Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[oJShine]

Nobody is quite sure what exactly happened to the Mayan civilization.
We know that in 900 AD their cities were still prosperous, but a hundred years late they had been abandoned.
A number of theories have been put forward to explain this.
One theory is that the Mayan ruling class died out because rulers did not work and so became unhealthy,
and there was nobody to tell the farmers what to do.
Another idea is that farmers were unable to grow enough food to support large populations in cities.
Other people believe that a natural disaster,
suck as an earthquake, occurred, the cities were destroyed, and the people never moved back.
Or perhaps another Mexican people conquered the Mayas,
and destroyed their cities. Another theory is that there was a revolution, in which the farmers killed their rulers.
Some experts believe that an epidemic of some kind caused the disappearance of the Mayas.
Others think that the Mayan cities suffered from an environmental disaster,
caused by drought or overproduction.
Finally, some people believe that the people abandoned their cities because their priests told them to do it.