Mexican Zapotec rugs, blankets, weavings
Monte Albán demise - page 4 of 5

The South Platform, constructed during this same period, contained carved slabs of stone with inscribed or sculptured surfaces on its northern corners. The Plain Stela and the Lapida de Bazan depict significant Teotihuacan elements. Strong political and cultural ties with Teotihuacan are reflected in the Monte Albán murals and the new vertical panel architecture. Similarly, an Oaxaca residential sector appears at Teotihuacan, with Zapotec style pottery, urns, and a tomb. A Monte Albán mural on Tomb 105 shows the Teotihuacan influence of profiled speech scroll figures, one wearing the goggles of the rain god.

The Zapotecs were animistic, believing in a pantheon of gods that included a supreme being and Cocijo, the water god. Cocijo’s image is often depicted on urns. During this era there also appeared two other deities, the Wide billed Bird and a crocodile creature with an up curled snout.

The demise of Monte Albán began by 600 A.D., the result of a scarcity of basic resources after the tribute system collapsed; possibly there was also a loss of ecological equilibrium. As the overextended Zapotec empire receded back to the Oaxaca Valley, by 700 A.D., Monte Albán was largely abandoned and fell into ruins. There is no archaeological evidence of warfare or wanton destruction. The Zapotecs had retreated in city-states, from where they fought each other and outside invaders such as the Mixtecs, who had been migrating into the Oaxaca Valley from the mountains of the northwestern Oaxaca state.

Monte Albán was the focal point of the Zapotec empire, which expanded outward from the city over the course of seven hundred years. The metropolis was a center of religious and political power. Its inhabitants developed a class society that confronted its neighbors with warfare and diplomacy to maintain a system of trade and tribute. The Mixtecs would later adopt many of their cultural traditions and architecture.

Mitla, located near Monte Albán, was a Postclassic Zapotec religious center that flourished between 750 - 1521 A.D. It was the place where many of the great Zapotec priests and kings were buried, and where a famous oracular priest, or Great Seer, held office and arbitrated regional political disputes among the nobility. One of the oracle's primary responsibilities was to communicate with the mummified ancestors who were buried in the tombs at Mitla.

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Mexican Zapotec history - Mitla - page 5

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