 By the Middle Preclassic Period (900–300 BC), Olmec artistic styles had been adopted as far away as the Valley of Mexico and Costa Rica.Maya cultural characteristics, such as the rise of the "ahau", or king, can be traced from 300 BC onward.During the centuries preceding the classical period, Maya kingdoms sprang up in an area stretching from the Pacific coasts of southern Mexico and Guatemala to the northern Yucatán Peninsula.