A new discovery has led archaeologists to believe that the Mayan civilization began construction of their storied buildings during the construction boom in Central America, which took place as early as 1000 B.C.
For many people, the only thing associated with the Mayan civilization is probably the Mayan calendar, which was the source of last year's much-hyped false apocalypse. However, scientists believe that there is much more to be uncovered about the civilization, and a new discovery helps shed more light on the origin and growth of this ancient subculture.
The discovery of new radiocarbon date samples from the ruined plazas and pyramids of Ceibal, located in Guatemala, provides evidence of an earlier spread in growth of ancient Maya city-building than scientists previously believed, said archaeologist Takeshi Inomata of the University of Arizona-Tucson. Inomata lead the team of archaeologists that made the discovery.
"Ceibal's ceremonial complex (is) the earliest in the Maya lowlands, predating other examples by roughly 200 years," Inomata said. "This also means there was a drastic social change at the time" as the Maya switched from largely hunter-gatherer lives to farming.
It is interesting to know that even in the current times, more than 6 million Maya people still exist in Central America. Ever since U.S. explorer John Lloyd Stephens, "the father of American archaeology", wrote articles about the lost cities and crumbling pyramid temples of the Mayan civilization, anything related to it has been an object of fascination for archaeologists.
"The exciting thing about this (study) is not about a 'cool' find as much as about supplying a realistic, practical, complicated, story on the origins of things Maya," says archaeologist Lisa Lucero of the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign, who was not part of the study team. "Human history is complicated and based on continual feedback from neighbors, foreign or no."
