THE TACTICS OF MAYA FARMERS Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

THE TACTICS OF MAYA FARMERS - Essay ExampleThe classic Maya civilization flourished in the southern low lands of Mexico, Guatemala, and Honduras amongst the conk out four centuries before Christ and AD 900. Despite the conditions of pro yearned dry spells caused by draught, constant brushfires that devastated the earth, and erratic rain patterns that wreaked havoc on agriculture, the Maya communitys survival for such a long period of time could be attributed to their farming tactics.The hot and humid conditions of the low lands, with no possibility for irrigation, represent the primary challenge to the Mayan existence as a farming community, but they seemed to have adapted to these indecent conditions by their innovative tactics. They moved to the dense forest area that mantled the southern lowlands, cleared the cardinal forest and utilized it for agriculture. In order to overcome the infertility of their homeland, they adopted the slash-and-burn cultivation by cleansing the b rush and trees, and burning them. This helped them to put to use even the barren lands. However, this had a shortcoming that the fertility would last for only about two years or so. The Mayans were again imaginative here by migrating to warm meadows where they cultivated, and returned after several years to utilize the same land they earlier abandoned. Maintaining this process as a cycle, they were able to use a wider area of land. Thus they were able to circumvent, albeit temporarily, the challenges of nature.