NO. 1 CULTURAL DEVELOPMENT IN LATIN AMERICA 39 
region. We think it probable that the famous Toltec capital of Tula was 
already flourishing in central Mexico when the Puuc sites were yet 
occupied. 
This brings us to the greatest unsolved problem of all, that is, the 
cause or causes of the Classic downfall, not only in the Maya area, 
but in all of southeastern Mesoamerica. While many theories, most of 
them controversial, have been propounded, as yet no final answer can 
be given. But it is interesting that the pollen profiles from the Valley 
of Mexico, as analyzed by Sears (1953), show severe desiccation of 
that zone increasing in an almost logarithmic curve throughout the 
Classic, and it might be that lowered rainfall toward the close of the 
Classic Period resulted in the economic, and therefore the cultural 
and social, collapse of southeastern Mesoamerica as well ; we must 
await pollen diagrams for the Maya area to see whether or not this 
happened. Furthermore, the Oaxaca highlands are even now quite dry, 
and the same climatic events may have finished off Classic Monte 
Alban civilization at the same time. 
Whatever its underlying factors, the failure of Classic civilization 
around the end of the ninth century was a fact, and from that disaster 
through the Spanish Conquest, both the Maya highlands and lowlands 
were peripheral to, and to a certain extent under the control of, 
events which were taking place outside that area. The most impor- 
tant of these events was the destruction of Tula through a combina- 
tion of internal conflicts and the pressure of outer barbarians. The 
diaspora of Nahua-speaking groups from central Mexico both before 
and after this happening (we are accepting the interpretation that the 
Quetzalcoatl faction left Tula some time before its final destruction; 
Jimenez Moreno, 1954-1955, p. 224) once again brought powerful 
Mexican influence into our area. Elite warrior groups, all claiming 
descent from the lords of Tula, conquered the ''Maya" highlands 
and Pacific coast ; more surely Toltec armies forcibly wrested Yuca- 
tan from the lowland Maya and established hegemony over them, rul- 
ing from Chichen Itza. 
The Early Post-Classic, lasting roughly until a.d. 1200, thus intro- 
duced Toltec styles in art and architecture to the Maya area, in par- 
ticular such features as colonnaded halls, warrior columns, and the 
reclining stone figures called Chac Mools. New pottery types include 
the fine-glazed ware called Tohil Plumbate, probably produced to 
Toltec specifications on the Suchiate River which divides Chiapas 
from Guatemala. The first metals also appear at this time, mostly in 
the form of copper bells and gold plaques, the latter decorated in 
repousse with scenes of Maya-Toltec battles (Lothrop, 1952). Once 
