Imagine scrolling through page 16 of Google search results – that’s where Tulane University PhD student Luke Auld-Thomas found a clue leading to a massive Maya city, hidden for centuries beneath Mexico’s jungle canopy. The city, now called Valeriana, was uncovered in the southeastern state of Campeche, and it’s packed with ancient wonders: pyramids, sports fields, roads connecting neighbourhoods, and even amphitheatres.
The discovery happened thanks to Lidar (Light Detection and Ranging), a high-tech laser scanning technique that maps structures hidden under dense vegetation. This tool had been used by a Mexican environmental group, and when Auld-Thomas processed the data, he found signs of a sprawling city that archaeologists believe could rival Calakmul, Latin America’s largest Maya site. In fact, the site’s sheer density places it among the largest of ancient Maya settlements, with an estimated population of 30,000 to 50,000 people at its peak, around 750-850 AD, that’s more than the number of residents in the area today.
In total, Auld-Thomas and his team uncovered three sites, all within an area roughly the size of Edinburgh, Scotland. They named the city Valeriana after a nearby lagoon.
Professor Marcello Canuto, a co-author on the research, says this finding challenges the old assumption that tropical regions weren’t conducive to advanced civilizations. The Maya clearly thrived in these environments, building complex societies with incredible infrastructure and artistry.
The research was conducted in collaboration with Tulane University’s Middle American Research Institute, Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History, and the University of Houston’s National Center for Airborne Laser Mapping. Their findings were recently featured in the journal Antiquity
“Our analysis not only revealed a picture of a region that was dense with settlements, but it also revealed a lot of variability. We didn’t just find rural areas and smaller settlements. We also found a large city with pyramids right next to the area’s only highway, near a town where people have been actively farming among the ruins for years. The government never knew about it; the scientific community never knew about it,” Auld-Thomas said in a statement.
As for why Valeriana was eventually abandoned, the archaeologists aren’t completely certain, but they believe climate change played a big role. For now, this lost city remains an exciting reminder of the Maya civilization’s incredible legacy and a lesson in the surprises that can still be uncovered, even from page 16 of a Google search.
