CAMPECHE, MEXICO—BBC News reports that traces of a Maya city have been discovered in an ecological reserve on the Yucatán Peninsula by researchers led by Ivan Sprajc of Mexico’s National Institute for Anthropology and History (INAH). Airborne laser scanning of the area conducted by researchers from the University of Houston helped the team to spot the structures, which are covered with dense vegetation and situated on elevated terrain surrounded by wetlands. One of the pyramid-shaped buildings stands about 50 feet tall. Sprajc said that the site would have served as an important regional center. It has been named Ocomtún, the Mayan word for stone column. The many cylindrical stone columns found in the city are thought to have been placed at the entrances to rooms in the upper parts of the buildings, Sprajc added. Pottery at the site suggests the city was inhabited between A.D. 600 and 800, which is known as the Late Classic period. To read about powerful women of the Yucatán's Maya kingdoms, go to "Jungle Realm of the Snake Queens."
