Mexico: Oldest and largest Maya structure discovered near Guatemalan border

In the latest breakthrough discovery of lost civilization, researchers have found the largest and the oldest Mayan cite through a unique laser technology called lidar. Using the aerial remote-sensing method, researchers at the University of Arizona found a colossal rectangular elevated platform that was built between 1000 and 800BC in Tabasco state, Mexico. The new structure is located at the site called Aguada Fenix that liest near the border of Guatemala, which in its total volume exceeds the 1,500-year-old Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt. 

What makes this discovery more groundbreaking is that the structure is unlike the already discovered pyramids discovered from the Maya civilization in cities like Tikal and Palenque in Guatemala and Palenque respectively. According to the study published in journal Nature, oldest Mayan structure is not built with stone but instead, the people used clay and earth for its construction. It was used to carry out mass rituals and was before the civilisation developed social inequality and hierarchy. 

“This was a big construction before the social hierarchy,” the lead researcher said. “The really interesting implication is what this site tells us about the potential of human collaboration, which can do really amazing things without the presence of a centralized government.”

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Lidar technology

He also lauded the lidar technology used for the study. Lidar is a short form of Light Detection and Ranging which is a remote-sensing technique that cam employ a pulsed laser along with other data just by flying over the site. It can then further generate a piece of three-dimensional detailed information about the structure. 

The researchers derived that the structure was built at the early age of the civilisation as it was more communal and did not find any signs of sculptures that depict individuals of higher status. Takeshi Inomata, the lead authority of the study and archaeologist at the University of Arizona called the largest Mayan site as a “natural landscape” because of its size.

“Because it is so large horizontally, if you walk on it, it just looks like natural landscape,” said Takeshi Inomata. “But its form comes out nicely in lidar.”

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