CHAPTER 1 ORIGINS AND DEVELOPMENT OF MESOAMERICAN CIVILIZATION 71The sixteenth and penultimate ruler of Copán, Yax Pasaj Chan Yoaat, or First
Dawned Sky Lightning God, came to power in A.D. 763. He began an ambitious build-
ing program at Copán, but he ruled in a time of crisis. By Yax-Pasaj’s reign, over-
population had put a strain on the valley’s resources, and noble families were
increasingly competing with the ruling family for power. His monuments differ from
those of his predecessors in that they depict nobles alongside the king who share
similar privileges of recognition and royal actions.
Nobles were erecting their own monuments in elite compounds during the late
eighth century, representing a clear challenge to the royal family. When Yax-Pasaj died
in the early ninth century, dynastic rule at Copán was close to collapse. His succes-
sor began to carve a monument commemorating his seating in A.D. 822, but it was
never completed. Although the city center and outlying neighborhoods continued
to be occupied for another hundred years or so, centralized political control and all
of the activities it had engendered had come to an end.A Classic Zapotec Civilization.
Although Teotihuacan and the lowland Mayas were the largest civilizations of the Clas-
sic period, several other areas of Mesoamerica also supported large state-level societies
at this time. In the Valley of Oaxaca, the Zapotec hilltop city of Monte Albán became
capital of a powerful state. Evidence from stone monuments indicates that the use of
force was sometimes needed to subjugate neighboring as well as distant polities.
Monte Albán apparently had a good relationship with Teotihuacan. Depictions
of what appear to be diplomatic meetings between Teotihuacan “ambassadors” and
Zapotec lords were recorded on stone monuments at Monte Albán, and Zapotec
merchants lived in their own barrio at Teotihuacan. After A.D. 600, however, Monte
Albán suffered a period of decline, and its territory began to shrink as subject towns
gained strength and broke away from its control. By A.D. 700, Monte Albán had lost
its dominant position in the Valley; and by A.D. 800, portions of the site—including
the Great Plaza—were no longer in use. Nevertheless, part of the site and the sur-
rounding area continued to be used into the Postclassic period.EPICLASSIC/TERMINAL CLASSIC AND EARLY
POSTCLASSIC PERIODS.
A period immediately following the decline of Mesoamerica’s Classic period civi-
lizations, called the Epiclassic period in Central Mexico and the Terminal Classic pe-
riod in the Mayan area, and the subsequent Early Postclassic period were times of
transition and transformation in Mesoamerica. Because the dates attributed to these
different periods vary from region to region and because developments at some of
the sites discussed later do not fall neatly into one period or another, we consider this
entire period—from the beginning of the eighth century to the twelfth century—in
the following discussion.
The interval between the destruction of Teotihuacan and the rise of the Aztec
empire over five centuries later saw the rise and fall of a succession of militaristic