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32 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
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Aztecs |
a people who lived in the Valley of Mexico |
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Tenochtitlan |
capital city of the Aztecs |
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Mayas |
a people who established a great civilization in Middle America |
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Slash and Burn Agriculture |
a farming technique in which trees are cut down and burned to clear and fertilize the land |
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maize |
corn |
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hieroglyphics |
the signs and symbols that made up the Mayan writing system |
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Olmec |
civilization that was the first culture in the Americas to build cities with large religious centers |
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Tikal |
a thriving Mayan city located in Guatemala |
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Pok-ta-tok |
a special ball game outdoors where players tried to knock a ball through a stone hoop set on a wall |
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chinampas |
island gardens in the shallow lakes around the capital |
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Quetzalcoatl |
the god of priests |
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Aztec calendar |
a schedule of religious festivals and farming cycles |
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Aztec class structure |
First the emperor, second came members of the royal family, nobles, priests, and military leaders, third came the soldiers, fourth came artisans - skilled creators of jewelry, pottery, sculpture, and other goods - and merchants, fifth came the farmers, and sixth was slaves |
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Moctezuma |
the Aztec emperor |
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Tlaloc |
the god of earth and rain |
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Huitzilopochtli |
the god of sun and sky |
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chacmool |
a figure to hold offerings to the god |
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Great Temple |
a temple that honored two Aztec gods |
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Coyolxauhqui |
a stone carving of Huitzilopochtli's sister |
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causeways |
raised streets of hard earth |
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Andes |
a mountain chain of western South America |
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Cuzco |
the capital city of the Incan Empire, located in present-day Peru |
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census |
an official count of people in a certain place at a certain time |
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quipu |
a group of knotted strings used by the Incas to record information |
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terraces |
steplike ledges cut into mountains to make land suitable for farming |
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Festival of the Sun |
thousands of people that gather at the ruins of an Incan fortress in Cuzco for the yearly Festival of the Sun, which celebrates the winter solstice |
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Sapa Inca |
the Incan ruler or ''the emperor'' |
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Quechua |
the official spoken language of the empire |
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gorge |
narrow pass between steep cliffs or walls |
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aqueduct |
stone-lined channels |
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conquistador |
conqueror |
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Francisco Pizarro |
a Spanish conqueror in the 1530s that conquered the Incan Empire |
