"xalap" - 1 õppematerjal

Home reading - Veracruz

Long before Cortes these tropical lowlands wwewe the domain of the Olmec,Mesoamerica's oldest civikization, which rose to prominence 3,000 years ago, developing religious ideas, mathematical concepts and a calendar system that would be adopted later by the Maya and Aztec. Master carvers, the Olmec disappeared mysteriously around 400 b.c.,leaving behind gigantic asalt heads believed to represent their rulers.Most are n display in Mxico's museums, including the Museum o Anthropology in Xalap (right), the capital of Veracruz state. Many of the Olmec sities were locates atop vast salt domes, witch, to modern feologists, means the presence of oil.Today that oil fuels a billon-dollar industry, second only to manufacturing.Mexico is the leading oil producer in Latin Ametica, with the world's eighth largest reserves.Yet even the gargantuan oil industry has been vulnerable during the country's economic crisis.To raise cash to service the national debt, Mexico's stateowned petroleum