EUROPE, NORWAY, WORLD

Large-Scale Trade in Herring Dates to the Viking Age

Large-Scale Trade in Herring Dates to the Viking Age

Large-Scale Trade in Herring Dates to the Viking Age
Lane Atmore has spent weeks and months in the lab extracting DNA from tiny herring bones like this.

Historians have believed extensive herring trade started around the year 1200 AD, later controlled by the Hanseatic League. Now, a new study shows that it was already established in the Viking Age.

“We found that this trade existed already around 800 AD, 400 years earlier, which really pushes back this extensive fishing,” says Doctoral Research Fellow Lane Atmore at the University of Oslo.

She is the first author of the study, published today in PNAS, which shows that herring bones from western populations around Sweden and Denmark were found as far east in the Baltic as Truso in today´s Poland. Truso is known as an important Viking Age trade port.

“In the genetic signature from these bones, we found that the fishes were adapted to higher salinity than you find in the central Baltic. This means they were coming from around Kattegat, and then they were being shipped into the eastern Baltic,” Atmore says.

The lower salinity of The Baltic Sea means that herring from the population in Kattegat will have a hard time adapting to the waters further east.

“That high salinity adapted fish are never found that far in,” Atmore says.

More difficult to trade

Her co-author, Associate Professor Bastiaan Star, has previously studied cod trade in the same area.

“Earlier we have seen that cod from the trading place Hedeby in what is now Germany had travelled all the way from northern Norway. Our new study shows that it was not just cod. It was also herring, a fish that technologically is much more difficult to trade,” Star says.

Atlantic herring (Clupea harengus) is a much fattier fish than cod and not easy to store, let alone trade if you don’t have the right technology.

“If you don’t cure it with salt or smoke, it will go bad very quickly. You need access to salt and wood so that you can cure it and then ship it. You need to have extensive trade networks and to catch enough fish if it´s going to be worth the investment,” Atmore says.

“I think that fish was traded over greater distances than previously anticipated. We can now pin down this date because these bones are absolutely dated between 800 and 850,” Star says.

“We can´t prove that it was the Vikings who brought the herring from one place to the next, but we know that we have herring bone from a site where Vikings were trading,” Atmore says.

Biology and archaeology

Atmore and Star are both biologists. In this study, they have worked closely with archaeologists. One of them is Professor James H. Barrett at NTNU University Museum.

“The herring industry of the Baltic Sea supported one of the most important trades in medieval Europe,” Barrett says.

“By combining the genetic study of archaeological and modern samples of herring bone, one can discover the earliest known evidence for the growth of long-range trade in herring, from comparatively saline waters of the western Baltic to the Viking Age trading site of Truso in north-east Poland,” Barrett says.

The study also reveals what has happened to the herring populations in more recent times.

“The economic and political ramifications of the herring industry are well-charted, but its ecological impacts have been much debated,” Barrett says.

Spring spawners and autumn spawners

The different populations of herring have their own spawning grounds, hence their adaptation to different levels of salinity. Populations also differ in spawning season.

“There are two major populations that spread across all Atlantic herring. One spawns in the springtime, and one spawns in the autumn. These populations spawn in unique locations and in different seasons, so they don’t interbreed much. This means they are genetically different from each other,” Atmore explains.

She is now able to identify where these fish are coming from to see how populations grow and decline, and how this is impacted by the fishing industry.

“We found that earlier in the historical record, starting around 800, you get more fish in these archaeological sites that come from the autumn spawning population in the western Baltic. This is a population that was targeted by a famous fishery around 1200,” Atmore says.

Collapsed 100 years ago

In more recent times it was the opposite.

“They were then targeting the autumn spawners and this population collapsed in the 1920s. In the Baltic now commercial catches are 90% spring spawners,” Atmore says.

“It´s not that the autumn spawners entirely disappear in the Baltic. It is more that they are not commercially interesting anymore. They are still there, but not in the numbers we were used to,” Star says.

He is not in doubt that the fishing industry had a major impact on the herring populations.

“There is a consistent pattern with over exploitation that takes place over centuries,” Star says.

“Our results provide a new and persuasive way to test the archaeological hypothesis that human impacts on super-abundant European marine fish started already in the Middle Ages, and that different herring stocks were targeted sequentially through time,” Barrett says.

This also means that the ecology of the Baltic Sea has shifted. Autumn spawners spawn in a different place at a different season.

“They are also bigger than the spring spawners and they eat slightly different food. When the population of autumn spawners goes far down in size, the ecology is going to change,” Atmore says.

“The Baltic Sea is much more confined compared to the North Sea. Some of the impacts that humans or climate may have, is amplified in such a small system,” says Star.

CROATIA, EUROPE, WORLD

Croatia’s Roman City of Ridit Investigated

Croatia’s Roman City of Ridit Investigated

The ancient building has massive walls and a rectangular outline (approx. 20 x 10 m). Georadar images show the frame of the entrance, according to scientists most likely in the form of relics of a colonnade.

The foundations were discovered under and next to the Church of St. Daniel in the village of Danilo near Šibenik, the former Roman city of Ridit.

Although archaeologists have been finding numerous architectural elements and decorations from the monumental Roman sacral building until now its location was unknown.

View of the valley where the village of Danilo is currently located, in ancient times it was the city of Ridit/Municipium Riditarum.
Georadar surveyed the church in Danilo, under which relics of the Roman sacral building were discovered.

Polish research leader, Professor Fabian Welc from the Institute of Archaeology of the Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw, said: “The data we have collected indicate that under today’s church and the adjacent cemetery there are relics of a temple, which was part of the forum, the most important part of a Roman city.”

Georadar survey in the area around the Danilo cemetery.

He added that the forum was the centre of the social and economic life of the inhabitants of every Roman municipium (city). This forum was located at the intersection of the main communication arteries and was also the central point in the city. In addition to the temple, it was the location of the most important public buildings of cities, such as courts or municipal offices. The forum was additionally decorated with monuments or triumphal arches.

Georadar survey in Danilo.

Next year, scientists plan to conduct archaeological research near the church to verify the findings of geophysical surveys. It is known that the current 18th-century church was built on the foundations of an earlier, small Romanesque Christian temple. Under it – according to the latest research – was the oldest, Roman temple.

The LIDAR aerial scanning technology was also helpful in locating the temple. It enables a very thorough analysis of the terrain and makes it possible to detect the remains of former architecture, very weakly outlined on the surface.

According to the scientists, not only the church was built on the ruins of the former temple. The nearby cemetery, which functioned from the 9th to the 15th century, was also partly located within its original range. Next to it were other buildings surrounding the forum.

Some of the medieval graves were dug directly into the relics of the Roman baths along with the adjacent vast building with a central courtyard and a portico surrounded by numerous rooms.

Professor Welc said: “This means that the extensive medieval cemetery was founded directly on the relics of Roman buildings.”

The Croatian project coordinator, Dr. Ana Konestra added that thanks to large-scale geophysical surveying and analysis of the ALS model, a number of other Roman buildings were identified around the modern-day cemetery in Danilo. According to the archaeologists, they were mainly residential and utility buildings.

Croatia’s Roman City of Ridit Investigated
Reconstruction of a building with a courtyard made by Professor Fabian Welc.

Even before the recent surveys, there were suspicions concerning the location of the forum within the area of the cemetery, because reused fragments of monumental architectural decorations and a large column were discovered in the stone walls surrounding medieval graves.

Professor Welc said: “The very size of these elements indicated that somewhere near the cemetery there had to be a large, monumental building, which had to be part of a complex of buildings surrounding the city forum. However, previous excavations did not allow us to determine its location.”

Archaeologists have been conducting research in Danilo for over 70 years.

The first extensive work was associated with the construction of the water pipeline. It brought finds in the form of hundreds of Roman inscriptions, some of which mentioned Municipium Riditarum, an enigmatic city founded somewhere in Danilo by the local community of the romanised Ridit tribe.

A fragment of an ornamented monumental beaming of the Roman temple was unearthed in the 1950s in the medieval cemetery near the church in Danilo.
EUROPE, ICELAND, WORLD

19th-Century Farmer’s Cottage Uncovered in Iceland

19th-Century Farmer’s Cottage Uncovered in Iceland

Archaeologists have unearthed a cottage near Úlfarsfell, a mountain and popular walking area between Reykjavík and Mosfellsbær. The discovery was made during exploratory excavations made preceding the construction of the shopping centre.

Archaeologists Unearth Cottage Between Reykjavík and Mosfellsbær

According to Icelandic law, an archaeological investigation must be conducted before construction and any finds registered with the Cultural Heritage Agency of Iceland.

The cottage in question, called Hamrahlíð, was found to have been inhabited from around 1850 to 1920.

Among the everyday objects found to include a knife, pottery, plates, cups, glass bottles, and some agricultural tools.

An archaeologist from Antikva ehf., the contractor responsible for the excavation, stated to RÚV that: “We’ve found cooking pits, so people were cooking something here or working with food.

We don’t have any mounds or any built-up fireplaces, but we do have these holes. In one, which is 35 cm deep, we have at least six layers of moss with burnt bones and charcoal. It can be seen very clearly on the floors that they busied themselves around this area.”

Hermann Jakob Hjartarson, the archaeologist at Antikva, has stated that relatively few studies of such small cottages have been carried out. He started to RÚV, “undoubtedly, I think that this is still just one part of a bigger story. Most people here at that time were just cottage farmers.”

EUROPE, SCOTLAND, WORLD

Rare golden sword pommel acquired by a Scottish museum

Rare golden sword pommel acquired by a Scottish museum

Rare golden sword pommel acquired by a Scottish museum
A pommel is a decorative piece attached to the bottom of a sword sometimes used as a counter-weight

An “exceptionally rare” gold sword pommel discovered by a metal detectorist near Stirling has been acquired by National Museums Scotland. The pommel, which is about 1,300 years old, was found in 2019 and was declared to the Scottish Treasure Trove unit.

The gold decoration which would have sat at the top of a sword handle measures 5.5cm wide, weighs 25g and was valued at about £30,000.

The find has been described as “hugely significant”.

Dr Alice Blackwell, senior curator of medieval archaeology and history at National Museums Scotland (NMS), said goldwork from this period was “virtually unknown” anywhere in the UK.

She said it showed the spectacular skill and craftsmanship of the early medieval period.

The pommel is thought to date from about 700 AD.

The solid gold object is encrusted with garnets and intricate goldwork which features religious motifs and fantastical creatures.

The discovery was made at Blair Drummond towards the end of 2019 but NMS said that due to restrictions during the pandemic decisions about its acquisition were delayed.

It was allocated to them on the recommendation of the Scottish Archaeological Finds Allocation Panel.

Dr Blackwell said its archaeological value was due to what it told us about important cultural, political and artistic interactions in northern Britain at this time.

She said its decoration combined elements from both Anglo-Saxon England and the kingdoms of Early Medieval Scotland.

“Early medieval Scotland is a really interesting period,” Dr Blackwell said.

“You have a number of culturally distinct kingdoms and the pommel’s design has taken from the different cultures and melded them together “

That melding of different cultural styles is known as the “insular art” style, which was made famous by illuminated manuscripts such as the Lindisfarne Gospels.

Dr Blackwell said this fusion of styles had made it hard to determine where exactly it was made and to whom it may have belonged.

However, she said it potentially could have belonged to royalty due to the higher standard of goldwork the pommel had compared with other goldware found in this period.

“In a way, this is the start of the artefact’s journey,” Dr Blackwell said.

“A lot of research and work is still to be done to uncover what stories it can tell us about the political and cultural landscape of Northern Britain at this time.”

AUSTRIA, EUROPE, WORLD

Mummified Baby From Centuries Ago May Have Died From Lack of Sunlight

Mummified Baby From Centuries Ago May Have Died From Lack of Sunlight

Mummified Baby From Centuries Ago May Have Died From Lack of Sunlight
The infant mummy is covered in a silk coat.

For centuries, the crypt of one of the oldest aristocratic families in Austria has preserved a tragic secret. A boy, perhaps no older than a year or two in age, who died not from a lack of food, or injury. But for a simple want of sunlight on his skin.

The male child was found mummified in a family crypt reserved for the Counts of Starhemberg, having been interred there somewhere between the middle of the 16th and 17th centuries. His tiny features are withered but detailed, his body still wrapped in an elaborate silk garment.

Yet, in spite of living a life of privilege, his short existence was clearly not a healthy one.

A virtual autopsy of the corpse using CT scans has revealed malformations to the ribs that resemble classical signs of malnutrition, specifically vitamin D deficiency. Known as rickets, this condition tends to result in a bowing of the legs, a feature that wasn’t evident in the boy’s bones.

Keeping an open mind, the researchers considered a second possibility – low amounts of vitamin C, resulting in scurvy. While the rib deformations aren’t identical for both conditions, their similarities were enough for the researchers to investigate further.

Fat tissue analysis revealed the 10- to 18-month-year-old was overweight for his age, at least compared to other infants of the time. As a result, researchers suspect the child was well-fed in his patrician life, making vitamin C deficiency less likely.

Vitamin D, on the other hand, isn’t absorbed from our food in significant amounts, but rather produced in the skin through chemical reactions that depend on ultraviolet (UV) radiation, suggesting the child was severely undernourished not for want of food, but by lack of sunlight.

The chemical is absolutely crucial in building bones during childhood, explaining bone abnormalities. It also allows the body to better absorb calcium and phosphorous throughout life.

“The combination of obesity along with a severe vitamin deficiency can only be explained by a generally ‘good’ nutritional status along with an almost complete lack of sunlight exposure,” explains pathologist Andreas Nerlich from the University of Munich.

Although rickets isn’t necessarily a death sentence, a look at the child’s lungs revealed signs of lethal pneumonia, an infection that is common in infants with vitamin-D deficiencies.

A close-up of the mummified infant with his hand on his stomach.

It took until the nineteenth century and a pandemic of rickets for scientists to figure out that Sun exposure is necessary for bone formation, much too late to help the Starhemberg infant.

The mummified infant found in Austria is just one child from one time in one family in one part of Europe, but given how few infant burials have been found so well-preserved, the discovery is an interesting insight into the living conditions of noble infants of the 16th and 17th centuries.

During this time, aristocrats often avoided the Sun to keep their skin porcelain white, a sign of high rank in much of European society. Only peasants and labourers were Sun-kissed.

In Italy, many skeletons of noble children buried in the Medici Chapels in Florence during the 16th and 17th centuries also show signs of rickets, including bowing of the limbs. Researchers behind a 2013 study argued that prolonged delay in providing adequate amounts of solid foods that would provide small amounts of vitamin D in infants could add to the risks of rickets.

It’s not clear if the infant found in the Austrian crypt was weaned, or ate fatty foods rich in vitamin D. What is known is he was well-fed and cared for. In fact, his high level of body fat is probably what has kept his remains so well preserved. There’s even some recent evidence that vitamin-D deficiency is tied to childhood obesity, raising questions of just what role his privileged diet might have played in his illness.

Given that the corpse was buried in a silk funerary coat and was the only infant in the family crypt, researchers suspect he was a firstborn, possibly named Gundaker, Gregor, or Reichard, judging by the family tree. Unfortunately, his coffin did not bear an inscription.

“This is only one case,” admits Nerlich, “but as we know that the early infant death rates generally were very high at that time, our observations may have a considerable impact on the overall life reconstruction of infants even in higher social classes.”

CANADA, NORTH AMERICA, WORLD

A camera left in the Yukon by a legendary explorer in 1937 is found 85 years later

A camera left in the Yukon by a legendary explorer in 1937 is found 85 years later

In 1937, legendary mountaineers Bradford Washburn and Robert Bates were exploring Canada’s frigid Yukon region when they had to abandon their gear in order to quickly escape. Nearly 85 years later, the cache of gear they left behind has been found – including Washburn’s camera. 

Professional mountain explorer Griffin Post told CBS News he first heard about the abandoned cache in the book “Escape from Lucania.” Author David Roberts writes about where Washburn and Bates may have left the cache of gear in the Kluane National Park and Reserve.

“But nobody really knew for sure, and that doubt and that possibility that it was still there is what I went on,” Post said. 

Griff Post and the Washburn’s camera, which was embedded in the ice of Walsh Glacier.

Washburn is a mountaineer, explorer, surveyor, mapmaker and author who is also known for the photos he took of the dramatic landscapes he explored. He’s visited many of the world’s wild regions, including remote Alaska and Mount Everest.

Post said Washburn and Bates abandoned their gear because their pilot couldn’t come back to pick them up, so they decided to summit the peak and hike out into Canada. They planned to come back the following winter but never did. 

On a quest to find the cache, Post led a team to the remote Walsh Glacier. Post and Teton Gravity Research — which produces skiing, snowboarding and surfing films — partnered with University of Ottawa Glaciologist Dora Medrzycka, who travelled with them, and mapped out the glacier to determine where the gear could have moved over time. Dr. Luke Copland and a team at the University of Ottawa helped them remotely.

The team found a portion of Washburn’s aerial camera, which is believed to be his first-ever aerial photography camera, according to a press release from Teton Gravity Research. They were also able to retrieve two other cameras with film still loaded inside.

“It was such an emotional rollercoaster because you go in, you’ve done all this research, you’re so excited, and then the first time you fly in you see how vast the terrain is and how much area you’re supposed to cover and how many crevasses the cache could’ve fallen into years ago,” Post said. “It’s like ‘I don’t think there’s any way we can find this.’ It’s so overwhelming.”

However, Post said, searching for the cache ended up feeling fun. 

“At times I felt like a little kid. You’re jumping over a crevasse, like looking for treasure essentially. Like this is wild I get to do this,” he said. “And if we don’t find anything, well as far as adventure goes, we checked that box.”

During a seven-day trip, the crew of seven people searched on foot, ski and snowboard, travelling about 60 miles each, Post said. 

“We found it on the morning of the seventh day,” he added. “It took every minute basically, and in the end, the helicopter was about to take off to come pick us back up, and that was when we found the cache.” 

A camera left in the Yukon by a legendary explorer in 1937 is found 85 years later
The team of seven searched for seven days, travelling about 60 miles before finding the cache on the final day of their trip.

The team found a portion of Washburn’s aerial camera, which is believed to be his first-ever aerial photography camera, according to a press release from Teton Gravity Research. They were also able to retrieve two other cameras with film still loaded inside. 

Archaeologists from Parks Canada, which oversees national parks in the country, returned to the glacier with the team a few weeks later and helped them carefully retrieve what they could, successfully extracting the camera from the ice, according to the press release. 

Post said they will be “examined in the coming weeks and we’re cautiously optimistic something will be salvageable.”

Post said they will be “examined in the coming weeks and we’re cautiously optimistic something will be salvageable.”

The team estimated the camera had moved about 12 miles from where it started, Post said. Until this point, scientists only had data about glacier movement dating back to the 1960s, and analyzing the movement of the cache since 1937 can help them better understand how the velocity and thickness of a glacier may have changed. 

Post said not only was it historically significant to find the cache but “the science was almost cooler.” 

“Because we essentially backfilled three decades of data the science community didn’t have as far as how glaciers moved,” he added.

WORLD

Frontal Sinuses in Hominin Skulls May Offer Clues to Evolution

Frontal Sinuses in Hominin Skulls May Offer Clues to Evolution

Sinuses can provide insight into how ancient human skulls changed over time. While their function remains uncertain, the sinuses offer a new way of looking at human evolution. The changing shape of the frontal sinuses is helping to reveal more about how modern humans, and our ancient relatives, evolved.

Frontal Sinuses in Hominin Skulls May Offer Clues to Evolution
From Homo erectus to more modern species, sinuses can help demonstrate changes within the ancient human species.

An international team of researchers led by Antoine Balzeau of the Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle revealed that the small cavities, located just above the nose, are linked to the size of the frontal lobe.

This part of the brain is responsible for processes that make us uniquely human such as speech, emotion and planning, with the sinuses now providing another way for scientists to infer the development of this part of the brain. The frontal sinuses also offer a new way to investigate the relationships between different species of ancient hominins, with the study providing additional support for Homo Naledi belonging to our genus, despite having some prehuman characteristics.

Professor Chris Stringer, an expert in human evolution at the Museum who co-authored the paper, says, ‘Sinuses are interesting morphological features in fossils but they have been neglected. Many papers that describe new species don’t mention them, and they are often only illustrated incidentally to the rest of the specimen.’

‘This has left what data there very disparate. To try and rectify that, this paper compiled the biggest selection of fossil sinus data ever from many different sources. It shows that within our genus, Homo, sinuses can be used to tease apart the relationships between different species.’

Co-author Dr Laura Buck, formerly of the Museum but now at Liverpool John Moores University, adds, ‘In early hominins and non-human apes, the size and shape of frontal sinuses are directly related to the amount of space available for them to grow into.’

‘The step change we see between these species and later hominins, including ourselves, suggests a shift in the way the skull is organised and develops. It may be relevant that this is happening at the same point as we start to see substantial brain expansion in these taxa.’

The findings of the study were published in the journal Science Advances. 

Our species, Homo sapiens, has four types of sinus – two of which are only found in humans and our close relatives.

What are sinuses?

Sinuses are air-filled spaces within the bones of the skull that are lined with a mucous membrane. Humans have four types of sinuses: the maxillary sinuses under the eyes, the ethmoidal sinuses between the eyes and nose, the sphenoidal sinuses to the outside of the eyes, and the frontal sinuses. While they have been known for centuries, it is unclear what their role is. Suggestions that they produce mucus and nitrogen oxide to defend against infection or provide thermal and shock protection to the nervous system can help to explain their current function, but not necessarily why they evolved.

Some researchers have even suggested that sinuses are an example of an evolutionary spandrel, a structure that evolved as the by-product of something else and has no initial role. Further adaptation may give it a function later in evolutionary time. Research on other animals, such as bovids and primates, has shown that sinuses can differ between species, driving interest in whether sinuses could also be helpful to distinguish between species of ancient humans.

The exact path of human evolution is still the subject of heated debate, with many competing theories over how our species came into being, and how many close relatives we have. Examining the sinuses of ancient species could help to address this.

The maxillary and frontal sinuses are of particular interest, as in primates they are only found in humans and our closest relatives, the chimpanzees and gorillas. This new study examined 94 fossil hominins from over 20 species to gain a greater insight into the variation of the frontal sinus, and what that reveals about human evolution.

Their sinuses reinforce the classification of Homo Naledi as an ancient human species.

How can sinuses be used to study human evolution?

The researchers used CT scans of the specimens to create 3D models of the frontal sinuses, allowing them to digitally reconstruct the structures. These models were then used to take measurements which could be compared between the different species.

While sinus size was not able to distinguish between early species of hominins, such as Australopithecus, it could separate more recent Homo species in the past two million years.

The study found that species such as Homo erectus, Homo neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens have distinct ranges of sinus size, which researchers suggest could be linked to evolutionary constraints caused by the development of characteristics such as larger brains.

This relationship was also seen for Middle Pleistocene (770,000 to 120,000 years ago) hominins whose identity is currently uncertain, including in specimens associated with the controversial species Homo rhodesiensis.

‘Three crania, which I believe represent Homo rhodesiensis, stand out as very different from the others,’ Chris says. ‘Their sinuses are much bigger than their relatives and we don’t know why. It could represent that they’re a specialised group.

‘They have very large brow ridges which have been suggested as having a role in social signalling, and large sinuses would reduce the weight of these.’

Meanwhile, the sinuses of Homo Naledi, whose mix of non-human and human characteristics have been a source of confusion for scientists, were similar to those of Homo erectus. This supports H. naledi’s human status and adds further information that could be used to help decipher its evolutionary past.

The study also reveals new information about our own evolution, showing links between these sinuses and the size of the frontal lobe from Homo erectus onwards. The size of the sinuses is consistent with the development of a short extension of one of the brain’s lobes relative to the other, a feature that most humans have today and may be associated with the dominant hand.

The researchers hope that future studies of ancient human fossils will measure the sinuses in order to better understand the development of this feature, and potentially offer new insights into how our species and close relatives came into being.

‘After reading this paper, we hope that more researchers will appreciate the importance of sinuses and begin to use them when describing or redescribing a species,’ Chris says. ‘As more data becomes available, this will help us understand more about our evolution and the role that sinuses play.’ 

MEXICO, NORTH AMERICA, WORLD

Lidar Survey Reveals Urban Sprawl of Ancient Maya City

Lidar Survey Reveals Urban Sprawl of Ancient Maya City

A graphic illustrating new details, uncovered using LiDAR laser technology, of the ancient Mayan city of Calakmul, Mexico, in this undated handout image.

Following years of research, Dr. Kathryn Reese-Taylor, PhD, professor in the Department of Anthropology and Archaeology at UCalgary, as well as her team of international colleagues, has used lidar (light detection and ranging) to help uncover more secrets of the enormous ancient Maya city of Calakmul.

As a result, researchers on the Bajo Laberinto Archaeological Project, a University of Calgary-led international and multidisciplinary research project directed by Reese-Taylor, can now better understand the density and landscape modifications of Mexico’s ancient Maya Calakmul settlement.

“By using lidar imagery, we are now able to fully understand the immense size of the Calakmul urban settlement and its substantial landscape modifications, which supported an intensive agricultural system,” says Reese-Taylor.

“All available land was covered with water canals, terraces, walls and dams, no doubt to provide food and water security for Calakmul residents.”

Although the number of people who lived at Calakmul during the height of the Snake King’s rule was not a complete surprise because of previous mapping and archaeological investigations by the Autonomous University of Campeche and INAH, the team was astonished at the scale and degree of urban construction.

Immense apartment-style residential compounds have been identified throughout the surveyed area, some with as many as 60 individual structures, the seats of large households composed of extended families and affiliated members.

These large residential units were clustered around numerous temples, shrines, and possible marketplaces, making Calakmul one of the largest cities in the Americas in 700 AD.

But that’s not all the team was able to see.

“We were also able to see that the magnitude of landscape modification equalled the scale of the urban population,” explains Reese-Taylor. “All available land was covered with water canals, terraces, walls, and dams, no doubt to provide maximum food and water security for the city dwellers.”

Lidar Survey Reveals Urban Sprawl of Ancient Maya City
Copyright, Bajo Laberinto Archaeological Project and Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia

What’s next for the team and the technology

Going forward, the lidar survey will be used by INAH to help with policy and planning for the biosphere in anticipation of the expected increased tourism in the area.

The lidar will also continue to support the Bajo Laberinto Archaeological Project, which aims to investigate the causes of the rapid population increase at Calakmul and its effect on the region’s environment.

“We’re excited to see what else this technology will help us learn about Calakmul,” says Reese-Taylor. “It’s such a privilege to be unearthing the secrets of Mexico’s ancient settlements.”

Reese-Taylor and her colleagues on the Bajo Laberinto Archaeological Project will present their preliminary findings from the lidar survey on the INAH TV YouTube channel, on Tuesday, Oct. 25 at 5 p.m. MT. 

All In One Magazine