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At the recent Society for American Archaeology meeting in Sacramento, California, archaeologist Michael Callaghan from the University of Texas presented his team's findings from the ancient site of K'o (now modern-day Guatemala) and what they believe to be the oldest known royal Mayan tomb. Excavating under a wealthy home, they discovered a lid leading to a tunnel of about 16 inches wide. Following the tunnel, they discovered a chultan, or storage chamber, where a burial was performed. Within this storage chamber they discovered a body they believe to have been a man in his fifties who was reasonably healthy when...

March 14, 2002 Archaeologists Find Mayan 'Masterpiece' in Guatemala By JOHN NOBLE WILFORD rchaeologists exploring deep in the rain forest of Guatemala have uncovered what they think is the earliest intact wall painting of the Maya civilization. A depiction of scenes from mythology and ritual, the 1,900-year-old mural is being hailed by experts as a masterpiece. Even though only part of the mural has been exposed so far, scholars said the scenes and portraits promised rare insights into the society and religion of the Maya. The paintings, dated about A.D. 100, are described as more extensive and better preserved than...

Now overgrown by jungle, the ancient site was once the thriving capital of the Maya civilization Had we been traveling overland, it would have taken two or three days to get from the end of the road at Carmelita to El Mirador: long hours of punishing heat and drenching rain, of mud and mosquitoes, and the possibility that the jungle novice in our party (that would be me, not the biologists turned photographers Christian Ziegler and Claudio Contreras) might step on a lethal fer-de-lance or do some witless city thing to provoke a jaguar or arouse the ire of the...

CIUDAD ARCE, El Salvador - El Salvador's Maya Indians on Sunday invoked the forces of nature in an ancient ritual to help US President Barack Obama - set to visit the Central American nation - make wise decisions. The ceremony for Obama was part of an annual equinox ritual held by members of the country's Maya community. "We beg the volcanoes, the mountains, and the grandmothers and grandfathers, to call on the energy of the sun to surround ... Obama as he makes decisions," an indigenous shaman named "Tata" Neto said. Five Maya priests, including Neto - also known as...

Both sculptural fragments were recovered in 1993 by archaeologist Arnoldo Gonzalez, from the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) and were recently incorporated to the Northern Tableau at the Archaeological Site of Palenque, in the Mexican state of Chiapas. Epigraphist Guillermo Bernal Romero has interpreted the secondary text of the tableau, integrated by the pair of fragments salvaged. In a preliminary expression of the glyphs ordered in columns, the date that corresponds to September 9th 687 is mentioned, when Palenque forces broke into the city of Po' (Tonina) "by the work" of its ruler K'inich Kan B'ahlam, firstborn child...

Centuries before the first speakers and subwoofers, ancient Americans -- intentionally or not -- may have been turning buildings into giant sound amplifiers and distorters to enthrall or disorient audiences, archaeologists say. Temples at the ancient Maya city of Palenque (map) in central Mexico, for example, might have formed a kind of "unplugged" public-address system, projecting sound across great distances, according to a team led by archaeologist Francisca Zalaquett of the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. Zalaquett's team recently discovered that Palenque's Northern Group of public squares and temples -- built around roughly A.D. 600 -- is especially good at...

2012, Just Another Year It’s like Y2K all over again. People are making a fortune writing and talking about 2012. The movie 2012 was entertaining, if not largely implausible. Really, are you going to escape an exploding supervolcano? Or you can breeze through Apocalypse 2012 which is an entertaining book that looks into all of the cataclysms we are overdue for and those who peddle end time theories. In any case, this whole “the world is going to end in 2012” started with the Mayan calendar. The ancient Mayan calendar resets itself at the end of 2012. Technically it is...

Using new techniques and extensive excavations, researchers have found that the Maya coped with tough environmental conditions by developing ingenious methods to grow crops in wetland areas. "The work shows that this intensive agriculture is more complicated and on a par with these other areas of intellectual development," says Timothy Beach, a physical geographer at Georgetown University in Washington DC, who presented his findings on Wednesday at the Geological Society of America (GSA) meeting in Denver, Colorado. The Maya civilization, considered one of the most advanced ancient societies, lived in sprawling and densely populated pockets from the Yucatán Peninsula in...

For two weeks we had been tunnelling beneath the surface of the acropolis hill at the ancient Maya city of Waká in Guatemala's Petén rainforest. It was the spring of 2006, and we knew that under the surface of the acropolis was a virtual layer cake of earlier structures. The acropolis had been one of the city's enduring spiritual centers before it was abandoned around A.D. 820. A large pyramid and several buildings still stand there today.We were at the bottom of a shaft we had dug the previous spring, working our way up the stairs of a buried building...

Tonina Lords Mentioned in Inscriptions: Nicknamed "Reptile Head", he ruled near 514 AD: Apparently the name of a bird (Kohkaj?) is combined.K'inich? Sawan B'ahlam Yaxuun Tihl, nicknamed "Sotz' Choj", ruled near 568 AD.Chak B'alu'n Chaahk, died near 589 AD.K'inich B'ahlam Chapaht, ruled since 615 AD and was contemporary of K'inich Janaahb' Pakal, the famous Palenque lord.Yuhkno'm? Wahywal? , defeated and probably sacrificed by Palenque in 687 AD.K'inich B'aaknal Chaak, the most powerful lord of Tonina, was enthroned in 688 AD. He defeated Palenque and its allies in at least 3 military campaigns.K'inich Chuwaaj? K'ahk' used the title of "Young Prince"...

A well-preserved tomb believed to be the final resting place of an ancient Mayan king has been discovered in Guatemala, scientists announced last week. The 1,600-year-old tomb was discovered on May 29 beneath the El Diablo pyramid in the city of El Zotz. It is packed with of carvings, ceramics, textiles, and the bones of six children, who might have been sacrificed at the time of the king's death. However, much more work is needed before the scientists can piece together all the clues about the tomb's owner. "We still have a great deal of work to do," said Stephen...

Is that a caricature of President Obama featured in the apocalyptic Mayan calender ?

A wall with a rich glyphic text that includes the complete name of the ruler that founded one of the most important Maya military seigniories was discovered in Tonina Archaeological Zone, in Chiapas. Epigraphists point out that the finding will bring in new information regarding Maya grammar, since it shows linguistic features yet to be deciphered. The discovery adds up to the sarcophagus recently uncovered by specialists of the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH). The wall dated in 708 AD was detected at El Palacio; a stucco portrait of K'inich B'aaknal Chaahk, the most powerful seignior of the...

A 1000-year-old stele with the sculpted image of a Mayan ruler was found in the archaeological area of Lagartero in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas, the National Anthropology and History Institute, or INAH, said. In the bas-relief sculpture the Mayan ruler rises above an individual who lies at his feet, "a scene representing the seizing of power by one Maya group from another," INAH said, adding that the archaeological area of Lagartero will be open to the public this year. INAH experts found the stone monument in late 2009 at the 10th section of Pyramid 4 in Lagartero, the...

Ruins of a pre-Columbian city built before the rise of the Maya civilisation have been discovered in a remote region of eastern Honduras, the Institute of Anthropology and History says. The so-called City of Encounters, in the wilderness of Botaderos mountain about 120 miles northeast of the capital, includes vestiges of three rectangular plazas, various mounds and small stone-encrusted pillars. It appears to have been built in the pre-Classical or early Classical period between 300 B.C. and 300 A.D., said Mexican anthropologist Victor Heredia, an investigator for the institute. "It's a pre-Hispanic city, a complex site. It has a well-defined...

The ancient Mayans may have had enough engineering know-how to master running water, creating fountains and even toilets by controlling water pressure, scientists now suggest... Scientists investigated the Mayan center at Palenque in Chiapas, Mexico. At its height, this major site, inhabited from roughly 100 to 800 AD, had some 1,500 structures -- residences, palaces, and temples -- holding some 6,000 inhabitants under a series of powerful rulers. The center at Palenque also had what was arguably the most unique and intricate system of water management known anywhere in the Maya lowlands. These involved elaborate subterranean aqueducts to deal with...

...Anabel Ford, an archaeologist at UC Santa Barbara and director of the university's MesoAmerican Research Center, suggests... that the forest gardens cultivated by the Maya demonstrate their great appreciation for the environment. Her findings are published in the current issue of the Journal of Ethnobiology in an article titled "Origins of the Maya Forest Garden: Maya Resource Management." ...The ancient Maya, who farmed without draft animals or plows, and had access only to stone tools and fire, followed what Ford calls the "milpa cycle." It is an ancient land use system by which a closed canopy forest is transformed into...

COME MONDAY, it is three years and counting. Three years till what? Three years until the end of the world! You didn't know that? Where have you been? Dec. 21, 2012--a Friday. That's the big day. The Mayans have supposedly predicted that this is when the end will come, and so have several other previous cultures. Why, even that old soothsayer Nostradamus is said to have determined that this date will mark the end of time. Of course, that makes me a little wary, because nobody seems to recognize Nostradamus' predictions until after they happen. After the Sept. 11, 2001,...

“Of Mayans and Millerites: 2012, 1844, and 2009” (Mark 13:24-37)There’s a new movie out called “2012,” maybe you’ve heard of it. It’s about an enormous, earth-shaking event that will take place in the year 2012. No, it’s not a fantasy about my Chicago Cubs finally winning the World Series. No, nothing as far-fetched as that. Rather, “2012” is a big-budget disaster movie about the end of the world. I haven’t seen it, and I’m not planning on seeing it, but from what I can tell, it’s your standard end-of-the-world movie: Big cataclysmic disaster coming, worldwide destruction, some time to get...

GUATEMALA CITY (Reuters) – Scuba divers are exploring the depths of a volcanic lake in Guatemala to find clues about an ancient sacred island where Mayan pilgrims flocked to worship before it was submerged by rising waters.