Secrets of the Snake Altar (Full Episode) | Lost Treasures of the Maya | National Geographic

0:04 ALBERT: Okay, here we go.

0:08 Ready?

0:08 Let's turn it on.

0:10 OMAR: Yeah.

0:11 Wow!

0:11 Oh, wow.

0:12 ALBERT: Look at that.

0:14 That is nuts!

0:15 What are those?

0:18 Revealed.

0:19 From deep within the jungle.

0:22 Startling evidence of the Maya at war.

0:29 I'm Albert Lin.

0:31 Engineer...

0:32 There's a forgotten world down there.

0:34 Lost cities hidden in the jungle.

0:37 And National Geographic explorer.

0:39 The frontier of the Maya world is actually right under our feet.

0:43 I'm on a mission to uncover the secrets of one

0:45 of the world's most mysterious ancient civilizations, the Maya.

0:54 And right now, technology is writing a whole new story.

0:59 REPORTER (over TV): New technology reveals that ancient civilization in Central

1:02 America may have been much more complex than archaeologists believed.

1:07 ALBERT: In 2018, National Geographic broke the news of an incredible discovery.

1:13 (speaking French).

1:16 ALBERT: That captivated the entire world.

1:22 And I was right there to see it.

1:25 Wow!

1:26 Revealed from the sky.

1:28 TOM: This is the most important development in Maya archaeology in 100 years.

1:33 ALBERT: And on the ground.

1:36 Ah, it gives you like chills up your back.

1:40 Using 'LiDAR' technology that can see through the dense jungle like an X-ray.

1:45 Okay.

1:46 Are you ready to see it without the trees?

1:48 More than 60,000 man-made structures brought

1:51 to light in an incredible new treasure map.

2:02 ARCHAEOLOGIST: Very narrow.

2:04 ALBERT: Now, armed with the new map...

2:07 (speaking Spanish) ALBERT: Some of the world's most intrepid archaeologists...

2:12 LEILA: It's going to be dangerous.

2:14 ALBERT: Sure.

2:16 Are taking on the jungle.

2:18 FRANCISCO: Bhanny, there is a painted pot.

2:19 It's got an inscription.

2:21 ALBERT: In search of its secrets.

2:23 FRANCISCO: We have a skeleton.

2:26 ALBERT: All on a quest to rewrite the astonishing story of the Maya.

2:47 Alright!

2:48 To me, the Maya have always been one

2:50 of the most fascinating of all ancient civilizations.

2:56 But so much of what we thought we knew is wrong.

3:01 Down there right now history is being completely rewritten.

3:05 Armed with this new revolutionary treasure map,

3:07 archaeologists are on this journey of discovery, but on a massive scale.

3:13 This time I'm investigating the Maya at war.

3:19 Unearthing a rare ritual altar...

3:23 MARCELLO: This is the moment we've been waiting for for about a year.

3:26 Efraim, Efraim, Efraim!

3:29 ALBERT: With links to one of the most ruthless of all Maya dynasties.

3:34 I'll be exploring an ancient site that saw mass conflict.

3:38 Something went down like right here.

3:42 Right here people died.

3:44 And I'll be following one of the most startling of all the new discoveries.

3:49 EDWIN: Wow!

3:52 ALBERT: That's completing overturning...

3:54 EDWIN: Wow!

3:56 ALBERT: Everything experts thought they knew about warfare...

4:02 ALBERT: And the ancient Maya.

4:12 Deep in the jungles of Central America,

4:15 Guatemalan archaeologist, Edwin Roman-Ramirez is on a mission.

4:22 Heading for a remote mountain ridge in search of the Maya.

4:32 ALBERT: The Maya emerged 3,000 years ago in Central America,

4:38 across a region of what is now Guatemala,

4:40 Southern Mexico and adjoining countries.

4:46 The Maya tamed the jungle, creating cities of dazzling scale and complexity.

4:54 Forging a civilization that lasted over 2,000 years.

5:00 But as well as stunning glories,

5:02 there was a brutal side of blood and human sacrifice.

5:11 But apart from inscriptions and carvings little

5:13 is known about how they waged war.

5:18 Edwin is on the hunt for new evidence,

5:23 exploring the deep jungle outside an ancient city called El Zotz,

5:27 in the far north of Guatemala.

5:35 He's working with fellow archaeologist

5:36 and National Geographic explorer, Tom Garrison.

5:42 TOM: I mean this LiDAR data is incredible.

5:45 You know...

5:46 ALBERT: On the new high tech map

5:48 they can see evidence of huge man-made structures.

5:52 TOM: This looks like we have a pretty serious

5:55 causeway almost running up the side of the cliff face.

5:58 ALBERT: Before, these buildings were completely hidden beneath the jungle.

6:03 Now, they're being laid bare.

6:06 TOM: I'm thinking maybe if you start down here and climb up,

6:09 check out what that looks like and then maybe see what this earth work is.

6:14 It looks like a pretty big one.

6:17 ALBERT: Tom and Edwin think the newly identified

6:19 buildings could reveal some unique clues to Maya warfare.

6:24 TOM: I mean you look at these features here and, you know,

6:29 this one's almost eight meters tall.

6:32 EDWIN: Eight meters, Tom?

6:33 TOM: Yeah.

6:36 But, of course, we're not going to know 'til you get out there and check on it.

6:37 Yeah, this'll be exciting.

6:38 EDWIN: Okay, that sounds perfect.

6:39 TOM: Alright.

6:40 EDWIN: Thank you, Tom.

6:41 TOM: Yeah.

6:41 EDWIN: We'll see you later.

6:43 ALBERT: The new map reveals a mysterious series of buildings,

6:47 running two and a half miles along a steep ridge,

6:51 all seemingly connected to a whole complex of structures at its base.

7:01 Oppressive heat, dense vegetation and deadly wildlife make

7:08 this one of the most extreme frontiers in archaeology.

7:21 ALBERT: It's Edwin's 15th season working in these punishing conditions.

7:34 ALBERT: But it's the very first time with the new treasure map.

7:55 ALBERT: Then suddenly out of the dense jungle...

8:06 ALBERT: Edwin spots something.

8:09 Perched at the very top of the mountain ridge...

8:13 an ancient pyramid hidden for centuries.

8:18 And it seems the pyramid is just one

8:20 of a group of structures all revealed by new technology.

8:29 EDWIN: Ooh-hoo, yeah.

8:33 ALBERT: The new treasure map is the result of a massive survey,

8:36 charting over 800 square miles of jungle.

8:43 Called the Pacunam LiDAR initiative it's

8:46 bringing together an international consortium of experts.

8:52 One of the engineers behind the survey is Juan-Carlos Fernandez Diaz.

9:01 His team flies a plane over the dense jungle canopy.

9:07 Using high-tech scanning equipment,

9:09 billions of laser pulses are fired down and bounced back.

9:15 The technique is called LiDAR.

9:39 ALBERT: Only a tiny fraction of the pulses make it to the ground.

9:55 ALBERT: Once all the unwanted pulses reflected from the trees are filtered out,

10:00 the data that's left allows the engineers to build

10:03 a 3D map of the hidden jungle floor.

10:12 San Diego, California.

10:14 This is where I research using

10:17 digital technologies to explore the ancient world.

10:21 And I've been given very special access...

10:26 Look at this.

10:27 To explore the new data on a giant scale.

10:32 This is how the jungle looks from above.

10:35 But when LiDAR strips away the trees...

10:40 countless man-made structures appear.

10:45 In all, an incredible 60,000 hidden features have been revealed.

10:54 Two of the project leaders, National Geographic explorers,

10:58 Tom Garrison and Marcello Canuto have come to join me.

11:04 LiDAR.

11:06 MARCELLO: Wow, look at that!

11:07 TOM: Magic.

11:08 MARCELLO: Look at that.

11:10 Look at that.

11:11 Wow.

11:11 It's almost like we're flying over the ancient Maya world in a helicopter.

11:15 This is what is so exciting about LiDAR, it's humbling.

11:19 There are things that the LiDAR data is teaching me and teaching all of us.

11:22 TOM: We're not just talking about one new city, it's dozens.

11:25 It's a scale of discovery, like you're saying,

11:27 that it just blows everyone's mind.

11:30 MARCELLO: When I saw the first LiDAR coming out I said that's the future,

11:33 you know, that's what we have to do.

11:38 ALBERT: Back near the ancient Maya city of El Zotz,

11:41 the new map has led Edwin Roman-Ramirez to a spectacular discovery.

11:48 On top of this high mountain ridge hides an ancient pyramid.

12:22 ALBERT: Beyond the pyramid Edwin spots more ruins.

12:30 ALBERT: And surrounding them all, giant walls.

12:40 ALBERT: All predicted by LiDAR.

12:43 But this new site, with banks and ramparts,

12:46 looks nothing like a typical Maya city.

12:52 EDWIN: Look at that.

12:54 ALBERT: And its discovery could solve a massive mystery about the Maya at war.

13:02 EDWIN: Wow.

13:03 This is really amazing.

13:10 ALBERT: Edwin Roman-Ramirez has followed the new

13:12 LiDAR treasure map to a startling discovery.

13:18 The ruins of what Edwin believes was once a vast fortified citadel,

13:24 protected by the mountain ridge and surrounded by massive ramparts.

13:30 Which makes it a groundbreaking find.

13:35 Because in all the Maya world,

13:37 permanent defenses on such a scale have barely ever been found.

13:45 Before the LiDAR map experts believed the Maya

13:48 settled conflict in a very unusual way.

13:52 They thought it was highly ritualized,

13:54 involving only the capture and sacrifice of kings.

13:58 But now the new evidence suggests something very different.

14:04 On the giant screen,

14:06 Edwin's mountain fortress is evidence of war on a colossal scale.

14:13 Wow.

14:14 Look at that ridge.

14:16 TOM: Yeah, this is amazing.

14:18 I mean you can't really say this is anything other than a Maya fortress.

14:23 You can see big ditch and rampart systems.

14:26 The one up there that's eight meters high.

14:30 So, you know, it's like 25 feet tall.

14:34 This is a heavily protected area.

14:36 Now we're looking west, and as we move up to the next couple

14:41 of ridges we start to see lone stone structures,

14:44 and what this could be would be a system of watch-towers, of surveillance.

14:50 ALBERT: Watchtowers?

14:51 TOM: See that one right there?

14:52 ALBERT: Yeah, yeah.

14:54 TOM: Yeah.

14:55 They're monitoring this landscape.

14:56 You see a feature like this and you

14:58 know that you're looking at a landscape of conflict.

15:02 This is a fortress, it's a military installation, people are at war.

15:13 ALBERT: Edwin returns from the fortified ridge,

15:18 because down on the valley floor there are remains of more buildings.

15:25 Here, excavations have already begun.

15:29 And from one of the first test pits...

15:36 FERNANDO: Awesome.

15:39 ALBERT: There's an astonishing discovery.

15:46 ALBERT: An incredibly rare and perfectly preserved

15:48 flint spearhead well over 1,000 years old.

16:15 ALBERT: A deadly spearhead.

16:18 Fortified ramparts.

16:20 And a line of watchtowers leave the archaeologists in no doubt.

16:27 TOM: You're looking at a landscape of conflict.

16:30 ALBERT: This is compelling evidence of all out war,

16:35 right at the heart of the Maya world.

16:43 It's incredible for me to think that all that jungle wilderness

16:46 down there was once a landscape of fear and of conflict.

16:52 On a scale that experts had never imagined until the LiDAR survey.

17:00 But I want to explore evidence of war for myself.

17:05 Where I'm headed is so remote the only

17:08 way in is by helicopter, and then by river.

17:14 This is the age of discovery, this is what it's all about.

17:19 Yeah!

17:26 I'm joining Puerto Rican archaeologist Omar Alcover.

17:31 Far beyond the Pacunam survey area he's part of a team

17:34 that is taking remote archaeology to a whole new level.

17:42 Are we in no-man's land right now, what is this?

17:44 OMAR: We're basically in international waters.

17:46 The river's shared by both Mexico and Guatemala,

17:48 and it's one of the natural borders between the two countries.

17:55 ALBERT: 2,000 years ago these banks were home to two rival Maya kingdoms.

18:02 An ancient Maya city called Piedras Negras.

18:07 And Macabilero, a nearby group of barely-explored ruins.

18:15 At both sites, cutting edge technology is revealing

18:19 more startling evidence of the Maya at war.

18:29 The sun's now making its way right overhead and the temperatures have picked up.

18:36 So it's going to be a challenge.

18:40 I'm going up a little bit more bionic than most.

18:44 But it's worth it.

18:47 This jungle has secrets to reveal and we're going to find them right now.

19:00 ALBERT: I'm climbing through isolated

19:03 mountain jungle with archaeologist Omar Alcover.

19:08 For the Maya this would have been just as tough.

19:19 This is some of the densest jungle I've ever been.

19:22 I mean it's old growth, you know.

19:25 You can't see more than 50 or a 100 feet in any direction, then it's just green.

19:29 The challenge is trying to find anything in all this.

19:33 Luckily for us, we've got technology.

19:38 Okay.

19:40 Ready, let's turn it on.

19:42 OMAR: Yeah.

19:43 ALBERT: Wow.

19:44 OMAR: Oh, wow.

19:46 Nice.

19:47 Yeah.

19:47 ALBERT: Look at that.

19:49 That is nuts.

19:51 What are those?

19:52 Is that just all masonry?

19:55 I've built data gathered by Omar into an augmented reality platform.

20:00 And suddenly I can strip away the trees revealing

20:04 a vast wall stretching over 100 yards across the hillside.

20:10 It's like an x-ray right through the trees, huh?

20:12 That is crazy.

20:16 Let's go check it out.

20:17 OMAR: Yeah, let's go.

20:22 ALBERT: It's amazing to think each one of these blocks

20:25 would have been cut and hauled up here by hand.

20:32 But until Omar combined thousands of close-up photographs into a single model it

20:36 was impossible to see the entire line of the wall from a distance.

20:44 And what it reveals is the incredible effort made

20:48 by the Maya here to defend themselves from attack.

20:55 OMAR: The fact that they built over seven of these on the top

20:59 of a mountain means the threat of a violent encounter was very real.

21:04 ALBERT: Something went down like right here, right here people died.

21:08 OMAR: Yeah, probably, probably.

21:10 ALBERT: You're running up, you're trying to attack, you're running up,

21:12 you hit these bricks and then all of a sudden...

21:14 OMAR: They come at you with sling stones

21:16 or just loose rocks even that they throw down.

21:21 ALBERT: This is another fortress built

21:24 by a community under threat over 2,000 years ago,

21:29 right at the extremes of the Maya world.

21:35 Along with Edwin's citadel near El Zotz,

21:38 these discoveries are changing our whole understanding of Maya warfare.

21:56 It's been a really hard day, really hard.

22:00 But there's a lot more to see in this whole jungle,

22:03 and it's just going to have to wait until tomorrow.

22:32 64 miles east of Omar's fortress and back

22:35 inside the LiDAR survey area it's morning, and here they've got better weather.

22:44 That's good news for archaeologist Marcella Canuto.

22:51 He's on a mission to explore another

22:53 totally new discovery revealed by the LiDAR map.

22:58 MARCELLO: The site is relatively large.

23:00 You know, you can see several buildings, one, two, three, four, five,

23:02 and there's sort of maybe three buildings here and perhaps a little platform.

23:06 So it's a relatively substantial site.

23:09 ALBERT: Marcello has spent more than a decade

23:11 investigating an ancient Maya site called La Corona.

23:18 It's his first field season since the results of the Pacunam survey.

23:23 And on this giant screen Marcello is going

23:25 to see La Corona as he's never seen it before.

23:30 So hidden inside these trees...

23:32 MARCELLO: Yeah.

23:33 ALBERT: Is the site of La Corona.

23:34 MARCELLO: Yes.

23:36 So nestled in amongst all of these swamps and hidden under

23:38 those trees is the main part of La Corona right there.

23:41 ALBERT: Let's take a look, ready?

23:44 MARCELLO: Yeah.

23:45 Wow, look at that.

23:47 That looks great.

23:49 Look at that, look at that, wow.

23:52 ALBERT: That's your site.

23:54 MARCELLO: That's it, that's it.

23:55 That's it.

23:55 ALBERT: Wow.

23:56 MARCELLO: Yeah, that is so cool to see.

23:58 ALBERT: It just all of a sudden pops out of the trees.

24:00 MARCELLO: Yes, exactly.

24:02 ALBERT: How long have you been working here?

24:03 MARCELLO: We have been working here since 2005.

24:05 ALBERT: 2005.

24:05 MARCELLO: 2005.

24:06 ALBERT: And then only this year you see this LiDAR data.

24:08 MARCELLO: Yes, exactly.

24:10 This is the first time we're actually seeing the entire site in one shot.

24:14 ALBERT: No-one knows La Corona better than Marcello.

24:18 But the LiDAR map is even surprising him.

24:22 MARCELLO: Look at that, okay.

24:24 There is a causeway that I had not seen before right there,

24:30 coming through that central group, right there.

24:35 See those two little parallel lines.

24:37 ALBERT: Oh, yeah, I see they sort of run together...

24:38 MARCELLO: That's right.

24:39 That's right.

24:40 And what it's doing is it's actually...

24:41 Oh, that's amazing.

24:43 And that causeway is connecting up

24:44 to another group that we've never investigated before.

24:48 ALBERT: Did you know about this before?

24:50 MARCELLO: No, no, I did not know about this at all.

24:52 I really did not know about this.

24:53 Until I saw this data I had never seen that causeway before.

25:00 ALBERT: And it's not the only discovery revealed by the LiDAR.

25:05 Further, beyond the new causeway there's another previously unknown site.

25:12 Heading into the field outside La Corona, Marcello investigates.

25:17 MARCELLO: This is it.

25:19 Okay.

25:27 ALBERT: Before the LiDAR survey,

25:29 Marcello would never have found anything hidden in this jungle.

25:37 MARCELLO: Oh, yeah, yeah.

25:39 ALBERT: But right on cue.

25:41 MARCELLO: There it is!

25:48 MARCELLO: There's the main structure.

25:51 How cool is this?

25:52 Yep, this is the big one.

25:55 This is the main structure.

25:57 ALBERT: The LiDAR map has led Marcello

25:59 to some ancient remains completely new to archaeology.

26:04 MARCELLO: And there's the other one, there's the other one.

26:07 These are the two main structures in the site that we were looking for.

26:11 ALBERT: It's a massive find.

26:15 An entire settlement less than a day's march north of La Corona.

26:26 Future excavations will seek to reveal more

26:28 about this site and La Corona itself.

26:35 MARCELLO: In the simplest way possible we found

26:37 a new site today, that's a good day.

26:40 That's a really good day.

26:45 ALBERT: Back at the main site in La

26:47 Corona excavations have been underway for over a decade,

26:51 and it still continues to yield treasures.

26:59 MARCELLO: Working in a place like La Corona is almost a full time job.

27:06 So after 12 years it becomes just part of your life.

27:11 So of course it holds that kind of special place for all of us,

27:15 because this is something that we've dedicated our professional lives to.

27:21 ALBERT: One of the biggest finds of all

27:23 is being dug from the ground this season.

27:28 A lavishly carved stone monument.

27:34 Marcello made the discovery beneath a collapsed temple in one of La

27:41 Corona's grand plazas right at the heart of the ancient city.

27:48 Carvings on the monument contain clues to one

27:51 of the most powerful royal dynasties the Maya ever knew.

27:57 The Snake Kings.

28:01 For over a century experts have worked to decode Maya writing,

28:07 and much of it still remains a mystery.

28:12 But they have been able to decipher the story of the Snake Kings,

28:17 who rose in the north and conquered city after city, including La Corona.

28:28 Morning, the beginning of a crucial day at La Corona.

28:35 Marcello and his team are preparing to lift

28:37 the precious monument and transport it to safety,

28:41 at Guatemala's National Museum of Archaeology.

28:46 Its shape and location leave the team in no

28:49 doubt that this is a sacred ritual altar.

28:56 MARCELLO: We have evidence on the very surface of this altar of some burning,

29:01 some kind of ritual that involves fire.

29:05 The kinds of rituals that were involved here are difficult to imagine.

29:10 Rituals that in other sites involve burning

29:12 would have involved some form of blood-letting.

29:16 ALBERT: Torture and death were fundamental to Maya belief.

29:21 On sacred altars ceremonies would be held

29:24 to appease the gods with human sacrifice.

29:31 Guatemalan archaeologist,

29:32 Alejandro Gonzalez began excavating the altar over a year ago.

29:59 MARCELLO: So right now we're finally setting up the scaffolding

30:02 that's going to be required to lift the altar.

30:08 ALBERT: Made from solid limestone, it's twice the weight of a grand piano.

30:14 MARCELLO: This is the moment we've been waiting for for about a year.

30:18 So we'll see how this works.

30:33 So this is it.

30:47 MARCELLO: Minutes ago like the whole altar slightly moved,

30:50 and I was thinking to myself,

30:51 you know, that's the first time this altar has moved in the last 1500 years.

31:00 Everything is starting to tense up, both my nerves as well as the ropes.

31:07 ALBERT: For archaeologists it's the altar's

31:09 inscriptions that are most important, with clues to the epic rise of the Maya

31:15 Snake Kings hidden in its delicate and intricate carvings.

31:23 The altar depicts a powerful King of La Corona and it reveals his name,

31:28 Chak Took Ich'aak, a known ally of the Snake Kings.

31:36 And a longer inscription even tells us when it was dedicated, May 12th 544 AD.

31:47 Until this discovery, no-one knew that the powerful Chak Took Ich'aak

31:52 had anything to do with La Corona at all.

31:58 But the altar's Snake King inscriptions fit

32:02 with the new discoveries revealed in the LiDAR map.

32:08 MARCELLO: From La Corona this is exactly in the direction

32:11 that one would walk to go to Calakmul, the capital of the Snake Kings.

32:19 ALBERT: It turns out that Marcello's newly revealed causeway and settlements

32:22 went directly to the Snake's capital city, far to the north.

32:31 MARCELLO: What we think is going on is

32:32 that for the Snake Kings to do everything they

32:34 wanted to do in the rest of the Maya world they needed to go through La Corona.

32:42 (speaking Spanish).

32:47 ALBERT: Back in La Corona's ancient plaza,

32:49 Marcello and his team have been working in scorching heat for eight hours,

32:57 gradually inching the altar from the ground.

33:02 MARCELLO: It's lifted.

33:03 We're holding its weight and we're now just trying to guide it.

33:09 ALBERT: Time is running out.

33:15 MARCELLO: It's going to be our last shot because we're

33:17 going to lose the light in about half an hour,

33:19 in less than an hour we'll lose the light for sure.

33:23 ALBERT: After more than a 1,000 years in the ground

33:25 the precious altar hangs precariously in the air.

33:30 (shouting) MARCELLO: Efraim, Efraim, Efraim, Efraim.

33:47 ALBERT: The point of no return.

33:51 A ton of ancient Maya altar is hanging from a fragile jungle scaffold.

33:58 Night is fast approaching and the altar is still not safe.

34:19 MARCELLO: Oh, my god, it's on the truck.

34:21 -It's on the truck.

34:22 MARCELLO: It's on the truck.

34:25 I'm never finding another monument in my life!

34:37 ALBERT: At last they've done it.

34:48 MARCELLO: I'm ecstatic, I'm exhausted, but I'm ecstatic.

35:06 ALBERT: Back on Guatemala's border with Mexico the rain's finally cleared

35:10 and I'm with archaeologist Omar Alcover on the trail of another ancient city.

35:25 We just made it another 10 miles down the river in this wilderness,

35:29 this thick, deep jungle.

35:32 And we're now at one of the most

35:33 important archaeological sites in all of the Maya world,

35:36 and yet we're still in the most remote part of the Guatemalan jungle.

35:42 I've already explored a mighty fortress at Macabilero,

35:45 now I'm heading for an ancient city called Piedras Negras.

35:55 Far beyond the Pacunam survey area, Omar is a part of a team using a new

35:59 technology that could be another game changer in archaeology.

36:07 Here they've been doing LiDAR using drones.

36:14 It's more flexible than using conventional aircraft, and much more affordable.

36:22 Right now this technology is experimental, but the potential is massive.

36:29 The trees are so thick here.

36:31 OMAR: Yeah.

36:34 ALBERT: I've built the very first data map

36:36 of Piedras Negras into my augmented reality platform,

36:42 and I'm hoping it will let me see through this dense jungle.

36:45 Trees...

36:46 no trees.

36:49 That is awesome.

36:53 Wow.

36:54 OMAR: Oh, wow.

36:55 ALBERT: So that's a building?

36:57 OMAR: Yeah.

36:59 ALBERT: Whoa, look at that.

37:01 What is that?

37:02 OMAR: Yeah, that's a pyramid.

37:04 ALBERT: That is so awesome, it's like a window into the past.

37:08 This is incredible.

37:09 I mean this is just...

37:11 It's almost like magic, you know,

37:12 all of a sudden you can just delete the trees and there you go.

37:17 For the very first time, thanks to drone LiDAR,

37:20 I can see the ancient remains of what were

37:23 once the giant pyramids of a lavish royal court.

37:30 Excavations are even helping to predict how

37:33 many of the buildings might have looked.

37:41 They're so different from the first fortress at Macabilero.

37:45 Omar's in no doubt, this royal court was

37:48 built by a different group of Maya people.

37:52 And he believes that the two groups were at war.

38:00 Did something happen between here and Macabilero?

38:02 OMAR: Yeah.

38:03 I mean Macabilero gets abandoned, but Piedras Negras rose, not only in power,

38:08 but in population and size immediately after Macabilero was abandoned.

38:12 ALBERT: So something must have gone down?

38:13 OMAR: Mmhmm.

38:22 ALBERT: It's intriguing to think that 2,000 years ago this lavish royal court

38:29 of Piedras Negras could have been

38:32 at war with the nearby settlement of Macabilero.

38:37 And Omar believes that conflict might have continued for more than 600 years,

38:44 until around 350 AD,

38:46 when the fortress of Macabilero fell and its settlement was abandoned.

38:55 Piedras Negras was victorious and flourished into a mighty Maya kingdom.

39:06 OMAR: Its name in ancient Mayan...

39:08 ALBERT: Would have been what?

39:09 OMAR: Would have been Yo'k'ib.

39:10 ALBERT: Yo'k'ib.

39:11 What does that mean?

39:12 OMAR: It's like the home of the turtle lords.

39:14 ALBERT: The turtle lords?

39:15 OMAR: Mmhmm.

39:16 So that's how the royal court identified themselves, as the turtle lords.

39:20 ALBERT: We're standing on the hallowed grounds

39:21 of the ancient turtle lords right now?

39:24 OMAR: Yeah.

39:25 ALBERT: With a window into their world.

39:30 In Maya mythology, turtles were important.

39:35 Their shells were associated with earth gods

39:38 and represented the cracked soil that crops grew from.

39:44 The turtle lord of Piedras Negras were

39:46 the self-styled lords of the life-giving earth itself.

39:53 Oh, look at this, this is an actual room, huh?

39:56 OMAR: Yeah, so this is the entrance to one of them.

39:58 ALBERT: Wow.

40:01 Exploring the grand royal court of Piedras Negras I can still sense their power.

40:10 Look at these massive stairs and these terraced mounds.

40:14 You're basically looking at the blood,

40:16 sweat and tears of hundreds and hundreds of people over many generations.

40:21 OMAR: Yeah, so that's what basically highlights the power these Kings had,

40:25 able to mobilize all of the resources and people

40:28 that would have been necessary to build a space like this.

40:32 It really accentuates the power of the turtle lords here.

40:38 ALBERT: And now, after centuries of decay,

40:40 modern archaeology and cutting-edge LiDAR from drones can fully

40:44 reveal this incredible ancient palace for the very first time.

40:53 Before LiDAR most of what we knew of Maya war

40:57 came from drawings depicting ritual conflict and the capture of kings.

41:03 But now that's completely changing.

41:09 Revealed by new technology...

41:18 ALBERT: A fortified citadel at the heart of the Maya world, with ramparts,

41:23 watch-towers, and even the incredibly rare evidence of a weapon of war.

41:30 EDWIN: That's a really cool find.

41:33 ALBERT: A ritual altar connecting the city of La

41:35 Corona to the powerful warring dynasty of the Snake Kings.

41:41 MARCELLO: That's the first time this altar has moved in the last 1500 years.

41:45 ALBERT: And a settlement pointing towards their capital far to the north.

41:50 MARCELLO: There it is.

41:52 There's the main structure.

41:54 How cool is this?

41:57 ALBERT: All newly discovered evidence of conflict being made by technology.

42:04 TOM: It's a much more sophisticated idea

42:06 of conflict and war than you think of when

42:09 you see pictures of Maya Kings capturing a single

42:12 person by the hair in battle, you know.

42:15 That's a single event.

42:17 MARCELLO: This tells you this is not small scale.

42:19 These are, this is a landscape that is

42:23 riddled with conflict and was for centuries,

42:26 and this is something that we would never

42:28 have been able to tell without the LiDAR.

42:33 ALBERT: With tens of thousands of new

42:35 LiDAR discoveries still waiting to be explored...

42:38 TOM: It's incredible.

42:39 It's a revolution in our field.

42:41 It is changing the way that we do Maya archaeology.

42:45 ALBERT: The jungles of Central America can only have more secrets to give up.

42:50 TOM: We're definitely talking about a period

42:52 that is pre-LiDAR and post-LiDAR in Maya archaeology,

42:56 and everything that we know now is going

42:59 to be different from what we knew before.

43:02 It's that big of a change.

43:04 ALBERT: It almost feels like the invention of the CAT scan or the x-ray,

43:06 but for archaeology.

43:12 From high in the sky to beneath the trees,

43:17 into the very depths of the Maya world,

43:20 archaeologists are still just beginning to reveal the extraordinary

43:26 world of one of our planet's greatest ancient civilizations,

43:32 the mysterious jungle kingdoms of the Maya.