Hundreds of Ancient Maya Sites Hidden Under Mexico Reveal a Mysterious Blueprint

[Judi Lynn]

2. Archaeologists used lasers to find nearly 500 Mesoamerican monuments hidden in the Mexican jungle

Aylin Woodward Oct 28, 2021, 1:44 PM



A grass-covered pyramid named La Venta, in Tabasco, Mexico. The site dates back to the Olmec civilization. DeAgostini/Getty


Several millennia ago, the Olmec and Maya civilizations flourished in what are now Mexico and Guatemala. They built massive stone pyramids and elevated rectangular plazas for rituals and ceremonies, but over time many these sites were lost to the jungle, subsumed under dense vegetation.

But over the last few years, archaeologists have started leveraging a new technology to find these hidden, Mesoamerican ruins: LIDAR, a system that can generate three-dimensional maps by bouncing lasers between a scanner in the air and the Earth below.

LIDAR, which stands for light detection and ranging, can reveal how close or far away the ground is from the scanner, which in turn helps reveal discrepancies in the landscape.

In a study published Monday, researchers describe how they used this kind of laser mapping data to uncover nearly 500 Mesoamerican sites between about 2,000 and 3,000 years old.

More:
https://www.businessinsider.com/laser-mapping-technology-uncovers-lost-mesoamerican-ruins-mexico-2021-10