Chap 16

Which of the following best describes the Mesoamerican ball game?

All answers

Maya society was stratified into which of the following social groups?

All answers are correct

Mesoamerican writing survives:

All options

Following the demise of Teotihuacán, a unified Late Classic Maya political empire emerged; the cities of the Maya lowlands became united under one king who ruled from the famous site of Tikal.

False

Maize was a remarkably easy plant to domesticate, and the people of Mesoamerica adopted it quickly; they became sedentary quite early on.

False

Teotihuacán and Chichén Itzá developed into the earliest true cities in Mesoamerica.

False

Best known for his conquest of the Aztec empire, this conquistador landed on the Mesoamerican mainland in 1519, encountering the Maya of Yucatán.

Hernan cortes

Which of the following is NOT usually recorded in Classic Maya inscriptions?

Information about the lives of common people.

Because no other Mesoamerican polity appears to have been strong enough to destroy Teotihuacán, researchers suggest that the demise of that city resulted from:

Internal conflict and increased fictionalization

What was by far the most important crop to the cultures of Mesoamerica?

Maize

Which of the following statements correctly characterizes the use of metal in Mesoamerica?

Metal was rarely used and, when it was, it was for ritual objects and not tools.

What Late Preclassic Zapotec city in Oaxaca contained a ball court, twenty temples, palace-like residence buildings, and may have housed more than 17,000 people?

Monte Alban

What Aztec ruler was killed while under Spanish house arrest in May 1520?

Montezuma 2

Between c. 9500-2500 BCE, most Mesoamerican people were:

Nomadic Foragers

Around 1600 BCE, ________ became widespread in Mesoamerica.

Sedentary communities

In 378 CE a lord named Siyaj K'ak arrived at the Maya site of Tikal, founding a dynasty there; half a century later a lord named Yax Kuk Mo founded a dynasty at the Maya site of Copán. Siyak K'ak and Yax Kuk Mo were closely associated with, and may have come from, what city, located hundreds of miles away?

Teotihuacán

When were the cultural traits that we associate with the emergence of Mesoamerican royalty, such as royal portraits and dated inscriptions, first observed?

The Late pre classic period

How did most famous Aztecs, those who gave rise to the great civilization we now know as the Aztec empire, refer to themselves?

The Mexica.

Which Early to Middle Preclassic culture is known for the production of colossal stone heads?

The olmec

Most archaeologists believe that the influence of Teotihuacán stretched far beyond the Basin of Mexico and across Mesoamerica.

True

The Classic period center at Cantona shares few architectural features with Teotihuacán and has its own distinctive ceramic tradition

True

The Olmec cultural complex predates the Classic Maya cultural complex.

True

The Postclassic city of Tula was truly cosmopolitan, fusing Central Mexican and northern Gulf Coast influences, among others.

True

Classic Maya rulership was closely associated with ________, which can be seen in the construction of defensive walls and earthworks, but especially in depictions of captives and sacrifice in Maya art.

War

The Aztec capital of Tenochtitlán was:

an urban island, reclaimed from a lake, and crisscrossed by canals

In the absence of a male heir, political control of a Late Classic Maya city:

could fall to a female regent or queen.

Each major Late Classic Maya city would have had a central precinct dominated by ________, which would have served as temples or the palatial residences of lords.

masonry pyramid temples

The Tlaxcalans were enemies of the Aztecs who allied themselves with the Spanish during the conquest of the Aztec.

true

The Maya polities of the northern Yucatán:

weathered the Maya collapse of the great southern Maya cities and grew into major centers in their own right.