Similarities Between Olmecs and Other

Meso-American Cultures

There were several Olmec traditions that were adopted by other Meso-American societies, including: the building of religious centers with temples and stepped pyramids; also borrowing the Olmec calendar and human sacrifice rituals.

The most obvious similarity between the Olmecs and most other Meso-American cultures are the impressive step pyramids, which were the main focus of most religious centers. In following more with the model of Mesopotamian ziggurats than their Egyptian counter-parts, the American step pyramids were crowned with temples, used for religious rituals.

The Olmec’s calendar was also borrowed by subsequent Meso-American cultures. The Maya, for example, borrowed the concept, but made their calendar much more complex. In fact, the Maya had two calendars: one based on the solar year, the other a shorter ritual year. They believed that what would happen on a given day was based on where it fell in the two calendars.

Yet another borrowing from the Olmecs was the concept of human sacrifice. In the Maya rituals, no one was killed, but instead the ruling elite drew blood from various parts of their anatomy. By the time the Aztecs got a hold of it in the 1500’s, though, sacrifice victims died a very gruesome death, with blood flowing like rivers down the sides of pyramids.

There were many other aspects of the Olmec culture that survived their downfall; their use of rubber, their traditional ball games, and their cultivation of maize to name a few. There still many mysteries about their culture however; things that they didn’t pass on to future peoples. Archaeologists have yet to uncover an Olmec system of writing, and the practice of carving giant stone heads seems to have died with its originators.