Anthropology team uncover unknown areas in Belize

UCF anthropology team, Arlen and Diane Chase, are using a remote-sensing technology to uncover previously unknown areas of the ancient city of Caracol in Belize.

Florida Trend magazine recently profiles the UCF team and their research in their popular series “Research Florida”.

Diane Chase is hoping technological advances can help solve the mystery of Caracol’s demise.

“The Chases hope that the new technique and other emerging technologies will help answer one of the greatest puzzles of modern archaeology — what led to the collapse of Maya civilization around 900 A.D.

While scientists have hypothesized that everything from drought to warfare to the overexploitation of natural resources decimated the Maya, the Chases say they believe that internal social and political stresses likely played a major role in the collapse. One potential clue: The distribution of goods and ritual items over the ages. Archaeological finds from 550 to 790 A.D. showed that the general population and the elite shared many of the same kinds of wares and tombs, for example. In later years, that “symbolic egalitarianism” vanished and may have, the Chases postulate, to Caracol’s eventual collapse.”

You can read the full article from Florida Trend magazine here.