Classic Maya collapse

The Classic Maya collapse is the name archaeologists give to the decline and abandonment of many Maya city-states in the southern lowlands of Mesoamerica during the eighth and ninth centuries CE. Great cities such as Tikal, Calakmul, Palenque and Copán stopped raising inscribed monuments, ceased major building and were eventually deserted. Its causes remain one of archaeology's most debated questions, and many scholars now prefer to speak of a rupture or transformation rather than a collapse.

The Classic period of Mesoamerican history is usually dated from about 250 to 900 CE, with its final century known as the Terminal Classic. During these centuries the lowlands of what are now Guatemala, southern Mexico and Belize were divided among rival kingdoms ruled by kings who recorded their reigns, wars and rituals in hieroglyphic inscriptions carved on stone monuments.

Those dated monuments provide one of the clearest measures of the crisis. Around 514 roughly ten were erected a year; the number rose to about twenty by 672 and some forty by around 750, then fell back to ten by 800 and to none by 900. King lists tell a similar story. At Copán, a carved altar records a line of rulers from 426 to 763, and the dynasty appears to have ended soon after. Studies of the Copán valley suggest its population peaked at around 28,000 and had dropped to roughly 15,000 by 900 and below 1,000 by 1200. Few new buildings were begun in the central Maya area after about 830.

More than 80 explanations have been proposed, and none commands universal agreement. Older ideas pointed to invasion by outsiders from the Gulf Coast, possibly influenced by the Toltecs, but most specialists doubt that any military defeat could account for such a long and complex process. Another idea linked the decline to the fall of trade networks centred on Teotihuacan, though that city's power is now thought to have waned in the seventh century, well before the worst of the Maya crisis. Others have proposed epidemic disease, soil exhaustion and deforestation, or the strain of ever more complex and competitive societies, an argument made by the anthropologist Joseph Tainter.

Since the early twenty-first century, drought has gained ground as the leading explanation. Lake sediments and cave formations from the Yucatán Peninsula record severe dry spells during the Terminal Classic. A 2018 study of gypsum from Yucatán lakes estimated that yearly rainfall fell by between 41 and 54 per cent during the collapse, and by up to 70 per cent at the driest moments. Because the Maya relied on stored rainwater rather than permanent rivers, even moderate shortfalls could have damaged harvests and unsettled political order.

Critics note that much of the climate evidence comes from the north, while the worst abandonment occurred in the south, and that some regions suffered little or even flourished. Researchers have suggested that a deep water table in the central lowlands, or access to coastal trade in the north, may explain these differences.

The collapse did not end Maya civilisation. Its centre of gravity moved north, where Chichén Itzá built a short-lived regional empire and cities such as Uxmal and Mayapán flourished, while highland kingdoms such as the Kʼicheʼ and Kaqchikel also prospered. Independent Maya states survived until the Spanish conquest was completed in 1697, and millions of Maya people still live in the region today.

Our 800 and 900 maps show the Maya city-states of the Yucatán Peninsula and the lowlands to its south during the decline of the southern cities.