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Mexican authorities are extremely restrictive when it comes to access to ancient Aztec, Mayan and other archaeological sites. Since COVID, the pyramids have been cordoned off and access to them prohibited. However, and as is typical with the Mexican malinchismo (a term used for locals who give preferential treatment to foreigners), MrBeast was granted unfettered access not only to the pyramids themselves but also permission to enter areas millions of Mexicans have never seen. “I can’t believe the government’s letting us do this,” he said. “Nobody gets to go where we’re going,” he said inside one of the pyramids. He...

According to a statement released by Brown University, an international team of archaeologists discovered an altar in the Maya city of Tikal that is characteristic of the Mesoamerican culture centered at Teotihuacan. Teotihuacan, located outside of present-day Mexico City, thrived between the first and eighth centuries a.d., when it had a population of as many as 100,000. The new discovery is some of the strongest evidence to date that they had cultural interactions with Maya cities more than 600 miles to their southeast. The four painted panels of the late fourth-century altar, which was found in an elite residential complex,...

It is in one of the most remote places on the planetFor many centuries, extensive, vast and lush deserts in terms of sand have been a challenge for archaeology, as beneath their dunes there may be remains of ancient civilisations. Well, thanks to Artificial Intelligence (AI) and synthetic aperture radar (SAR), something surprising has been discovered in the Dubai desert. What is synthetic aperture radar (SAR)? Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) is a technology that provides high-quality images of the subsoil and can penetrate sand. This information is combined with powerful algorithms to analyze large areas of land for patterns that...

SALCAJA, Guatemala -- Working and going to school have become optional in this highland Guatemalan town, thanks to a flood of U.S. dollars sent home by migrants living in the United States. The family-run mills that produce brightly colored, hand-woven traditional fabrics have fallen quiet as their potential work force -- mostly young men -- hang out at the town's pool halls or video game salons, living off remittances and waiting to make their own journeys north. "Kids have easy money, and the only thing they know how to do is spend it on video games," complained Salcaja Mayor Miguel...

A graduate student analyzing publicly available drone data in Mexico unexpectedly stumbled across a huge ancient Mayan city buried beneath dense jungle. For centuries, the city lay hidden amid jungle canopy in the state of Campeche, on the Gulf of Mexico. New research published Tuesday in the journal Antiquity reveals sites that in total cover area about one-and-a-half times the size of Washington, D.C.

Using advanced lidar imagery, researchers from Tulane University have discovered over 6,500 unexplored ancient Mayan settlements hidden beneath dense Mexican jungle forests.The researchers say their findings only scratch the surface of the settlements that likely populate the country's unexplored landscape.The team involved with the historic discovery employed lidar technology to scan a 50-square-mile section of the overgrown landscape in Campeche, Mexico. Like radar, which uses radio waves to image objects, lidar employs laser pulses that bounce off different materials at different rates. These reflected pulses allow researchers to peer beneath the surface of several types of terrains, including jungle forests,...

In the Dzibanché Archaeological Zone in Quintana Roo, archaeologists have unearthed two platforms with stucco reliefs that reveal new details about the Kaanu'l dynasty, which ruled over the territories that today comprise Mexico, Belize and Guatemala.The discovery of the ancient vestiges, which have representations of ancestors, mythical animals and other traits of power, derives from the application of Promeza.In a statement, the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) said the discovery offers "new insight" into the workings and worldviews of this powerful Maya dynasty, which ruled during the Early and Late Classic periods, between 250 and 650 AD...Archaeologists believe...

Explanation: To see the feathered serpent descend the Mayan pyramid requires exquisite timing. You must visit El Castillo -- in Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula -- near an equinox. Then, during the late afternoon if the sky is clear, the pyramid's own shadows create triangles that merge into the famous illusion of a slithering viper. Also known as the Temple of Kukulkan, the impressive step-pyramid stands 30 meters tall and 55 meters wide at the base. Built up as a series of square terraces by the pre-Columbian civilization between the 9th and 12th century, the structure can be used as a calendar...

Xibalbanus tulumensis contains toxins that are suitable for the development of active substances against neurological diseases. Credit: Björn M. von Reumont ================================================================== Venom from the marine remipede, Xibalbanus tulumensis, exhibits unique medical potential for treating neurological disorders, showcasing the importance of marine biodiversity in pharmacological research while facing environmental threats. Many animals use venom for self-defense or hunting. The components of venom, known as toxins, affect a wide variety of physiological processes, making them particularly interesting for the development of new pharmacological agents. While the venoms of some animal groups, such as snakes, spiders, scorpions, and insects, have been extensively...

The 36-square-foot stone also speaks of the mythical founding of the Mayan city-state Cobá.During a conference on August 12, Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador announced that workers from the Ministry of Culture’s National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) had found a tablet engraved with Mayan hieroglyphs near Nohoch Mul, a pyramid in the Archaeologic Zone of Cobá in Quintana Roo on the Yucatán Peninsula. Indigenous peoples first settled in Cobá—derived from the Mayan word “Ko’ba a,” roughly meaning “choppy water”—between 350 BCE and 250 CE, with Mayan civilization blossoming between 600 and 1000 CE, or what historians of...

Mexico News Daily reports that a stela measuring more than 36 feet long has been discovered in the Cobá archaeological zone in the eastern Yucatán Peninsula. Glyphs carved into the stone describe the founding of the Maya settlement of Keh Witz Nal, or Deer Mountain, on May 12, A.D. 569, according to a preliminary analysis of the text conducted by researchers from Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH). The text also names K'awiil Ch'ak Chéen, a previously unknown ruler of Cobá, and confirms that rulers often adopted the name of the god K'awiil, a protective deity associated with...

A vase purchased for $3.99 at a Maryland thrift store turned out to be a nearly 2,000-year-old Mayan artifact. Anna Lee Dozier of Washington, said she was shopping at the 2A Thrift Store in Clinton when her attention was grabbed by an unusual vase. "It looked old-ish, but I thought maybe 20, 30 years old and some kind of tourist reproduction thing so I brought it home," Dozier told WUSA-TV. Dozier said she was visiting Mexico on a work trip earlier this year when she noticed some items on display at the Museum of Anthropology bore a startling resemblance...

In the height of the Maya empire, the victims of human child sacrifice appear to have been very carefully selected.According to a new analysis of ancient DNA led by researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, the chosen victims have something in common. The remains of 64 individuals found inside a subterranean chamber known as a chultún all belonged to young boys, many of whom were closely related. Among them, two sets of identical twins.It's a discovery that contradicts the common notion that sacrifice victims tended to be young girls...We've known about the tragic fate of the children...

The National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) and the Ministry of Culture have confirmed a great archaeological find in Quintana Roo.During excavations in section six of the Mayan Train, which extends between Tulum and Chetumal, vestiges of ancient Mayan beekeeping have been found...The team of archaeologists has recovered jobón caps, an indication of meliponiculture, the breeding of stingless bees, practiced by the Mayans in ancient times.Initially, it was thought that the excavations were revealing an albarrada (wall), but the discovery of these covers changed the hypothesis, identifying the vestiges as parts of a meliponary.The lids, made of limestone, have...

A scene featuring a ballgame in a ballcourt, painted on a cylindrical ceramic vessel. (Dallas Museum of Art) It's no secret that sports fanatics tend to treat their favorite game as a sacred thing, but a new discovery suggests the ancient Maya took it to a whole new level. Beneath the paved floor of a plaza determined to be a court for Maya Ballgame, archaeologists have identified plants used for ceremonies. These plants have medicinal properties and are associated with religious use – including a plant with known hallucinogenic effects, whose use had never been previously seen in Maya contexts....

In an ancient Maya temple-pyramid in Guatemala, archaeologists recently discovered the scorched bones of at least four adults who were likely members of a royal lineage. The burning signaled a deliberate and potentially public desecration of their remains, according to new research.The bones offer a rare glimpse of intentional corpse destruction in Maya culture to commemorate dramatic political change.All of the remains belonged to adults, and scientists identified three of the individuals as male. Two were between 21 and 35 years old, and one was between 40 and 60 years old, researchers reported Thursday in the journal Antiquity. Among the...

An auction house in Colorado recently sold several historic Mayan artifacts, despite Mexican officials requesting the cancellation of the sale. On March 26, Mexico‘s culture minister Alejandra Frausto Guerrero posted on social media that Artemis Gallery in Louisville, Colorado was selling “pieces that belong to the cultures of Mexico” and demanding the business stop its sale. “There is nothing more immoral than put a price on the heritage of a nation,” Frausto Guerrero wrote. It was tagged with the campaign “My Heritage Is Not for Sale”. Mexico’s first lady, Beatriz Gutiérrez Müller, also wrote a post about the March 28...

Image Credit : National Geographic (Social) - RUBÉN SALGADO ESCUDERO Archaeologists have discovered an intact jade mask in the tomb of a Maya King at Chochkitam, a little-known Maya polity in northeastern Peten, Guatemala. Contemporary inscriptions indicate that Chochkitam was a royal city with a lineage traced back to Preclassic times. The site was first reported in 1909, with ongoing studies recording three main monumental groups connected by a long central causeway. In a recent announcement on National Geographic, excavations at Chochkitam have led to the discovery of an interlocking jade mask in the burial of a Maya King. Jade...

NATIONAL PUMPKIN SEED DAY The first Wednesday in October offers up the seasonal delight, National Pumpkin Seed Day! As the temperatures cool and the leaves turn, snack on these delicious tidbits. #NationalPumpkinSeedDay Many of us have fond memories of roasting these delicious nuggets after carving the Jack o' lantern. However, we never realized just how good (and good for us) they were. Surprisingly, pumpkin seeds have been valued for their dietary and medicinal properties for thousands of years. In fact, pumpkin seeds have been traced back as far as 7000 BC, according to archeologists excavating a tomb in central Mexico....

Archaeologists in Mexico have discovered the burials of 13 individuals — including two who were beheaded as part of sacrificial rituals and five whose skulls had been elongated through intentional deformation — near a Maya pyramid at the Moral-Reforma archaeological site near Tabasco...The burials date to between A.D. 600 and 900, a time when the Maya civilization flourished in the region, the INAH said in an Aug. 23 translated statement. The burials consist of human skulls, fragments of jaws, and bones of the lower and upper extremities, the archaeologists said in the statement. Their analysis also revealed that some of...