Not Satisfied? Check out some of these other theories:
Foreign Invasion
Excessive or Internecine* Warfare
Peasant Revolt, Revolution, or Social Turmoil
Collapse of Trade Routes
*Of or pertaining to conflict or struggle within a group
- The archaeological evidence of the Toltec intrusion into Yucatán in Seibal, Peten suggests to some the theory of foreign invasion.
Excessive or Internecine* Warfare
- A great inter-regional war took place between the kingdoms of Mutal (Tikal) and Kaan (Calakmul) during the sixth and seventh centuries. The main combatants sought and obtained alliances in the entire Classic Maya region. Some "Mayanists" (e.g., Demarest) point to large-scale conflict as the cause of the collapse, but it does not explain the abandonment of other cities that were not involved in these wars.
- According to Paul Colinvaux in The Fates of Nations - A Biological Theory of History, humans will fight to preserve their share of existing resources, unless they can obtain more resources. Internecine warfare can be the mark of a declining civilization or power, but this process, when caused by expanding population, is fairly gradual.
- The Maya used a number of intensive agricultural techniques. But it has been noted that the Maya fought during their dry season, to avoid interfering with agricultural activities
- Warfare before the Classic Maya Collapse was generally between Maya city-states and between royal rivals. The Greek city-states by comparison fought each other for years, mastered the military function, and the Greeks did not as a result abandon their city-states wholesale. Warfare with foreign city-states or nations simply does not cause the type of collapse seen in the entire Classic Maya region. Even when war exterminates a population, the victors move in to take that space. The Thirty Years' War, the Eastern Front in the Second World War, the Napoleonic Wars - none of these resulted in permanent abandonment of the affected cities.
Peasant Revolt, Revolution, or Social Turmoil
- One theory attributes the collapse of the classic Maya to a hypothesized revolution among these lower classes. As life became more burdensome, work began to undermine the religious development and collective enterprise of ordinary people. The increased burden of work may have caused people to abandon their values and revolt against the elite of society. This might help explain the abrupt collapse of elite functions, as well as unfinished buildings and ceremonial centers.
- Peasant revolt might also explain the evidence of the burning of temples and smashing of thrones.
- When lower classes or different cultural groups successfully revolt, they assume the higher positions of society or bring the elite lower -- but they do not leave. Warfare, revolution, civil war, internecine warfare, a peasant’s revolt, and dynastic struggle are all historical phenomena that normally resolve themselves and re-establish equilibrium. Social turmoil self-corrects over time. The revolutionary or class struggle theory for the Classic Collapse has no historical precedent. Revolutions invigorate nations, make them stronger usually, and then tend to be reversed as the social and economic pendulum swings back.
Collapse of Trade Routes
- It has been hypothesized that the decline of the Maya is related to the collapse of their intricate trade systems, especially those connected to the central Mexican of Teotihuacán.
- Teotihuacán abruptly declined around c. 650 to 700, and the fall of this city is believed to have contributed to the sudden change in Maya economic and trade functions in the highlands, which may have resulted in a ripple effect of decline across the entire Maya world.
- Much of the Classic Maya trade was in obsidian, feathers, cacao, and other luxury items. Staple foods were produced where the people lived, and storage was not far advanced in the humid environment. The collapse of trade routes would most likely be a temporary phenomenon - or one that resulted from failure of the entire agricultural economy. Trade route discontinuation is most likely an effect, rather than a cause of, the Classic Maya collapse.
*Of or pertaining to conflict or struggle within a group