Oldest and largest ancient Maya structure found in Mexico

Washington, June 3

Scientists utilizing an aerial remote-sensing technique have found the biggest and oldest-known construction constructed by the traditional Maya civilisation – a colossal rectangular elevated platform constructed between 1,000 and 800 BC in Mexico’s Tabasco state.

The construction, not like the hovering Maya pyramids at cities like Tikal in Guatemala and Palenque in Mexico erected some 1,500 years later, was not constructed of stone however moderately of clay and earth, and certain was used for mass rituals, researchers stated on Wednesday.

Located at a web site known as Aguada Fenix close to the Guatemalan border, the construction measured almost 1 / 4 mile (400 metres) large and nine-tenths of a mile (1,400 metres) lengthy and stood 33 to 50 ft (10 to 15 metres) excessive. In whole quantity, it exceeded historical Egypt’s Great Pyramid of Giza constructed 1,500 years earlier.

There had been no indicators of sculptures depicting high-status people, suggesting Maya tradition at this early stage was extra communal and solely later developed social inequality and a hierarchical society led by royalty, the researchers stated.

“Because it is so large horizontally, if you walk on it, it just looks like natural landscape,” stated University of Arizona archaeologist Takeshi Inomata, who led the analysis revealed within the journal Nature. “But its form comes out nicely in lidar.”

Lidar, brief for Light Detection and Ranging, is a remote-sensing method that employs a pulsed laser and different knowledge obtained flying over a web site to generate three-dimensional details about the form of floor traits.

Nine massive causeways and a collection of reservoirs had been linked to the construction. Some components of the agricultural Aguada Fenix web site right now are coated with cattle ranches. Other components are wooded.

“It is probable that many people from surrounding areas gathered for special occasions, possibly tied to calendrical cycles,” Inomata stated. “The rituals probably involved processions along the causeways and within the rectangular plaza. The people also deposited symbolic objects such as jade axes in the centre of the plateau.” Reuters