[Aztlan] Michael Coe Seminar at the Smithsonian

[michael ruggeri]

Listeros,

I am posting this now since Michael Coe seminars usually sell out---if  
you are interested in buying a ticket now.

Mike Ruggeri


Saturday, March 14, 9:30 a.m.-4:15 p.m.
Smithsonian Institute Seminar
Michael Coe
"Mexico: From the Olmecs to the Aztecs"
Before their subjugation by the invading Spanish conquistadores, the  
indigenous peoples of Mexico were heirs to a 2,500- year-old tradition  
of complex life, with powerful states, cities, magnificent art,  
standing armies, developed religious and philosophical systems, and  
other hallmarks of "civilization." Because of Mexico's diverse  
geography, these early cultures evolved in distinct ways but were  
periodically unified by the rapid spread of what some scholars  
considered exchange networks and others called empires. Scholar  
Michael Coe examines four of these powerful civilizations—Olmec,  
Teotihuacan, Toltec, and Aztec—that extended over non-Maya Mesoamerica  
before the conquest.
9:30 to 10:45 a.m. The Olmec: Mesoamerica's Oldest Civilization
For about 1,100 years (1500 B.C. to 400 B.C.), the Olmec created one  
of the most brilliant but enigmatic cultures of the NewWorld, with  
cities like San Lorenzo and Venta, and art including colossal heads,  
pottery, jade, and gods.
11 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. Teotihuacan: City of the Gods
This vast pre-Columbian city complex dominated Mesoamerica for about  
600 years (until 600 A.D.) with its grid plan, broad avenues, palaces,  
and enormous pyramids; new fieldwork at the Pyramid of the Moon  
revealed captive sacrifice on a grand scale.
12:15 to 1:30 p.m. Lunch
Participants provide their own lunch.
1:30 to 2:45 p.m. Tula of the Toltecs
Revered as super-civilized forebears of the Aztecs, Toltecs had a  
warrior cult and two great gods, Quetzalcoatl and Tezcatlipoca, and a  
highland capital, Tula, "the Place of the Reeds."
3 to 4:15 p.m. The Aztecs: Empire of the Sun
Evolving from nomadic barbarians, the Aztecs came to dominate most of  
non-Maya Mesoamerica from their island capital, Tenochtitlan- 
Tlatelolco (now under Mexico City). Through their art, poetry, and  
religion, we see they were misrepresented by the Spaniards as  
practitioners of human sacrifice on a grand scale.
Coe is a professor emeritus of anthropology at Yale University and co- 
author of Mexico: From the Olmecs to the Aztecs (Thames and Hudson,  
sixth edition), which is available for signing.
S. Dillon Ripley Center
1100 Jefferson Drive, SW
Washington DC
Metro: Smithsonian Mall Exit (Blue/Orange)
http://residentassociates.org/ticketing/tickets/reserve.aspx?performanceNumber=216729



Mike Ruggeri's Ancient America Museum Exhibitions, Conferences and  
Lectures
http://community-2.webtv.net/Topiltzin-2091/AncientAmerica/