What happened to the Mayan civilization?

Question

What happened to the Mayan civilization?

Answer 1

The State was overthrew and a lot of the culture but some of the people still are still in that regeion

Answer 2

There are many descendents left in both Guatemala and Chiapas (Mexico).  If you are referring to the "kingdoms", there were conquered by the Spaniards. It was a typical "divide and conquer" tactic. The Spaniards knew which of the major groups were at war with each other and used that to their advantage. They fought with the Kachikel against the K'iche'. There are roughly 22 different groups that speak a Mayan language living across their homelands.  During the civil war that was in Guatemala, many of the villages were targeted by Army forces and massacred for supposed "insurgent" sympathies.

Answer 3

When the spaniards came they shipwrecked around Akumal (maya region), the people there grabbed the spaniards and ate most of them.  They left two alive, and after 8 years one of them met up with Cortes and helped him translate from mayan to spanish, a lady, ex-mayan-slave, helped him translate nahuatl (the aztec language) to mayan.  This proved essential to the conquest´s succes.

The other spanish guy (Gonzalo Guerrero), fell in love with a mayan princess and helped fight off the Spaniards, showed them tactics and, different from the rest of the people in mesoamerica, made them know they were not gods, but simply human.

But the new sicknesses killed off most of the mayans and the spaniards kept coming and coming and reduced to slavery most of the mayans.  A huge henequen production was made in the mayan region (all of the ropes from the british, american, spanish, etc, navys where made from this henequen up until nylon was invented in the fifties).  Also bubble gum was produced in this area (chiclet is a mayan word).

Continuously the mayan would be angry for this inhuman treatment and fought the spaniards, the first war they had is what is called the Caste War, which started in 1847... in the beggining of the 20th century people stopped talking about it, but the mayans to this day continue fighting (with Marcos and the EZLN).

What I am trying to say is that though the mayas no longer live in pyramids (well, they never did, it was more as a market or religious/political center) they are still alive, they speak maya (more than a million of them) and have mayan customs.

hope this helps.