Lost metropolis in Mexico jungle found due to Google search that others missed

Archaeologists searching for remnants of the ancient Maya stumbled upon a remarkable discovery by simply typing a few words into Google.

Researchers followed a digital trail that led them to extensive, long-hidden structures within the dense Mesoamerican jungle. What they found was astounding – 6,764 buildings of various sizes spread across multiple ancient sites which have now offered new insights into the Maya civilisation’s sophisticated urban landscapes.

The boffins think it is second in density only to Calakmul, which is believed to be the largest Maya site in ancient Latin America. They found three sites – including pyramids, sports fields, causeways connecting districts and amphitheatres in the southeastern state of Campeche – which accumulate to be the size of Scotland’s capital Edinburgh.

“I was on something like page 16 of Google search and found a laser survey done by a Mexican organisation for environmental monitoring,” explained Luke Auld-Thomas, a PhD student at Tulane university in the US. It seems as though those researchers had not spotted the huge civilisation underneath the dense jungle, as per BBC.

The findings challenge earlier theories that the Maya people lived in scattered and isolated villages. Instead, these newly-uncovered buildings reveal densely-populated cities or towns with a complexity comparable to modern urban centres. “The point is that the landscape is definitely settled – that is, settled in the past – and not, as it appears to the naked eye, uninhabited or ‘wild’,” revealed Professor Elizabeth Graham from University College London, who was not involved in the research

The research, recently published in the journal Antiquity, shows how advanced Lidar (Light Detection and Ranging) technology has revolutionised archaeological exploration in tropical regions. Dr. Francisco Estrada-Belli and Professor Marcello Canuto, who led the project, credit Lidar for its ability to detect structures beneath dense forest canopies. By bouncing laser pulses off the forest floor, Lidar generates high-resolution maps that reveal hidden features, bypassing the limitations of traditional field surveys.

“In the early years of my career, we did surveys by foot, inching our way across the ground with hand-held instruments,” said Prof. Canuto. But in the decade since Lidar was introduced in Mesoamerica, it has mapped an area 10 times larger than what archaeologists previously achieved in nearly a century. “Lidar opens up a world of lost civilizations that were once impossible to survey due to dense vegetation,” Canuto added.

The civilisation has two plazas with temple pyramids, where Maya people would have worshipped, hidden treasures like jade masks and buried their dead. Further, it had a court where people would have played an ancient ball game.

The sheer number of uncovered sites now presents a new dilemma for archaeologists. “One of the downsides of discovering lots of new Maya cities in the era of Lidar is that there are more of them than we can ever hope to study,” said Auld-Thomas, another key researcher on the project. “I’ve got to go to Valeriana at some point. It’s so close to the road, how could you not? But I can’t say we will do a project there,” he added, noting the challenge of prioritising which sites to excavate first after the overwhelming number of discoveries.

The scope and density of the settlements also shed light on why Maya civilisation struggled to withstand environmental changes. Between 800 and 1000 AD the Maya experienced a dramatic collapse, in part due to severe droughts. The findings suggest overpopulation may have played a significant role in their society’s decline. “It’s suggesting that the landscape was just completely full of people at the onset of drought conditions, and it didn’t have a lot of flexibility left,” said Auld-Thomas. “So maybe the entire system basically unravelled as people moved farther away.”

The collapse of Maya city-states was also exacerbated by warfare and eventually by Spanish conquests in the 16th Century, which contributed to the eradication of these ancient communities.

Auld-Thomas concluded that many of these ancient cities may never be fully excavated. There are no known pictures of the lost city because no one has ever been there.

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