us history 10

The Olmecs - 1st to develop civilization around 1350BC

The Maya - great at engineering and mathematics - disappeared around 900AD

Toltec and Aztec -Aztec conquered the Toltec around 1150AD and created the first large empire. Practiced human sacrifice.

Technology spread out of Mesoamerica, up the Mississippi River and into the American South West

Many different peoples and cultures developed as early as 700AD

Most lived in cities or villages but some were nomads

Lived between the Mississippi and Great Lakes

Used a farming method called 'slash-and-burn' agriculture, where parts of forests are burned, then cleared for planting.

Most spoke Algonquian or Iroquois

The Iroquois often fought among themselves until the 1500s when they formed an alliance called the Iroquois Confederacy - which was an oral constitudtion that defined the law.