Archaeology & History

2,000-year-old Mayan civilization discovered in Guatemala

By T.K. Randall
December 26, 2022

Image: Amazon Rainforest in Tena, Ecuador
Credit: Jay / CC BY 2.0 (adapted) This vast new Mayan civilization, which dates back some 2,000 years, was found by a team of researchers from the US, Guatemala and France.

LiDAR, which is similar to radar but uses lasers as oppose to radio waves, has long proven an effective tool for locating evidence of lost civilizations because it can help identify signs of ancient buildings, roads and earthworks present underneath trees and undergrowth.

The new civilization discovered by the team was undeniably vast - spanning more than 1,000 interconnected settlements across an area of over 650 square miles.A network of 110 miles of raised roads (or causeways) linked these areas together.

Within the settlements the team found evidence of large platforms and pyramids which may have served as centralized hubs for work, politics and trade.

Intriguingly, the settlements were quite densely packed, thus contradicting some earlier theories suggesting that the peoples of this time lived in sparsely populated areas.

The researchers also found evidence of ball courts for recreation and canals for transporting water.

Source: Phys.org

Tags: Mayan, Guatemala