01x01 - Cradle of the Maya

[bunniefuu]

The sun is coming.

The Gods won't stop him.

Your smoke will go with them.

At the dawn

of one of the Americas'

greatest civilizations

lies a mystery I've been trying

to solve for more than a decade.

Whispers of a mythical city,

lost in the jungles of Mexico,

home to the origins of the Maya.

No harm will come to him.

My search

for this forgotten city

begins at one of the Maya's

most iconic sites, Palenque.

I want to discover

where the people

who built Palenque came from,

and maybe shed new light

on the birth

of the Maya civilization itself.

♪

One more turn down here?

Oh, there it is.

Wow.

Wow.

The tomb of one

of the most important kings

of the entire Maya world.

What are these symbols

representing?

It's like a map of the creation

of the Maya world.

It represents the origins

of Palenque and of the Mayas.

But we don't know exactly where

is the place of the origins.

It's a mystery.

Archaeologist Josuhé Lozada,

from the National Institute

of Anthropology and History,

is an expert

in interpreting Maya symbols,

also called glyphs.

I better start scanning.

My handheld LiDAR scanner uses

laser technology to gather data,

allowing us to create

a high-definition 3D model

of the glyphs

and search for clues

to the location

of this lost origin city.

This is the search

I've always been waiting for.

The place of the origins.

The beginning.

600 AD.

The Maya civilization

is at its peak,

stretching across parts

of Central America

and into southern Mexico,

where the regional

capital of Palenque

is home to around

20,000 inhabitants.

This was the Maya's golden age,

but I want to explore

their origins.

Where did these ancient masters

of mathematics,

astronomy and writing come from?

How did the remarkable story

of the Maya begin?

Hey, this is Josuhé.

My technology team,

Joe and Duncan,

are using advanced 3D software

to enhance the LiDAR scans

we made in the tomb,

so that we can examine

the glyphs in forensic detail.

We processed

your scans inside the tomb.

Amazing.

Wow.

I want to see any symbols

that might be describing

this mythical city.

Let's see, let's see.

Ah, this one.

It is a shell with

the emblem glyph

of the place of the origins.

It say "mat,"

and "mat" in Maya

is cormorant.

A cormorant is like

a fishing kind of bird?

Yes.

It's the land

of the cormorants.

The Cormorant City.

What else do you see in here?

We can see the split mountain

with many caves.

It's the mountain

of the origins.

The sacred hollow mountain

that emerged

from the primordial water,

and here is the water.

Like a lake.

Okay.

So, there's a mythical city

somewhere where

there's cormorants,

a hollow or split mountain,

and water.

Palenque lies on the edge

of Mexico's largest

tropical rain forest.

Let's see if we can find

anything nearby.

We'll focus on isolating the

closest viable locations first.

This looks like

mountains down here.

And a lot of water, too.

There is a very important river

that is in the south

of Palenque,

the Tulijá river,

and it's connected

with the lakes

of the Lacandon Jungle.

The lakes

of the Lacandon Jungle.

That's where we got to go.

Hey, Joe and Duncan. How are

you guys doing back there?

Hey, Albert, yeah,

doing good. We're on your six.

We're traveling

around 60 miles southeast

from Palenque, searching for

the source of the Tulijá River,

believed to be in a remote

lake district called Mensabak,

in the heart of

the Lacandon Jungle.

Looks like this route

follows pretty much

the path of the river, so

just follow it

all the way upstream.

Get as close as we can

to its source.

Yeah, sounds good, Albert.

The oldest

Maya settlements date

from around 1,000 years

before Palenque.

The most important of these,

sometimes called origin cities,

were built around

sacred natural features

like lakes and mountains.

The ancient Maya

would often follow rivers

back to their source,

to find them.

This looks promising.

This must be it.

We got here.

Right before dark.

Josuhé believes that

the Tulijá River originates

at a series of pools,

about a two-mile hike from here,

but through

thick jungle wetlands.

So, tomorrow's gonna be

a long, tough day.

Time to get some sleep.

Agh!

Lot of spikes. Lot of spikes.

Look at this.

Wow.

That's a cenote.

Wow.

It's beautiful.

During the rainy season,

this whole area floods.

Pools, or cenotes,

like this one,

become part of a larger system

that feeds the Tulijá River.

If the Maya believed that

this was the sacred source,

there could be clues

in the water.

We got to go inside, right?

Yes, we need to explore.

As we scan the water,

our eyes are drawn to something

totally unexpected.

Wow.

Yeah.

Wow, it's right over here.

You see the stones there.

It follows the whole line.

Okay, let's take a look.

Huge hand-carved stone blocks,

one on top of the other,

rising 20 feet

up from the floor.

It's an artificial cenote.

I think that it's a quarry.

A quarry?

For finding rocks

to build structures.

Mm-hmm.

How old do you

think this is?

The bigger the blocks,

the older they are.

I think they are from the times

before Palenque.

Wow.

The beginning

of the Maya civilization.

They obtained the rocks

to build their pyramids.

So, if these rocks

were pulled from this cenote

to build something, that

something must be close by.

Yes.

Hauling huge blocks

through this terrain

would have been brutal.

So where were they taking them?

From here we go up.

Okay.

It definitely feels like

I'm seeing blue

above that line there.

Yes.

Let's send the drone up.

Let's see if we can get a view.

Look at this.

Wow.

The lake.

It's just like in that glyph.

Could this be the lake we saw

on the glyphs back at Palenque?

Is the origin city

we're searching for

hidden somewhere out there?

Joe, Duncan.

Do you guys copy?

Copy you, Albert.

The jungle

is super dense up here.

Hold your position,

and I'll update you

when we reach the spot.

We've traveled

from the flooded quarry

to Noh K'uh, a remote

archaeological site

on the southern side

of the lake.

Santiago, are there a lot

of snakes out here?

Yes, so just be careful

where you step on the ground.

Archaeology professors

Santiago Juarez and Joel Palka

have discovered evidence

of an early

Maya settlement here.

Agh.

Looks like it clears out

a little bit up here.

Look, there's definitely

something here.

Definitely

a change in elevation.

What is this?

What's this ledge?

Wow, yeah.

Is that all

is this, uh

Is this shaped?

It's, uh,

made from a quarry.

There you go,

you got a corner right there.

So, this is the corner

of a, of what?

Of the top of the building.

Oh, you're kidding me?

So, we got

like a step here.

Wow.

Yeah, they're

starting here, too.

Looks like they leveled off

this structure.

Yeah, let me

clear it out a little.

Wow.

Yeah, see, a nice

little rectangular line

over here.

Keeps going here,

then comes back this way.

Oh, you can barely

make it out, huh?

When did this get built?

Uh, 2,500 years ago.

2,500 years ago.

People lived here?

Yes.

So, this is

way before Palenque?

Exactly.

So, we're looking at something

that predates Palenque

by at least 1,000 years.

This site and the

flooded quarry we discovered

suggest there was significant

Maya activity in this area,

right at the beginning

of the Maya era.

What do you think

this building was?

Oh, so if we're

looking at the way

the sun is rising,

this would have been a platform

to welcome the rising sun.

Wow.

Basically an observatory?

Yes.

From this plateau,

they would have mapped the stars

and the movement of the sun?

Yes, exactly.

We're looking at

ancient astronomers.

Joel and Santiago

believe that this site

could be part

of a much larger settlement,

reaching deeper into the jungle.

But the only way to see

if they're right

is by launching the drone

and scanning the whole area.

Hey, Joe, Duncan.

How's it going?

Yeah, I got one

for you guys.

Let's get the drone up,

and I'll send you

the GPS coordinates

of where to send it, okay?

Okay, drone's going up.

Okay, start motors.

The drone carries

state-of-the-art

LiDAR technology,

which beams light signals

through the canopy

to the jungle floor.

So, you can see the drone

there, it's just starting.

But the thickness

of this canopy means

an accurate scan of Noh K'uh

will take several days.

We've arranged to base ourselves

in the nearby village

of Mensabak,

home to the Lacandon Maya,

where the team can

charge their batteries

and process our LiDAR data.

The Lacandon were never truly

colonized by the Spanish,

making them almost unique

in the Maya world.

Today they are the guardians

of this highly protected

lake district.

I'm Albert.

Ah, your name is Albert.

Very well.

Let's go?

Yeah?

I'll gladly accompany you.

Mincho is one

of the community leaders.

This way?

I want to see if

the local people recognize

any of the symbols

that we scanned at Palenque.

Wow, this is incredible,

everybody's here.

You guys want to pull

those glyphs up?

Wow.

Wow.

Look at that.

So, zoom in

on that one.

Are there cormorants

around here?

Well, yes, there is a zone

in the area of the lagoon

where lots of cormorants

have been seen.

There's another symbol

that we found,

which shows a split mountain.

Can we pull that up?

Yep.

Are there big mountains

around the lake

that might have, I don't know,

like, uh, caves or?

Well, the one that we know

when we have traveled

to the area

is the mountain of Chak Aktun.

It's split.

Chak Aktun.

It's a mountain that's got

a split down the middle?

Yes.

Can somebody help

guide us there to Chak Aktun?

Yes, yes, we could go.

Wow.

This landscape is

sacred to the Maya.

Agreeing to lead us through it

is a deep show of trust in us.

I hope we don't let them down.

Look at this.

It's amazing, isn't it?

Through here?

Sí.

First we have to cross the lake.

Maya guides

K'in and Bor

will lead us to the mountain.

And Mexican archaeologist

and climber Arcelia García

will help me explore it.

That's got to be

the Red Mountain.

Looks like it.

Chak Aktun.

Chak Aktun, or Red Mountain,

lies around two miles

to the northwest

of the archaeological site

of Noh K'uh.

I think I see some cormorants.

Are those cormorants

right there?

Yeah.

Just like in the glyphs!

Can I pass you that rope?

Yeah.

Let's go.

Okay.

Looks like there's

a little trail up here.

You need to hit this

to tell the Lord that

you are coming to his house.

To tell the mountain?

Uh-huh.

Oh, okay.

Okay.

The ancient Maya believed

that a powerful god

split a mountain with an axe,

releasing sacred seeds

from which human life originated.

This is a powerful place.

I can feel it in my bones.

What is this? Oh!

What?!

You got to see this.

What is this?

Wow.

A hole into the mountain.

The wind comes out of here.

Here it breathes.

Mountains are

living, breathing things.

Wow.

It's unique, there is

no other place like it.

I mean, a mountain

with a hollow core.

This has to be this symbol

that's being referred to

at Palenque.

You think this is what this is?

Sí.

The split mountain.

That's incredible.

Let's go.

Vamos, vamos.

Wow.

Hey, Albert!

Yeah.

There's another one over here.

Another entrance.

There's got to be

a connected cave system, right?

Right.

If this is

the hollow mountain,

these tunnels could be

the entry point.

We'll take one each.

You take those.

Yeah.

You have a radio?

When the ancient Maya

discovered mountains

like those described

in their origin myths,

they became the center

of their spiritual world.

We're going into a place

that's reserved for the gods

or the souls of the dead.

Hope the gods are with us.

I'm in another world

right now.

Alright, Arcelia, how are you

doing on your end?

This rock is razor-sharp.

Yeah, the rock is

pretty sharp here also.

But all good.

Arcelia,

I'm at the bottom

of this first section

of the cave.

It's beautiful.

Hey, Albert,

if you see any stalagmites

or stalactites,

look around there.

Oh, look.

There's a stalactite

right there.

For the Maya,

those were sacred spaces.

So, see if you see

anything around them.

Ah, anything in here.

Looking in all the cracks.

Not sure I want to know

what I'm gonna to find.

What is that?

Oh, I'm finding something!

Hey, I've got pottery.

I've really got pottery,

right here.

Are you serious?

Ha ha, right where

you said beneath the stalactite.

I've got a piece of pottery.

I think I can see your light,

is that, is that you?

Hey.

Hey.

The tunnels are connected.

That's incredible.

This must be a whole system.

But right where you were

saying to look,

directly below the stalactite,

look at this.

I mean, that's clearly pottery,

isn't it?

Yeah, it is.

Look at this piece.

This looks pre-Palenque.

I can tell because it's thicker.

This is like waxy.

Can you feel it?

Yeah,

and you can almost see

that there was paint there.

Yeah.

I've seen pottery like this,

like this color, in Noh K'uh.

In Noh K'uh?

Yeah.

Wow.

Do you think this was put here

by the people of Noh K'uh?

Yeah, most likely.

Oh, my gosh.

I mean, that's 2,500 years ago.

I can picture them,

coming down from there

with the ropes

all the way here

with their torches,

carefully placing the pottery

just in the right spot.

Alright,

I'm going to get down

to the second level now, okay?

2,500 years ago, the people who

climbed inside this mountain

believed they were entering

a living being.

A powerful, sacred entity.

Imagine how they must have felt.

It's overwhelming, really.

Wow.

I mean, look at this place.

Wow.

What a chamber.

Look, there's bats.

Here there's no sunlight.

So, the deeper it is, the closer

we are to the deities.

To the gods.

Exactly.

Wow.

We're really in the heart

of the mountain.

This is a split mountain.

It feels like the glyphs

that we scanned in Palenque

are coming to life here.

The cormorants, the lake,

and now this incredible

split mountain

suggest this could be the site

of the lost origin city.

But it's just so vast.

Over on the other side

of the lake,

Joe and Duncan have been

carefully scanning the area

around Noh K'uh to try and

find out how big it really is.

How are you guys doing?

Hey, Albert,

it's Duncan here.

I think we're

onto a good thing.

You wouldn't believe

what we found up here.

Make your way over

to Chak Aktun.

Let's do a scan

of the whole mountain.

The LiDAR scanner

beams 400,000 lasers

towards the ground every second.

The canopy's so dense.

Yeah.

While many beams reflect

off the top of the trees,

some make it all the way down

to the jungle floor,

allowing the team

to build a 3D model,

which may reveal

any human-made features.

Wow, look at that.

With over 150 acres of

jungle to cover at Red Mountain,

there's a long night of scanning

and data processing ahead.

You guys get some

of the data in?

Just looking

at the point cloud now

for the, from the aerial LiDAR

of the whole

of the Red Mountain, so.

Okay, so this is

the top-down aerial view, right?

Oh, my gosh!

What is that?

Can we remove

the trees off the mountain?

Of course.

Unbelievable.

Look how the, the Maya

flattened the mountain.

It's a four-sided pyramid.

The entire mountain's modified.

Like, how special is that?

We can use the algorithm

to pull out the features.

Oh, wow,

look at that.

Look at everything here.

That looks like

a massive temple

Yes.

formed out

of the mountain itself.

It's almost like whoever drew

this symbol at Palenque

was literally drawing a diagram,

a schematic diagram,

of this exact place.

Yes.

Exactly.

Our scans have

revealed details

of an enormous pyramid temple

site at Red Mountain.

But there is no evidence

of a human settlement there.

If this really is

the split mountain

described in the glyphs,

we must figure out where the

people who worshipped it lived.

You guys also did a bit more

at Noh K'uh, right?

Let's fly over there.

Okay,

let's strip away the trees.

Whoa.

They leveled

everything off.

See this

gigantic rectangle here?

Oh, and there's another one

there and another one there.

It's rectangle

on top of rectangle.

These are all artificially

constructed hills.

That's something

I never saw before.

This is an urban community.

Wow.

I mean, it almost

looks like a modern city system,

doesn't it?

It does, but

at the time that this was built,

what, almost 2,500, 3,000

years ago, is that right?

Right, right.

Did the Maya

have large cities?

No, so this is

a first-generation city.

So, the idea of even having

a city is completely new.

Based on the scale of this

and what I already know,

I would say it's one

of the earliest cities

in the Maya region,

around 800 BC.

Wow.

How many people do you think

made up this city?

Oh, gosh. I wouldn't

be surprised if this city,

at its peak,

was about 20,000 people.

20,000 people

at the time

when the Maya civilization

was just beginning?

Yes.

It is a sacred city space.

Do you think

that the mountain

was part of what attracted them?

I think that's

definitely the big draw here.

This is a powerful place.

Now you got me wondering if

the site just keeps connecting.

I mean, based

we haven't seen the boundaries

of Noh K'uh there.

I just got to get

back out on that lake,

find out if that

human settlement at Noh K'uh

and the temple site

at Chak Aktun are connected.

If they are, and this is

one giant sacred city,

this could be one of the most

extraordinary discoveries

in the Maya world.

You guys pair off.

We'll keep going,

and then try to make a base.

Did we bring enough machetes?

Alright, here we go.

We're splitting

our search team into two.

Josuhé, Mincho and I

are headed to an area

on the western side of the lake

between Noh K'uh

and Red Mountain,

where our earlier scans

picked up

some interesting results,

while Joe and Duncan

will focus their attention

on an unexplored area

in the east.

We must be getting close now.

Yes.

Look at this, Albert.

See this shape,

the perfect shape of that rock.

You can see the angles here.

It must have come

from uphill somewhere.

So, let's keep going up.

I think so.

Cut rocks!

Ah, look at this.

There are a lot of rocks

here in a line.

It looks like a platform.

Yes.

Maybe it's an observatory,

because in a high position,

and face to the lake.

Another observatory.

Their world begins and falls

with the sun.

We found something all the way

out here. Incredible.

Incredible.

Ah.

Could this observatory

be connected in some way

to the one we saw at Noh K'uh?

We need to get the LiDAR team

over here now.

Hey, Joe, uh, Duncan,

do you guys copy?

I'll send you our coordinates.

Let's scan this area.

Wow, this jungle is dense.

GPS is good.

Start motors.

How are you guys doing?

Yeah, good, I'm just

mapping the perimeter here

at the moment.

Will our data show us

how the sacred mountain

Chak Aktun

is connected

to the city of Noh K'uh

and finally reveal

the true scale

of this extraordinary

lost Maya world?

Thank you

for hosting us

over this last couple of weeks.

It's been so wonderful.

So how was the scanning?

How is the processing?

With the city of Noh K'uh

in the south

and the sacred temple site

of Chak Aktun in the north,

we can now examine the new data

to reveal whether the two sites

are connected.

Alright, let's see what

you guys got in the west.

Wow, another structure.

Yeah, it's a site.

Yeah.

So, what do you think this is?

There's pyramids,

there's temples,

there's a rectangular

palace complex maybe.

A palace emerging

in the jungle.

You guys scanned this whole area

on the east of the lake,

too, right?

Yeah that shouldn't

be level. Oh, wow.

All that's all modified.

Oh, this wholeoh!

Wow, it looks like, like a,

like a structure,

like a platforms for the Mayas.

You can see the perfect shape

of the three mounds.

I just thought

of something

really, really,

really interesting.

This is really, like,

blowing me away right now.

In Palenque there's

three temples side by side

with a plaza in the middle.

You go to that east site,

and it's the same plan,

but 1,000 years earlier.

So maybe

the very same people

that are building this

are building Palenque?

Yes.

Wow.

A pre-Palenque!

The scale of what we're

revealing here is breathtaking.

The links between Palenque

and Noh K'uh feel undeniable.

Could this really be

the origin city

we've been searching for?

Let's turn on

all the different features

that have been identified.

I think you're gonna be

amazed at what we've picked up.

Oh, wow.

It's just everywhere we look.

Oh, wow.

Wow.

I mean,

the whole lake system

is one massive complex.

So, here's Noh K'uh.

It's a really big city.

What is this?

There's like

an alignment of the buildings

at Noh K'uh that's all

pointing the same way.

Wow.

It aligns almost like an arrow

to the split mountain.

What is happening there?

Many Maya cities

are built

according

to different orientations.

This one's oriented

to the sacred Red Mountain,

and maybe the pathway

of the sun.

It seems to me that they

are standing in Noh K'uh

and tracking

the movements of the sun

at different times of the year.

The sun?

What would be the most important

dates along their calendar?

August 13th.

The start of the Maya calendar

and the creation

of the current world.

August 13th, let's see

what the sun looks like.

Oh, my gosh!

Are you kidding me?

The sun sets on the very top

of the split mountain,

on the beginning day

of their calendar.

Their origin day.

It's a connection

between the people

and their city and the landscape

and the sun.

It's all connected.

It's quite amazing.

The sacred mountain

of Chak Aktun

is the spiritual hub

of a vast lost city,

wrapping right around the lake.

Do you think that it's

the origin place for Palenque,

or possibly more?

More, more.

It's a very, very important city

in the Maya world.

Could we be looking at

the, the cradle of the Maya

civilization itself?

It's a cradle.

It definitely is.

It's a large city on a lake

with a split mountain.

And it's so early.

It is definitely

an origin place.

The land of the origins.

We've looked

for a lot of lost cities before,

but right now

what it feels like

is that we're looking

at more than a city,

we're looking at the beginning

of an idea,

the beginning of a people,

a civilization.

I set out in search

of a mythical city,

home to the origins of the Maya.

I found a split mountain,

carved into a massive

temple site.

A sacred lake surrounded

by countless houses,

home to tens of thousands

of people.

Palaces and observatories

aligned to the pathways

of the sun.

A cradle of the ancient Maya.

This lost city provides

a tangible link to the origins

of one

of the Western Hemisphere's

most important civilizations.

Our technology has

illuminated a world

that had become blurred

by myth and legend.

But it was the modern Maya

who helped us understand

the origins of their ancestors

were intrinsically linked

to the natural world

they worshipped

and added a new chapter

to the origin story of the Maya

and the history of all of us.