And, vaster, some realms they owned; two rivers, a continent

September 28, 2018 1:32 PM

Ongoing analysis of the LiDAR in the Maya Biosphere Reserve finds more than monuments. Previously.
posted by clew (6 comments total)

this is great and i hope they'll be able to study the area further in situ without disturbing too much of the local ecosystem.

but also: "an astonishing amount of land modification done by the Maya over their entire landscape on a scale previously unimaginable" is kind of a weird statement from an expert in this field unless they're dramatizing it for a colonizer mindset.
posted by poffin boffin at 1:45 PM on September 28, 2018 [4 favorites]

I'm extremely here for the "One Art" allusion.
posted by torridly at 2:03 PM on September 28, 2018 [1 favorite]

This is very cool.

(but yes ease up on the adjectives).
posted by srboisvert at 2:14 PM on September 28, 2018

Both Canuto and Estrada-Belli noted that discoveries were made in a matter of minutes, compared to what would have taken years of fieldwork without the LiDAR technology.

"Seen as a whole, terraces and irrigation channels, reservoirs, fortifications and causeways reveal an astonishing amount of land modification done by the Maya over their entire landscape on a scale previously unimaginable," Estrada-Belli said.

I think what Estrada-Belli meant to describe as "on a scale previously unimaginable" was the scope of what the LiDAR scan revealed in a short amount of time compared to what older methods revealed, not what the Maya had actually done... the entire area is already known to have been Mayan.
posted by lefty lucky cat at 4:48 PM on September 28, 2018 [4 favorites]

From the previously, please go read (and favorite) Panjandrum's excellent comment.
posted by Dashy at 5:33 PM on September 28, 2018 [3 favorites]

The Maya Kept Jaguar Zoos For Centuries: A chemical analysis of excavated bones shows that Mesoamericans had a long history of keeping the fiercest predators around in captivity.
posted by homunculus at 9:23 AM on October 11, 2018 [1 favorite]