The Mayans, an ancient civilization located in modern Mexico, Guatemala,
Belize, Honduras, and El Salvador were heavily focused on temples, priests, and
rights based around their polytheistic gods. The Aztecs, like the Olmecs, did have
temples, priests, and rites, but they also had a heavy emphasis on sacrificial
rituals that involved killing masses of people for the gods to give them
plentiful harvests. The religions and philosophies of these people would be
spread by missionaries who would go out trying to convince people to join their
religion. Often trade would spawn religious spreading as people would
occasionally trade for religious texts, which later would cause them to adopt a
religion. Religious systems provided people with beliefs, many of them of which
were in high power, often translating into laws affecting how politics
operate. This led to people increasing prices for things of holy and sacred
value, within their religion, and people creating social structures based
on their religion or acting differently to people due to their new religious
beliefs. There is not that much information on the social structure,
gender structure, or political structure of Oceania because it remained
isolated from the rest of the world. But. it may be assumed the Oceania, in some
way, had a form of patriarchy being that many legal groups throughout history
supported the males over females and probably had a social structure of the
wealthy over those who were either poor or slaves.
However, barely anyone knows. The fact that the people of Oceania were hunters and
gatherers could mean that women were given more respect than the women in
other region being that based on history during the hunter and
gatherer times women were working and gathering with the men and even when the
men went away to go hunting the women were taking care of everything.
As people began to use and destroy the trees faster than they could reproduce
and grow, deforestation began to run rampant throughout the territories.
Deforestation led to soil erosion and the extinction of some local animal and
plant species. This led to the people migrating to new places and going by
the term "nomadic". This also may have caused many societies to turn into
hunter and gatherer societies because finding animals and vegetation outside
of the deforested location would help feed the people. Often those who had the
most power and stability to spare would sponsor the creation of art and
architecture. Art, along with other artifacts and objects, was used in the
vast trade network, but many trade networks were used for different reasons.
For example, many trade networks were used as a way of transportation for
missionaries to travel and spread their religion throughout the connected lands.
However, as the exchange networks expanded many different cultures were
shared with other people. The emergence of the new culture was intertwined with
the native culture including the intertwining of religions. This led to
many Universal beliefs throughout the nation. One example of this, as stated
before, is patriarchy and social class preference. Other examples of this
include universal laws of morality and ethics and within certain regions
universal laws of what is allowed and not allowed.
Little is known about Southeast American religious beliefs and practices before the
advent of Indian merchants and religious influences from the second century BCE onwards. However, these few things are known.
Monuments of early Mesoamerican culture, the religion appeared as early as 1000 BCE
at La Venta of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec in Mexico where central Mexico passes
through a narrow isthmus in the area east of the Yucatan Peninsula. A
religious system of symbols practices and iconography developed in the
northern Andean highlands of Peru this religious system proved to have a
long-standing influence on the entire central Andean region. Also, ancestor
veneration persisted in many cultures including the Andean areas in Peru this
was the belief that ancestors' souls lived on after they died. Families were
seen more as a unit of those living and dead as opposed to seeing a family on
their own. Ceremonial procedures to honor dead
relatives were held in homes, temples, and graveyards. Shrines devoted to past
relatives were kept in homes. The subjects would seek advice from their
ancestors as well as praise them, and they showed familial loyalty.
Also, since the Mayans were heavily based on temples, priests, and rites based
around polytheistic gods, and the Aztecs had a heavy emphasis on sacrifice
and rituals based on killing masses of people for plentiful harvest. It can be
assumed that people took their religion very seriously.
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