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Cool facts about the pre-Olmecs & Olmecs


rakovsky

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There are two main groups in the discussion as civilizations - the Mokaya and their successors the Olmecs. They liked chocolate, and had ceramics and agriculture in the 2nd millenium BC. By 1500 BC, in Tehuacan, 35% of their diet was cultivated food, compared to 5% in 5500 BC.

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The Mokaya archaeological site of Paso de la Amada on the Pacific Coast of Chiapas, Mexico (Figure 1), and the Olmec archaeological site of El Manatí on the Gulf Coast of Veracruz, Mexico (Figure 2), have each yielded one ceramic vessel that contain residues from the preparation of cacao beverages during the Early Formative (1900-900 BC) period. Our analysis shows that chocolate (Theobroma cacao) was consumed by the Mokaya as early as 1900 BC and by pre-Olmec peoples as early as 1750 BC, pushing back the chemical evidence of cacao use by some 700 years.

The Mokaya represent one of Mesoamerica�s earliest sedentary villagers. Their initial occupation began during the Barra ceramic phase (1900-1700 BC), a period when both agriculture and ceramics were introduced.

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http://antiquity.ac.uk/projgall/powis/

 

The Olmecs' roots go back to the cultures of the region of Tabasco of 1000-4600 BC.

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the Olmec had their roots in early farming cultures of Tabasco, which began between 5100 BCE and 4600 BCE. These shared the same basic food crops and technologies of the later Olmec civilization. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olmec#Etymology

 

That's old. Having irrigation allows your culture to open up to possibilities like more advanced art and technology.

And their chocolate was not eaten sweet, but drunken spicy and alcoholic!

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The first ground beans of the Theobroma cacao (cacao tree), can be traced to the Mokaya and other pre-Olmec people, with evidence of chocolate beverages dating back to 1900 BC – almost 4 millennia ago. However, the warm, liquid form of chocolate they enjoyed back then is very different to what we’re familiar with. The drink back then was not sweet, and was laden with chili powder and other strong spices; yes, the drink – chocolate was prepared as a drink for most of its history. ...

the sweet pulp of the cacao fruit, which surrounds the beans, was fermented into an alcoholic drink – that’s right, people got drunk on chocolate over 3,000 years ago!

http://www.zmescience.com/other/feature-post/chocolate-history-the-early-days-mesoamericans-culture-and-rituals/

 

Alcoholic hot chocolate with chili peppers and spices! Cool huh? Or... hot?!

Pre-olmecs also had figurines like this one from Serdan Aquiles in the Ocos area, Guatemala:

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They had painting. Here is rock art from Baja (north of the Olmecs' region):

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Great Mural Rock Art , Baja Mexico

Some of the Rock Art painting in Baja date to 7,500 years ago

http://mexicanhistory.org/firstmex.htm

Pre-olmecs had rubber they used to make rubber balls. Maybe they were playing an earlier version of the basketball game that the Mayans, Olmecs, and Aztecs did.

 

In The Political Economy of Ancient Mesoamerica, Vernon L. Scarborough writes about the Jade axes and rubber balls, along with other features which are impressive for prehistoric levels of society:

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Offerings dating to Ojochi and Olmec times have been found in the El Manati spring, showing that Olmecs and their predecessors invested in or created a sacred landscape. Jade axes and rubber balls were part of the pre-Olmec and SL period offerings there.

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the settlement pattern indicated an integrated and rationalized distribution of communities that goes back to pre-Olmec times

However, the cities were not nearly as large as Mayan or Aztec ones.



Olmecs themselves were pretty impressive:
 

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One major site at  La Venta has a large pyramid and a population estimated to be 18,000 .The Olmecs were masters at carving jade and their most famous legacy are their huge stone heads, some of which are over 9 feet high and weigh up to 40 tons , wearing a sort of helmet . The best-recognized aspect of the Olmec civilization are the enormous helmeted heads. As no known pre-Columbian text explains these impressive monuments have been the subject of much speculation. Once theorized to be ballplayers, it is now generally accepted that these heads are portraits of rulers. The basalt from which the heads were made came from over 50 miles away and were dragged or floated on great rafts with what must have been a huge amount of human labor .

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http://mexicanhistory.org/firstmex.htm

 

Wait a minute... rafting megaliths for 50 miles... using razors to shave the body (yes I read about that too)... headresses with cloths that go to the shoulders, coils or circles on the foreheads... pyramids... where have I seen this before?

220px-KneelingStatueOfSobekhotepV-AltesM

With so much determination that they could make the pyramids in Giza and their desire for the pharaoh's resurrection and their belief that the sun goes to the afterlife in the west, the Egyptians could have...

 

Nevermind...

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But...

Olmecs understood The Wheel?

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Some of the earliest figurines in North America are Olmec, like wooden busts sometimes found with infant remains.

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Olmecs also left Greenstone axes whose use stretched into the pre-Olmec period at some sites like a sacred spring:

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(Greenstone axe)

 

Pre-Olmecs had obsidian tools, and during the San Lorenzo phase, iron ore mirrors were used. To get an idea of what obsidian and iron mirrors were like, here is an Aztec obsidian mirror:

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  • 4 weeks later...
 

very interesting stuff. Surprised this thread doesn't have any responses. Do you have any follow up material?

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Here are a couple of more links that I thought might be of interest as well,it would seem that there is a lot of dubious material about this culture so I hope that these are of a better value for understanding.

https://www.scribd.com/document/255423349/Olmec-and-Nicoya-libre

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/archaeology-chocolate-180954243/

http://pages.ucsd.edu/~dkjordan/arch/mexchron.html

jmccr8

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The Olmecs have always made me wonder about if they were truly native to South America. The statues obviously have facial features that lean towards more African and some cases Asian. And then what happened to them? They seemed to be a thriving, mighty empire before they disappeared.

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42 minutes ago, JenTF said:

The Olmecs have always made me wonder about if they were truly native to South America. The statues obviously have facial features that lean towards more African and some cases Asian.

It is not "obvious" at all.  Only a few people think this, and a better theory is that they might appear African to some only by coincidence, due to the techniques they used and the stone they carved into.

To me, they look like any other Ameri-Indian depictions.

42 minutes ago, JenTF said:

And then what happened to them? They seemed to be a thriving, mighty empire before they disappeared.

They appear to have suffered from environmental problems, mainly volcanic problems.

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Yes I've been to that part of Mexico and strangely enough they look both Asian and have some features that  might be considered 'African'? DNA shows that they are indeed African - from tens of thousands x x of years before their ancestors walked from theire to Asia....then on to the Americas

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  • 2 weeks later...

This is a great thread, thanks for posting. The Olmecs and those who came before are a fascinating conundrum, as is the general population of North and South America.

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On 11/27/2016 at 11:13 PM, JenTF said:

The Olmecs have always made me wonder about if they were truly native to South America. The statues obviously have facial features that lean towards more African and some cases Asian. And then what happened to them? They seemed to be a thriving, mighty empire before they disappeared.

It's "African" only if you like cartoons.

 

They have the rounded skulls typical of Native Americans - Africans have elongated skulls.  And thick lips are common to all areas of the world.  The epicanthic fold is also a Native American trait.

 

In addition, the eye sockets of the skulls of people from the Americas are different than those from Africa.

 

And they didn't disappear.  They merged with later cultures.

Edited by Kenemet
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