The Maya civilization was a Mesoamerican civilization that developed in southeastern Mexico, Guatemala, and the western portions of Honduras and El Salvador. People continue to question the Maya civilization's mysterious collapse between the 8th and 9th centuries. This 2012 article from Smithsonian Magazine discusses new evidence about what may have contributed to the civilization's downfall. As you read, take notes on the possible causes of the Maya civilization's collapse. It's long been one of ancient history's most intriguing mysteries: Why did the Maya, a remarkably sophisticated civilization made up of more than 19 million people, suddenly collapse sometime during the 8th or 9th centuries? Although the Mayan people never entirely disappeared – their descendants still live across Central America – dozens of core urban areas in the lowlands of the Yucatan peninsula, such as Tikal went from bustling cities to abandoned ruins over roughly a hundred years. countless theories accounting for the collapse, ranging Scholars and laypeople have proposed from the plausible (overhunting, foreign invasion, peasant revolt) to the absurd (alien invasion, supernatural forces). In his 2005 book Collapse, though, Jared Diamond put forth a different sort of theory – that a prolonged drought, exacerbated by ill-advised deforestation, forced Mayan populations to abandon their cities. That hypothesis has finally been put to the test with archaeological evidence and environmental data and the results were published this week in a pair of studies. In the first study, published Tuesday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers from Arizona State University analyzed archaeological data from across the Yucatan to reach a better understanding of the environmental conditions when the area was abandoned. Around this time, they found, severe reductions in rainfall were coupled with a rapid rate of deforestation, as the Mayans burned and chopped down more and more forest to clear land for agriculture. Interestingly, they also required massive amounts of wood to fuel the fires that cooked the lime plaster for their elaborate constructions – experts estimate it would have taken 20 trees to produce a single square meter of the cityscape. The other study, published by researchers from Columbia University and elsewhere this week in Geophysical Research Letters, applied quantitative data to these trends. Using population records and measurements from current forested and cleared lands in the region, they constructed a computer model of deforestation in the Yucatan and ran simulations to see how this would have affected rainfall. Because cleared land absorbs less solar radiation, less water evaporates from its surface, making [5) clouds and rainfall more scarce. As a result, the rapid deforestation exacerbated an already severe drought – in the simulation, deforestation reduced precipitation by five to 15 percent and was responsible for 60 percent of the total drying that occurred over a century as the Mayan civilization collapsed. The lack of forest cover also contributed to erosion and soil depletion. In a time of unprecedented population density, this combination of factors was likely catastrophic. Crops failed, especially because the droughts occurred disproportionately during the summer growing season. Coincidentally, trade shifted from overland routes, which crossed the heart of the lowland,4 those-based voyages, moving around the perimeter of the peninsula. Since the traditional elite relied largely upon this trade — along with annual crop surpluses — to build wealth, they were sapped of much of their power. This forced peasants and craftsmen into making a critical choice, perhaps necessary to escape starvation: abandoning the lowlands. The results are the ornate5 ruins that stretch across the peninsula today. The collapse is especially intriguing because it seemingly occurred at “a time in which developed a a sophisticated understanding of their environment, built and sustained intensive production and water systems and withstood at least two long-term episodes of aridity, says B.L. Turner, the lead author of the ASU study. In other words, the Maya were no fools. They knew their environment and how to survive within it — and still, they continued deforesting at a rapid pace until the local environment was unable to sustain their society. One of the lessons of these complementary studies, says climate modeler Robert Oglesby of the The University of Nebraska, who worked on the second paper, is that our reshaping of the environment can often have unintended consequences — and we may not have any idea of what they are until it’s too late.    1. What did you learn? 2. What do you think about what you learned? 3. What questions do you have? 4. Make connections to the present day.  5. What historical research could be done concerning the topic.