Richard Hansen, Mirador Basin Project Director, is still in search of the explanations concerning the mysteries surrounding the Pre Classic Maya civilization. How did the Maya become such a successful society and why did they suddenly collapse after having lived in the jungle developing great urban centers for centuries? “Our focus is on the origin of the Maya civilization,” he tells us, “the origins of that formidable development. How is it that a society can develop in a tropical jungle when in present day in the Amazon jungle there are still people living in the wild, we could call primitive… They live in the same environment and they haven't made any kind of pyramids, or platforms, or roads, or anything. What is the process that takes us from a hunter- gatherer society to one of the most advanced civilizations in the history of the world? Second, what are the dynamics of this development? What were the mechanisms they used to maintain and establish that development so early? And third,” he asks, “Why did they collapse? What was the result of all of this, in their systems, that completely collapsed?”
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| Discovering 5 different construction phases at El Mirador's Structure 313, in the Grand Acropolis, entailed hard work, carrying heavy loads and doing fine restoration work one sizzling hot day after another. At El Mirador care is taken so that nature around the structures is preserved and so that excavations will keep the natural setting around them as intact as possible. El Mirador, July 2008. |
“We need to understand that we have a jewel here,” Richard Hansen indicated as he spoke of what was once home to the ancient Maya civilization, he explains that it is actually, “…A virgin jungle. It's the only place in Guatemala with five types of tropical forest and all five are in the basin.” Experts from the scientific team led by Hansen in El Mirador have conducted many tests that have yielded very interesting findings, “…according to the studies we have conducted when it comes to pollen…the forest that one can see here today is the same forest that was here three thousand years ago.” Hansen says, “We must preserve it… [as] in this zone one can find the largest and oldest cities of the Maya World: the Cradle of the Maya Civilization is here.” Hansen adds that the largest and oldest sites of the Maya World are found in the Mirador Basin.
Lilian Vega de Zea, of the Mirador Basin Project and whose specialty is the restoration of ceramics and stucco, believes that each archaeological investigation must be accompanied by a conservation team. For Vega de Zea, El Mirador is one of the archaeological projects that has always made it a priority to have a conservation team with extremely specialized professionals to guarantee things are being done in the most adequate and correct manner. “I believe that if no investment is made into these types of projects, things like these will be lost and it is important to everyone,” she says while she asks us what we think would have happened if the pyramids in Egypt had been lost forever. The pyramids are part of a worldwide heritage, as well as El Mirador. “…It's part of human kind's culture…and one must invest [in this type of project] because if no investment is made [in the restoration and conservation], it will be lost forever. And it may come to a point where it will be completely gone for good,” she says.
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Clockwise from top, Photo 1: Craig Argyle makes a major discovery during the 2008 field season. Photo 2: He uncovered a large Pre Classic frieze, dated between 300 and 200 BC. Center photograph: Lilian de Zea draws the details of the panel back at the lab. Photo 3: Lilian de Zea and Josue Guzman use her drawing as a reference and plan the details of the restoration and consolidation work on the frieze. Photo 4: Lilian de Zea works on the restoration of the top part of the panel, which repesents the central characters of the Popol Vuh's Maya Creation Myth, the Hero Twins Hunahpu and Ixbalanque |
Before the project started working at the site there were many looters in all of the Peten, as Hansen explains, “Since 1992 when we've had guards in cities throughout the basin we've had no new looters' trenches. When we didn't have the resources for that, we lost it all 100%... Every single structure [ever looted] has been destroyed, ripped through, torn apart, artifacts obtained and stolen, smuggled out of the country, taken to foreign museums and foreign collectors and the devastation [derived from looting] is complete”.
Richard Hansen has dedicated most of his life to the study of El Mirador and he's conscious of the fact that to understand a place so vast and rich in information it cannot be achieved in a short period of time, “This is not an event that we have going here, it's a process. And that's why I have dedicated 30 years of my life in this zone to try and understand it,” he adds, “Why burn it or destroy it if we can still understand it?”
Carolina Castellanos, Regional UNESCO Expert, fears for the conservation of the jungle and indicates that education and awareness are needed so that society as a whole may understand that the forest and the jungle must be adequately taken care of so that the ecosystem may keep functioning in harmony, “What does it mean if this were to be lost?” she asks, “And some people say, ‘nothing.' This is very serious, in other words we would have to conduct a survey and ask everybody, what does it mean if this were to be lost forever? What would it mean if this were not here for your children? What does it mean for future generations? In a world of climate change, in a world of global changes, what does this mean if the last little lung were to be lost forver? What will this imply for future generations?” For Castellanos we must stop thinking about ourselves only and start thinking about the world that we will leave our great grandchildren, “Not for your children, think of three or four more generations,” she says.
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Richard Hansen understands that the time that he and his team have to collect and interpret findings at El Mirador is very limited. This is because the artifacts, as well as the temples, have been subject to climatic effects in the jungle for thousands of years, which do not allow them to remain adequately preserved and eventually deteriorate due to environmental factors. A similar case is that of the rainforest, due to other pressures, in this case ecological ones. “In that case, before it can be destroyed, one must understand it. One must find a way to understand it; one must look for a way to take advantage of this knowledge for the sake of good science, of good conservation and for a sustainable development involving the communities. These three basic points are important in order to justify the conservation of all of this,” he says.
Scaffoldings and plastic awnings are the initial stage of an excavation, restoration and consolidation process. Before that archaeologist have already drawn up a very precise plan to accomplish what they needed to achieve at each structure. Here a massive stairway was revealed at the top of La Danta Complex that may now be appreciated by visitors at El Mirador.
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Carolina Castellanos, from UNESCO, says that conservation of archaeological sites such as El Mirador and their natural environmental is a challenge for Guatemalans and she believes that they should be proud and honored since something as valuable as the Cradle of the Maya Civilization is located right here in our country. “They are the ones [who] should take care of El Mirador like the treasure that it is, [since] the future of sites such as El Mirador will never be viable unless there is a wider social agreement than what we find here today. It's not a matter of authority, El Mirador does not belong to or is the sole responsibility of a few government bodies, more than anything else it belongs to the Guatemalan people,” she pointed out.
“We have the opportunity to investigate a rainforest culture that existed thousand of years ago,” Hansen adds. “Sometimes I ponder…what were the things that took them down the path of destruction? Because when they went, they left all their pottery on the floors of their buildings....and left their stone tools... and walked away forever.” |
Hansen says, “Hopefully 200 years from now, someone will stand in the same position we are in now, look across this forest and see much [of] the same things we are seeing now: flora, fauna, buildings and that's the goal, that's the reason we are here. When you realize how much blood and sweat and tears have gone into this…it's been a challenge, it's been a learning experience, but it's been an opportunity to share something with the world that we didn't know before. And [to] fight for a cause that's true, that's real. Generations from now, we'll have the opportunity to appreciate this and that's what it's all about. We're going to be gone in a little while; we're going to be dead and gone… Who's going to remember any of this? Who's going to remember what we did? I came to the conclusion years ago that science for the sake of science is sterile… and by conserving this [place], we're blessing the lives of an entire nation.”
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