‘Game changer’: Calgary archaeologist says technology has lifted veil on ancient Mayan city

‘Game changer’: Calgary archaeologist says technology has lifted veil on ancient Mayan city

Bill Graveland

Canadian media

CALGARY — The use of light technology has allowed archaeologists to peel back the rainforest to reveal the remains of an ancient Mayan city nearly twice the size of Vancouver.

LIDAR, which stands for Light Detection and Ranging, is a remote sensing method that uses light in the form of a pulsed laser. The pulses of light are combined with other data recorded by the airborne system to generate precise three-dimensional information about the shape of the Earth and the features of its surface.

“This is just a game-changer,” Kathryn Rees-Taylor, a professor in the Department of Anthropology and Archaeology at the University of Calgary, told The Canadian Press.

“You can try to survey and map in rainforests that you would take years to do, and lidar can fly over these large areas in a matter of days.”

Reese-Taylor has worked for many years with the National Institute of Human History (INAH) in Campeche, Mexico, on the Bajo Laberinto Archaeology Project, a multidisciplinary research project led by the University of Calgary.

She and a colleague first visited the ancient Calakmul settlement more than a decade ago.

“We hiked 13 kilometers to get there, looked around, marveled and marveled at all the massive unexcavated and unlooted ruins on the site, and walked back,” Rees-Taylor said.

“It was an incredible experience to climb these structures on the ground and observe the surrounding landscape.

Some of these structures you might be the first person to walk on in over a thousand years, so it’s really exciting. “

The Calakmul site, she said, was the new capital of the powerful Kanur (snake) dynasty, which dominated the geopolitics of the Mayan lowlands and controlled a vast network of vassal kingdoms.

Reese-Taylor said the results of the lidar scans could provide a better understanding of urban settlements and landscape changes in the capital itself.

“Others may just think it’s a big mountain, and we know that underneath it is a huge temple, for example, or a palace. So we can see all of that.

“Apartment housing complexes have been identified throughout the survey area, some with as many as 60 individual structures. These large residential units are clustered around numerous temples, shrines, and possibly a market place, making Calakmul the first place in the Americas in AD 700. One of the biggest cities.”

Reese-Taylor said the researchers were able to see the extent of landscape modification equal to the size of the city’s population. All available land is covered by canals, terraces, walls and dams.

“It strips away all the vegetation and we can see exactly what we’re looking for. Every time we get lidar, it’s like opening one of your favorite Christmas presents, you just don’t know what to expect.

“When you take a closer look at it and see what’s actually out there, it’s an incredible gift.”

Reese-Taylor said she will travel to the site in April once her course at the University of Calgary is over, and intends to spend two months there before the annual rainy season begins.

So far, the site covers 195 square kilometers and is very large, she said.

“It’s currently one of the largest cities in the Americas,” she said. “Almost two Vancouverites have access to the area.

Washington, D.C. is about the size of Amsterdam and Brussels. “

While the presence of temples and palaces is tempting, the initial excavations would have been more mundane, Reese-Taylor said.

“I would really like to dig in the new temple. But I think right now we have to focus on families because we have some information about the history of the temple and the civic structure of the city center, but we don’t have data on the people who actually lived there.”

The Canadian Press report was first published in October. February 29, 2022.

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