EXAM 1 STUDY GUIDE: HISTORY OF
MEXICO QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
Mesoamerican Social Organization - remember the social pyramid? I claimed
Mesoamerican societies were hierarchical, what does that mean? - Correct Answers -A
hierarchical is a system that practices the ranking of one group over another. The
Aztecs were governed by a single emperor who was chosen by a council of priests and
nobles.
Describe five major characteristics of the Aztecs. - Correct Answers -1) Religion
enabled the belief in human sacrifice.
2) Aztec ball game, Ullama, was an original invention that often required human
sacrifice.
3) Hierarchical system
4) Resourceful w/ food and clothes. Corn, beans, chile, and squash were popular in
their diets.
5)Believed in selling themselves and/or children into slavery to earn income.
New Spain - Correct Answers -Built by the Spanish on the ruins of Tenochititlan.
Spanish settlers farmed and built mines to find gold and silver. They started farms
called haciendas to make money
chinampas - Correct Answers -A method of mesoamerican agriculture which used
small, rectangular areas of fertile arable land to grow crops on the shallow lake beds in
the Valley of mexico.
silver mining - Correct Answers -Engine of growth of the Colonial economy. Aztecs were
the pioneers of silver mining, extracting the metal from Sierra Madre Mountains. After
the Aztec Empire fell, Spanish conquistador Hernan Cortes staked a silver mining claim
in Taxco or Tlachco, southwest of Mexico City. Late 1540s, a huge silver deposit in
Zacatecas led to production of one-third of Mexico's silver and one-fifth of the world's
silver supply by the early 1600s.
List and briefly describe two reasons given by Diamond for the collapse of the Mayas. -
Correct Answers -The "power cycling". Cities were getting into war and battles with one
MEXICO QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
Mesoamerican Social Organization - remember the social pyramid? I claimed
Mesoamerican societies were hierarchical, what does that mean? - Correct Answers -A
hierarchical is a system that practices the ranking of one group over another. The
Aztecs were governed by a single emperor who was chosen by a council of priests and
nobles.
Describe five major characteristics of the Aztecs. - Correct Answers -1) Religion
enabled the belief in human sacrifice.
2) Aztec ball game, Ullama, was an original invention that often required human
sacrifice.
3) Hierarchical system
4) Resourceful w/ food and clothes. Corn, beans, chile, and squash were popular in
their diets.
5)Believed in selling themselves and/or children into slavery to earn income.
New Spain - Correct Answers -Built by the Spanish on the ruins of Tenochititlan.
Spanish settlers farmed and built mines to find gold and silver. They started farms
called haciendas to make money
chinampas - Correct Answers -A method of mesoamerican agriculture which used
small, rectangular areas of fertile arable land to grow crops on the shallow lake beds in
the Valley of mexico.
silver mining - Correct Answers -Engine of growth of the Colonial economy. Aztecs were
the pioneers of silver mining, extracting the metal from Sierra Madre Mountains. After
the Aztec Empire fell, Spanish conquistador Hernan Cortes staked a silver mining claim
in Taxco or Tlachco, southwest of Mexico City. Late 1540s, a huge silver deposit in
Zacatecas led to production of one-third of Mexico's silver and one-fifth of the world's
silver supply by the early 1600s.
List and briefly describe two reasons given by Diamond for the collapse of the Mayas. -
Correct Answers -The "power cycling". Cities were getting into war and battles with one
