"New Mayan city discovered." Topic

So I'm a big Meso-American and South American wargamer. I have finished Aztec and Inca armies in 28mm and have a Mayan army about half way completed. Outpost makes a few Tarascans but I'd like more figures to make a Hail Caesar sized army. If someone made Mapuche in 28mm I'd buy those too.

Anyways, thanks to LIDAR a new city has been found in Northern Gautemala.

"Past archaeologists believed the central Maya lowlands in northern Guatemala consisted of small, disconnected city-states ruled by warring elites. More recently, archaeologists have theorized that the area was more interconnected and densely populated that originally assumed.

"Even though the latter view has been ascendant in recent years, the absence of regional data has left the debate unresolved," write the researchers in an article about their study published this week in Science. Now, they write that their research provides "robust support" for the view that the central lowlands had a complex structure and supported a large population."

link

This was discovered earlier this year but the link above has different imagery.

link

Got to get to work on those Maya……

And the theory about Maya being peace-loving seems to be dying… (good news for wargaming)

I had a very nice Naismith Design Aztec army.
I got a few samples of their Mayan figures. Not very many cavalry figures, though.
True 25mm.

Amazing, Bowman. Thanks for sharing.

Back in the day, all we had to look at were high altitude photos and early satellite images. I'm glad to see that LIDAR is now capable of doing so much more.

From the first link:

"… as well as 60 miles of causeways, roads and canals connecting large cities across the civilization's central lowlands"

"More recently, archaeologists have theorized that the area was more interconnected …"

This must also include their network of roads. There have always been way too many sacbe that seem to lead nowhere … Well, those white roads have to go somewhere, specially the ones that fanned out of big cities like Tikal in the jungles of el Petén.

They weren't typically very wide, and they weren't always as straight as once thought to be, but they still required a lot of work to build. They wouldn't have built them up above the uneven ground, and even paved them with crushed shells, if they didn't have a good reason for it.

This is really exciting.

Dan
PS. Here's a cross-section of a well-built sacbe:

I love these diagrams:
link

Wow Dan, awesome entry! A great link. Thanks.

And the theory about Maya being peace-loving seems to be dying……

Bill, that assessment is pushing almost 90 years now. That stems from J Eric Thompson and his 1931 tome, "The History of the Maya". He thought they were "peaceful philosopher kings" and his eminence in the field caused this to be the main viewpoint for quite a while. But he was wrong.

He also thought that all the Mayan writing concerned itself with esoteric and philosophical preoccupations. This was also to be proven wrong. Full scale excavations at many sites slowly unravelled the warlike nature of the Maya a few decades later. Also in the 60's, the decoding of the Mayan script by Proskouriakoff showed that he was totally mistaken about the content of the writing.

That's what happens when he (together with Sylvanus Morley) are the trailblazers in a new field. The first in any field are often wrong.

Linus Pauling always thought that proteins were to be the chemical basis of inheritance. Multicellular lifeforms are very complex and therefore the chemical means for creating new life had to be complex too. Proteins would contain this complexity. He couldn't believe that a double helix chain of 4 simple nucleotides could carry all the information to build a complex organism. He too was wrong. That's how science goes.

He also thought that all the Mayan writing concerned itself with esoteric and philosophical preoccupations.

This is a common historical misconception. There are many examples of "modern" resear4chers who interpret "ancient" culture behaviours as nature worshipers, putting those behaviours in a broad mystical and philosophical context.

Detailed observations, recordings, and discussions of celestial, seasonal, and meteorological phenomena could be about mystic and religious wonder. Coming from an agrarian area, I will tell you they are practical things that help people ensure they can eat tomorrow.

Yes, the gentle children of the jungle myth doesn't seem to want to go away. Very stubborn. Lots of modern "flower children" long for that past, though it never existed.

We humans are what we have always been, except that the feathers and the jade inlaid teeth have given way to other equally vain things. :)

Dan

This is a common historical misconception.

In the case of the Maya, I don't think this is correct.

Once the Mayan glyphs began to get decoded, the researchers were disappointed to find most of the writing dealt with dates, Kings, their kingly duties and dedications, and the histories of the Royal lineages. The writing certainly did not live up to Thompson's expectations.

"Indeed, it may be that scribes were not regarded as authors but, rather, as recorders of the declarations of the gods and divine rulers. This is also indicated by the very formulaic nature of Maya writing where formalised phrases are often repeated and the fact that the most common subjects of Maya texts are histories of both the real world and mythology, texts which declare ownership of particular objects, and texts dedicating buildings and monuments to specific gods."

link

Reading the works of the preeminent Mayan epigrapher, Linda Schele, such as A Forest of Kings and The Code of Kings puts this into better perspective.

From a review:

"No longer were we in the serene world of priestly astronomers but of the would be big beasts of the political jungle asserting their greatness, heritage and deeds on steles."

What's wrong with my jade inlaid teeth? I'm more concerned about where I'm sticking those porcupine quills!

So the sting ray spines in the penis are OK?

That'll wake up everyone. Those who do it, and all the ones who hear the screams.

Dan