A new maya The city, lost for centuries in the dense jungle of southern Mexico, has been discovered from a doctoral student’s computer hundreds of kilometers away. This is the story of how he did it.
The settlement, called Valeriana after a nearby freshwater lagoon, has all the hallmarks of a classic Mayan political capital: enclosed plazas, pyramids, a ball court, a reservoir and an architectural design that suggests a founding before 150 AD, according to a recently published study in the diary Antique.
And how did Tulane University graduate student Luke Auld-Thomas find it? The answer is in lasers. Until recently, archeology was limited to what a researcher could observe from the ground and with his eyes. However, light detection and ranging technology, known as lidar, has revolutionized the field, allowing us to scan entire regions for archaeological sites hidden under dense vegetation or concrete.
Let’s travel in time. It is 1848 and the governor of Petén, Guatemala, Modesto Méndez, together with Ambrosio Tut, artist and chronicler of the time, rediscover Tikal, one of the most majestic archaeological sites of the century. mayan civilization. In the mid-19th century, little was known about this advanced culture, which calculated the lunar, solar and Venusian cycles, and invented hieroglyphic writing and the concept of the number zero with hardly any tools.
The dense rainforest surrounding Tikal and the lack of roads made reaching the remains extremely difficult. But anyway, the Guatemalan government entered the heart of the Petén jungle, in search of its cultural heritage. Guided by the rumors of the locals, machete in hand, tape measure and compass, they entered the Petén jungle on an almost impossible mission. Arriving at the site of Tikal, Méndez and his team were amazed by what they saw: gigantic temples and pyramids, mostly covered by jungle. The most imposing buildings, hidden by nature, rose above the treetops. Tikal, although partially buried, preserved its majesty and gave clues to the enormous size of the city.
History repeated itself in 2024, but with some important variations. Instead of a machete, Auld-Thomas armed himself with a search engine. WIRED spoke this week with him and Marcello Canuto, director of the Middle American Research Institute at Tulane, about the discovery.
