17th century. Another factor implicated in the Hopewell de-
cline is increased warfare. War does seem to have become
more common aft er roughly 500 c.e., but this may be the
result of the increase in population and rise of chiefs with
the adoption of corn farming aft er Hopewell’s demise, rather
than being the cause of that demise. Some late Hopewell
structures once thought to be forts are now regarded as
ritual centers. Similarly, although use of the bow and arrow
became more common aft er 500 c.e., we cannot say that its
introduction increased warfare and led to the Hopewell de-
cline—the weapon may have been used for centuries before
this time. Ultimately the disappearance of the Hopewell cul-
ture remains a mystery.
Another mystery confronts us near the Gulf Coast of
southern Mexico, where the Olmec political and religious
center of San Lorenzo fl ourished between 1500 and 1200
b.c.e. Its rulers erected monumental images of themselves
and conducted trade in exotic materials with other ruling
groups across Mesoamerica. Around 1200 b.c.e. the creation
of monumental sculpture seems to have ceased, and the pal-
aces of the rulers were abandoned. Although San Lorenzo
itself was not abandoned at that time, its infl uence over the
Gulf Coast and other parts of Mesoamerica ended. When
the site was excavated in the 1960s, fi nds of broken statues
seemed to suggest destruction by foreign invaders or by a
revolution of local farmers against their kings, whose statues
they purposely smashed. However, more recent excavations
reveal that the broken statues simply represent the recycling
of the monuments of previous kings into new ones by art-
ists working for their successors. Recent geological evidence
indicates shift s in the courses of the rivers surrounding the
site, possibly as a result of silt buildup from erosion aft er the
Olmec cut down forests to clear land for agriculture. Th ese
changes may have damaged the local environment and inter-
fered with trade and travel.
Whatever the reason for San Lorenzo’s decline, La Venta,
to the east, succeeded it as the dominant Olmec center. La
Venta fl ourished from 1200 b.c.e. to around 400 b.c.e.—af-
ter which it, too, collapsed and was abandoned. At this same
time Olmec civilization itself began to fade, developing into
the so-called Epi-Olmec culture (ca. 400 b.c.e.–250 c.e.). Like
San Lorenzo’s demise, La Venta’s may have been related to the
silting of adjacent rivers, whether due to natural factors (even
a volcanic eruption) or to the eff ects of agriculture. But that
would not explain why the culture itself disappeared or why
the population of the eastern half of the Olmec Gulf Coast
dropped drastically around the same time. Nor can we say
that the Epi-Olmec culture represents a decline. Th is culture
created sophisticated art and played an important role in the
development of hieroglyphic writing and the calendar in Me-
soamerica, infl uencing the Maya. It was hardly decadent, as
some archaeologists have described it.
A third mystery of social collapse and abandonment ex-
ists in South America. Sometime around 2700 b.c.e. inhabit-
ants of the Peruvian coast began building huge ceremonialstructures in U-shaped arrangements. Th ey continued this
practice for more than 2,000 years. Th en, in the early fi rst
millennium b.c.e., it came to an end. Few new large coastal
cities were built between about 900 b.c.e. and 600 b.c.e., and
construction at many existing sites ground to a halt. Large
settlements were abandoned, sometimes reoccupied by
small groups of squatters who left their rubbish in the de-
serted temples. Where new construction took place, as on
the north-central coast, the old U-shaped pyramid groups
were replaced by labyrinthine arrangements of smaller
structures, and fortifi cations became increasingly common.
Meanwhile, religious infl uences from the highland site of
Chavín de Huántar made their appearance, supplanting the
long-dominant coastal traditions.
Th e mechanism for these changes remains poorly un-
derstood. Th e religious system that led to the creation of the
U-shaped enclosures suddenly lost its infl uence and prestige,
but why is unclear. Invasions from the highlands have been
suggested as a cause, but there is no solid evidence for this.
Confl ict might have broken out between priestly leaders and
their followers in the relatively egalitarian coastal cultures—
especially if those leaders tried to emulate the new class of he-
reditar y nobles that seems to have arisen in highland cultures
at the same time. Finally, there is evidence that an El Niño
climatic event in the middle of the fi rst millennium b.c.e. cre-
ated catastrophic fl ooding and killed off much of the cool-
water marine life on which coastal folk depended for much of
their food supply.See also agriculture; borders and frontiers; cities;
climate and geography; economy; empires and dynas-
ties; employment and labor; family; food and diet;
foreigners and barbarians; government organiza-
tion; health and disease; language; laws and legal
codes; literature; migration and population move-
ments; military; mining, quarrying, and salt making;
natural disasters; nomadic and pastoral societies;
religion and cosmology; settlement patterns; slaves
and slavery; social organization; towns and villages;
trade and exchange; war and conquest.FURTHER READING
Robert McC. Adams, “Strategies of Maximization, Stability, and
Resilience in Mesopotamian Society, Settlement, and Agricul-
ture,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 122,
no. 5 (1978): 329–335.
Gina Barnes, China, Korea, and Japan: Th e Rise of Civilization in
East Asia (New York: Th ames and Hudson, 1993).
Carlos E. Cordova, “Th e Degradation of the Ancient Near Eastern
Environment.” In A Companion to the Ancient Near East, ed.
Daniel C. Snell (Oxford, U.K.: Blackwell, 2005).
Roland Enmarch, Th e Dialogue of Ipuwer and the Lord of All (Ox-
ford, U.K.: Griffi th Institute/Alden Press, 2005).
K. A. Kitchen, Th e Th ird Intermediate Period in Egypt (1100–650 b.c.),
2nd ed. (Warminster, U.K.: Aris and Phillips, 1986).social collapse and abandonment: further reading 10090895-1194_Soc&Culturev4(s-z).i1009 1009 10/10/07 2:30:45 PM