2023-06-26 18:36:51
Stairway building found in Ocomtún. (Credit: National Institute of Anthropology and History)
(CNN Spanish) — A team of researchers discovered an ancient Mayan city in the southeastern Mexican state of Campeche. He National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) reported on June 20 that the discovery occurred in the Balamkú ecological reserve, after going some 60 kilometers through logging alleys with thick vegetation.
The site of the discovery was named Ocomtún, which in Yucatec Mayan means “stone column,” due to the numerous cylindrical rock posts scattered throughout the ancient settlement, they said.
A shrine discovered by researchers. (Credit: National Institute of Anthropology and History)
Ivan Ṡprajc, the archaeologist who led the expedition, explained that the monumental core covers more than 50 hectares and includes several large buildings, including several pyramidal structures more than 15 meters high.
According to the expert, the place functioned, probably during the Classic period (250-1000 AD), as an “important regional center.” However, Ṡprajc pointed out that Ocomtún suffered alterations in the Terminal Classic period (800-1000 AD).
The shrines in the center of the courtyards and squares have construction elements that were extracted from the surrounding buildings, and for the researcher they are a “reflection of ideological and population changes in times of crisis” that “by the 10th century led to the collapse of the complex organization Sociopolitical and Drastic Demographic Decrease in the Maya Central Lowlands.
The finding was made within the framework of the project “Expanding the archaeological panorama of the Mayan Central Lowlands”, approved by the INAH Archeology Council and coordinated by the expert from the Research Center of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts. The objective of the initiative is to expand the knowledge of a vast area almost unknown to archaeology.
One of the columns found in Ocomtún. (Credit: National Institute of Anthropology and History)
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