Wait, so does this mean that the pre-Colombian Americas were not the happy, peaceful place the modern apologists have made it out to be?
Next thing you know you will tell me that there was slavery and ritual murder too.
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Forty five years out of college, and nothing has changed my mind that the "science" of archeology is just fiction writing. How in the world am I supposed to be convinced of this warfare argument, from such scant evidence?
4
Since they used slash and burn techniques to grow maize and other crops, perhaps the same technique could be used to determine how large the crop burn was after each season, thus getting a rough estimate of the crop yield and what population size it might support...and hopefully look at it year by year, like tree rings in the lake or ground sediment samples.
5
This is one of the reasons I subscribe to the Times. This is a fascinating part of the world, with so many historic treasures and puzzles waiting to be discovered...and solved. Marvelous detective work.
15
Interesting article pointing out the unique and clever method of investigation.
Guess the Mayans are just like every other human civilizations this respect - no surprise!
9
I see a number of comments asking why this fire is deemed to be caused by warfare, and yes, this news article does NOT answer that question. That can leave the impression that the scientists were just making a wild guess, and leaves the conclusion open to criticism.
However, by simply reading the abstract of the actual report (linked in the article) one can see that the researchers directly answer the question:
"...we connect a massive fire event to an attack described with a Classic period war statement. Multiple lines of evidence show that a large fire occurred across the ancient city of Witzna, coincident with an epigraphic account describing an attack and burning of Witzna in 697 CE."
Let's remember to keep in mind that this article is simply a summation, one author's understanding of the conclusions that the scientists reached. Let's not criticize the scientists if the article doesn't mention each and every detail.
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If all civilizations act as the human race does throughout the universe is it any wonder why there is no interplanetary travel. They destroyed themselves long before that possibility as I'm sure we will eventually.
20
And we are certain a fire or fires was/were deliberately set because? The Great Chicago Fire and London Fire were accidents. I could give a hundred other examples of city wide accidental fires. I didn’t read any explanation in the article of proof of deliberately set fires. Wouldn’t that be the most important question?
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@Shamrock Everyone seems to have died.
6
Being one with nature sadly implies violence.
6
@David
Where is the proof of a deliberately set fire? Shouldn’t that be the first question to answer? Otherwise, what is the point of the inquiry. It would be impossible not to have evidence of any widespread fires. Every other place on earth experienced accidental fires. Ask Parisians, they still do.
@Shamrock before you accuse the scientists of conducting flawed research, you should read their paper. This is a Times article about their paper. It isn't the same thing.
21
Can’t wait till archaeologists are sifting through our ashes!
15
One might think that a multidisciplinary approach would be the standard approach at this point in our evolution. And yet it is not. But using it these researchers not only have built a convincing and thorough report but it is vastly more interesting and significant as a story and as a record of how humans have operated over history.
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