July 2012

New Amazing Mayan Discovery in Guatemala

"Currently, archaeologists are hard at work uncovering the rest of the temple."

 

Archaeologists have made yet another discovery that gives clues to the history and beliefs of the once great Mayan civilization.  The Mayans left behind countless numbers of sites as remnants of their history, though many have been swallowed by the jungle over the passage of centuries.  This latest find, dubbed the Temple of the Night Sun, dates back 1600 years to the Mayan Early Classic Age.

 

The temple was discovered while archaeologists worked to excavate another nearby ruin called the Diablo Pyramid.  This 45-foot tall structure is topped with a royal palace and a tomb and is thought to contain the remains of El Zotz, a dynastic founder.  The Temple of the Sun being so close would seem to confirm this theory.  Thinking it just another ruin, archaeologists did not expect to find what they did - a unique temple that portrays the Mayan sun god in a way that has not been seen elsewhere.

 

Adorning the temple are five-foot tall masks that show the sun god in his many forms, each representing a phase in the movement of the sun.  These types of decorations have been found at many sites, but none so far have included all of the sun god’s faces in one location.

Scottish mummies reveal ritualistic mysteries

A recent discovery in Scotland is bringing to light some very odd rituals that were practiced 3000 years ago in the region.  Some bodies were found more than a decade ago that few people thought anything about.  They were preserved by a peat bog and reburied, to be discovered by archaeologists in our modern times.  This practice isn’t too unusual for the time, but what is strange is the fact that these two bodies were composed of parts from six different people.

More destruction of history in Timbuktu

A few months back, I wrote about the travesty that was occurring in the historically and culturally rich city of Timbuktu, Mali.  Islamic extremists at that point had only just begun their takeover of the country, but now hold more than two-thirds of its territory.  And with their coup comes the destruction that seems to follow in the wake of extremist Islamic groups.  The victim this week is Timbuktu.

These extremists, who are said to belong to the Ansar Dine faction of Islam (and closely related to al-Qaeda), have been defiling Sufi mausoleums and tombs in an effort to rid the land of all non-Islamic influences.  Now they have even taken so far as to cause serious damage to a mosque - one of the holy places of their own religion.