ORG - What was Everyone Else Doing? (Lesson)

What was Everyone Else Doing?

When you were looking through your Key Terms for this unit and using it as a guide as you read through the content, did you pick up on the presence of terms that did not appear in the content? Let's look at the map below to see why that is...

 

As you can see, during the period covered in this unit, the world wasn't just made up of Greeks, Macedonians, Romans, Persians, Indians and Chinese. There were plenty of other people walking around on the planet—often either benefiting or suffering from trade or conquests with or by their more powerful neighbors. You've learned about the Xiongu (north of the Han Dynasty) and the Ptolemaic Dynasty (the Hellenistic Pharaohs in Egypt,) but there are other names on this map that you haven't heard of yet (outside of the key terms handout.) Let's very quickly look into their stories.

So, while most of these peoples wouldn't be considered "Second-Generation Societies," they were definitely poised to take advantage of the cultural diffusion emanating from the "Second-Generation Societies" discussed earlier and they certainly were keeping a close (and opportunistic) eye on what their more powerful neighbors were up to.

However, not all of the people on the planet were situated in locations that encouraged cultural diffusion. What was happening across the Atlantic Ocean, for instance? In Mesoamerica, the Olmecs began to develop a civilization in 1200 BCE. But for some reason, by 400 BCE they disappeared from the region. And though Mesoamerica wasn't situated in a way that allowed for the life lessons from Afro-Eurasia to affect it, the region didn't sit idle for long. Beginning around 300 BCE, the Mayan civilization dominated the region of Mesoamerica. It would still be hundreds of years before they reached the peak of their existence, but they were already building pyramids and using hieroglyphics at that time. Based on evidence found from archaeological digs, we know that religion was extremely important to the Mayans, who believed the gods created humans using corn. Based on this, we also know how important agriculture was to the Mayans- both for sustenance and religion. During this early period of Mayan civilization, they lived in a system of city-states. Mayans regularly raided each other's city-states in search of slaves (rather than territory.) Due to their location, the Mayans did not have large domesticated animals to use in agricultural and building projects and, therefore, relied heavily on humans as their main source of labor.

 

 

Review

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RESOURCES IN THIS MODULE ARE OPEN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES (OER) OR CREATED BY GAVS UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED. SOME IMAGES USED UNDER SUBSCRIPTION.