2. describe the social structure that developed in the olmec civilization and how they depended on each other.

3. list and describe the achievements of the olmec.

4. describe the colossal head that were built by the olmec and why they were built.

5. the maya did not unite to form a single united empire. independent city-states or kingdoms with common cultural ties developed instead. what cultural elements did these city-states share?

6. describe the branches of government of the maya that developed during the preclassic period and describe the duties of those who served in the government.

The social structure of Olmec consists of two groups: the main population, or common people we can say, and the elite. The common people used to work on the farms or with the watering or the irrigation systems in rural areas, providing food for the population which the elite lived apart of. The elite class consists of religious figures, rulers, and skilled craftsmen. In order to get the power and authority, It has been believed that rulers would usually correlate themselves with different gods, and the elite controlled by taking control over business and expensive imported materials.

They built numerous cities with the buildings and temples of stone, as well as the immense "heads" that are their renowned legacy. They have also developed a written system of pictographs even quicker than the civilization of  Mayan that followed them. The Mayans inherited religious beliefs, artistic skills, agricultural technology, some metallurgy, mathematics from the Olmec. They are usually considered as the first civilization that was ordered in the Americas and is considered to have even changed the Mayans and the Aztecs.

The representations of human heads sculpted from large basalt boulders in a form of stone are known as Olmec colossal heads. These were made because of their novel physical specialties, the difficulty and the cost required in their creation, represented the Olmec rulers. These were created and placed to admire the great ballplayers of the period or they were illustrations of Olmec rulers dressed in ballplayer clothes.

The rise of civilization was supported by the local ecology of well-watered soil, and by the network of transportation that was provided by the Coatzacoalcos River basin. This, in turn, triggered the rise of an elite class. The elite class generated the demand for the production of sophisticated luxury artifacts that define Olmec culture. They shared the language, the way the city-states were governed by the noble, used the same method of counting, admired the same gods and told the related myths, Same laws, and same style of clothes.

Each city of the Mayan had their own king. They developed a hierarchical government ruled by kings and priests or we can say that there was the hereditary system for ruling and the selection of the king in which the support of wealth, power and authority were the main tools used to rule and support the nobles. The nobles obeyed as officials and such in the administration of the king. The nobles were faithful and loyal to the king because he guaranteed their legitimacy. The Maya society was rigidly separated between nobles, commoners, serfs, and slaves in which the noble class was complex and specialized.