands in this important economic activity. Although, in general, the whole land was communally owned and belonged to the people, the nobles had greater access to the cream of the crop, not owned or worked: getting todocon work of farmers. Under this complicated stratum which was the nobility, it was the people, the common people call Yalba Uinikoob ( "little men"), Chemal Uinicoob, Memba Uinicoob or Pizilcan, all commoners. The "common people" was the most numerous and included farmers, fishermen, lumberjacks, masons, artisans, weavers, porters, etc. The village was farming corn and produce food for themselves and for the noble class. It was the cutting, loading, and farmed make stones that shape the grand buildings, which built roads and temples, which decorated their walls with paintings and mosaics. Below the town was on the social ladder: the slaves. They were, for the most part, people caught in war or enslaved by any crime. It was born a slave or become such to be sold on the business or be an orphan.

By Diana Palacios Chacón

FAMILY STRUCTURE AND INTERACTION - work/life balance

We don’t have the same concept about family or in terms of love and relationships between member of Mayas, they generally marriage in early twenties and these marriages were arranged in comparison with modern civilization were couples marriage for love; also we have concepts completely different about freedom or work, for example, in ancient civilizations woman just made domestic works like take care for children, cook cleaning between others , but now in the 21st century, woman work at the same capacity like a men, they can go to the office, bring the kids from school, and clean the house, everything in one day.

To other hand Mayas in the beginning are a nomadic civilization and lived in small family bands, but when started cultivating maize they abandoned a nomadic way of life to settle in villages surrounded by cornfields. Also the Maya created arable land by using a “slash and burn” technique to clear the forest and planted maize and secondary crops such as beans, squash and tobacco. The small villages where they lived are consisting of household compounds, occupied by extended families. In addition the division of labor was clearly between men and women: first, the men looked after building huts and caring for the cornfields, while the women prepared food, made clothing and tended to the family’s domestic needs.
Family structure may alternate between nuclear and extended, with the addition of newly married couples who will leave with their parents until they firs child is born.
The Maya society was divided into four main groups:
© The nobility: which are formed by priests, warriors, traders and bureaucrats, exercised power and belonged to this group only by birth.

© The craftsmen: who are specialized manufacturing objects used by the nobility to dress, decorate their homes and show their range. Farmers living scattered around the cities and pay third of what they produced to the nobility.

© The slaves: are prisoners of war that were sold to work or to be slaughtered in certain rituals to rain, the earth or the sun.

by: Jennifer Jimenez J