This folder contains images and descriptive text from the NOAA Paleoclimatology Educational Slide Sets.
  
The images are presented in .jpg or .gif format, and also as .tiff scanner files of the original 35mm slides.
The .tiff format files have been compressed using pkzip, and the resulting compressed files are also 
available here, and have the file name extension .zip.  The accompanying text files describe each image, 
and collectively provide a description of some of the major proxy data types utilized in paleoclimatology, 
how the data are collected and analyzed, and summarize paleoclimate information which can be deduced 
from these proxy data.   


Climate and the Classic Maya Civilization

Scientific Authorship:
Dave Hodell & Lisa M. Lixey

For over a decade, archaeologists have been trying to unlock the mystery surrounding one ancient society's 
collapse of the Classic Maya. Did human-induced sociopolitical or ecological change cause the collapse 
of this highly advanced Mesoamerican civilization, or could natural climate variability of the Yucatan 
Peninsula have contributed to the collapse? Paleoclimatologists are studying the climatic history 
of this region to provide archaeologists with the climate context in which the Maya civilization evolved, 
flourished and ultimately collapsed.