It is a Zapotec enclave of the fifteenth century in southern Oaxaca, Mexico. It was believed that it was simply a fortress where soldiers were trimmed, it was in fact a fortified and expanding city. This is the history of the pre -Columbian city found in Mexico.
A researcher at McGill University discovered it. Guengola, as the site is called, had an extension of 360 hectares. It has more than 1,100 buildings, four kilometers of walls. It includes a network of internal roads and an urban layout clearly organized with temples and communal spaces such as ball games. Elites and commoners lived in separate neighborhoods.
Using sounds
Everything indicates that the city was abandoned just before the arrival of the Spaniards. His people moved only 20 kilometers away, in Tehuantepec, a small city where their descendants still live today. This will give researchers a better idea of the level of political and social organization of the Zapotec. And a greater understanding of their level of intervention in the encounter with the Spaniards.
The finding was made using a remote sensing tool known as Lidar. It is based on pulsating laser rays, on a process similar to sounding, to provide three -dimensional topographic information. “We were able to do it in two hours using remote sensing and scanning equipment from an airplane,” they explained in a statement.
The size and arrangement of the remaining constructed structures could be map. Then its use was inferred based on the artifacts found in the locations.
Frozen in time
How was power distributed in the city? They calculated how much space was destined to elite areas, such as temples and ball fields. It was compared to what was built in the areas used by commoners. The ball games were built in Mesoamerica with the purpose of practicing a ritual ball game, and represent both the underworld and fertility. It was a way to connect with the ancestors and seeds that grow under the earth, where the underworld is.
The city has only between 500 and 600 years and is surprisingly well preserved. You can walk there in the jungle and discover that the houses are still standing. You can see the doors, the halls, the bars that separate it from the other houses, so it is easy to identify a residential layout. The pre -Columbian city found in Mexico is a frozen place in time.
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