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"Olmec-style" face mask in jade. The Olmec civilization developed in the lowlands of southeastern Mexico between 1500 and 400 BC. [3] The Olmec heartland lies on the Gulf Coast of Mexico within the states of Veracruz and Tabasco, an area measuring approximately 275 kilometres (171 mi) east to west and extending about 100 kilometres (62 mi) inland from the coast. [4]
San Lorenzo Tenochtitlán is best known today for the colossal stone heads unearthed there, the greatest of which weigh 28 metric tons (28 long tons; 31 short tons) or more and are 3 metres (9.8 ft) high. [1] The site isn’t to be confused with Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital located within Mexico City. Administrative names were translated ...
These heads were in a slightly irregular row, facing north. The other colossal head—Monument 1 (shown at left) – is a few dozen meters south of the Great Pyramid. The La Venta heads are thought to have been carved by 700 BCE, but possibly as early as 850 BCE, while the San Lorenzo heads are credited to an earlier period.
Some of the heads, and many other monuments, have been variously mutilated, buried and disinterred, reset in new locations and/or reburied. Some monuments, and at least two heads, were recycled or recarved, but it is not known whether this was simply due to the scarcity of stone or whether these actions had ritual or other connotations.
Olmec heads, Mexico, gulf coast. Largest Olmec head, almost 50 tons. Transported 37 to 62 miles (100 km). [49] Ħaġar Qim, one of the Megalithic Temples of Malta. Its largest stone weighs 57 tons and measures approximately 19 feet (5.8 m) long by 9 feet (2.7 m) tall by 2 feet (0.61 m) thick. [61]
Leo Wiener argued that Arabized "Black" West Africans influenced the cultures of Mexico which alongside the discovery of the Olmec heads resulted in more speculation, [11] in particular, the symbols on the Tuxtla Statuette, Teo Mask, [citation needed] and the celts (tools) in Offering 4 at La Venta.
The first archaeological investigations of Olmec culture were carried out by Matthew Stirling at Tres Zapotes in 1938, owing to the discovery there of a colossal head in the 19th century. Seventeen confirmed examples of stone heads are known, all from within the Olmec heartland on the Gulf Coast of Mexico, in the states of Veracruz and Tabasco.
The culture reached its height about 2600 years ago, with its best-known artistic expression being the colossal stone heads. [5] These ceremonial sites were the most complex of that early time period. For this reason, many anthropologists consider the Olmec civilization to be the mother culture of the many Mesoamerican cultures that followed it.