19 Facts About Olmec

The Olmec civilization was first defined through artifacts which collectors purchased on the pre-Columbian art market in the late 19th century and early 20th centuries.

Olmec heartland is the area in the Gulf lowlands where it expanded after early development in Soconusco, Veracruz.

Beginnings of Olmec civilization have traditionally been placed between 1400 BCE and 1200 BCE.

Many of these luxury artifacts were made from materials such as jade, obsidian, and magnetite, which came from distant locations and suggest that early Olmec elites had access to an extensive trading network in Mesoamerica.

The Tres Zapotes site, on the western edge of the Olmec heartland, continued to be occupied well past 400 BCE, but without the hallmarks of the Olmec culture.

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Olmec culture was first defined as an art style, and this continues to be the hallmark of the culture.

The African origin hypothesis assumes that Olmec carving was intended to be a representation of the inhabitants, an assumption that is hard to justify given the full corpus of representation in Olmec carving.

The Egyptologist Frank J Yurco has said that the Olmec braids do not resemble contemporary Egyptian or Nubian braids.

The 'Olmec-style' refers to the combination of deep-set eyes, nostrils, and strong, slightly asymmetrical mouth.

Olmec arts are strongly tied to the Olmec religion, which prominently featured jaguars.

The Olmec people believed that in the distant past a race of werejaguars was made between the union of a jaguar and a woman.

In Guatemala, sites showing probable Olmec influence include San Bartolo, Takalik Abaj and La Democracia.

Argument that the Olmec instituted human sacrifice is significantly more speculative.

Olmec are strong candidates for originating the Mesoamerican ballgame so prevalent among later cultures of the region and used for recreational and religious purposes.

Nonetheless, Olmec society is thought to lack many of the institutions of later civilizations, such as a standing army or priestly caste.

The Olmec used obsidian in many tools because worked edges were very sharp and durable.

Olmec culture was unknown to historians until the mid-19th century.

Stirling, along with art historian Miguel Covarrubias, became convinced that the Olmec predated most other known Mesoamerican civilizations.

Name "Olmec" means "rubber people" in Nahuatl, the language of the Nahuas, and was the Aztec Empire term for the people who lived in the Gulf Lowlands in the 15th and 16th centuries, some 2000 years after the Olmec culture died out.