Les archéologues viennent de faire une découverte incroyable au cœur de la jungle — une cité maya perdue ! Cachée depuis des siècles, cette ville antique a été découverte grâce à des outils de haute technologie comme des lasers pour scanner à travers les arbres denses. La ville est remplie des ruines de temples, de pyramides, et même de maisons qui étaient autrefois débordantes de vie. C’est incroyable de penser à la manière dont cette civilisation a prospéré il y a si longtemps dans un endroit si reculé. Cette découverte est une énorme victoire pour les amateurs d'histoire et les archéologues. Qui sait quels autres secrets pourraient encore se cacher dans la jungle ? Animation créée par Sympa. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Musique par Epidemic Sound https://www.epidemicsound.com Pour ne rien perdre de Sympa, abonnez-vous!: https://goo.gl/6E4Xna ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Nos réseaux sociaux : Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sympasympacom/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sympa.officiel/ Stock de fichiers (photos, vidéos et autres): https://www.depositphotos.com https://www.shutterstock.com https://www.eastnews.ru ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Si tu en veux encore plus, fais un tour ici: http://sympa-sympa.com
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00:00You are lost in the depths of the jungles of the Yucatan Peninsula, in Mexico.
00:05Mysterious sounds resonate around you, and to wrap it all up, the twilight settles little by little.
00:11Soon, you will find yourself alone in the heart of an unexplored tropical forest.
00:16It must be admitted that undertaking the quest for Eldorado alone was not the brightest idea.
00:22You continue to move forward as quickly as possible, when suddenly...
00:26Wait, what do you see over there? It looks like huge stone stairs.
00:31All this is not natural, so you grab your camera to take a picture of it.
00:36Maybe you haven't unleashed the gold, but you may have made an inestimable discovery.
00:42Congratulations, you have just discovered Ocumtun, a Mayan city forgotten for centuries.
00:48Hidden about sixty kilometers in the heart of the jungle, its name literally translates as...
00:54The stone had to be taken at the time, because its builders used it abundantly to build their pyramids, their dwellings, and even their ball games.
01:03If you thought that Europeans held the exclusivity of the round ball, you are wrong.
01:08The Mayans were amateurs of these games, which they practiced for pleasure and competition.
01:14Ocumtun is part of a series of other Mayan cities once lost, which are now rediscovered thanks to the current technological advances.
01:22We will address the others in a moment.
01:25The most amazing feature of this city is undoubtedly its location in the middle of swampy areas, which explains why it was built on an overgrown field.
01:35This city, of monumental magnitude, stretched over more than 50 hectares, the equivalent of 90 football fields.
01:44Researchers have discovered clues indicating that Ocumtun had pyramids that could reach 15 meters in height,
01:51and that it was probably a major social center between 250 and 1,000 AD.
01:57It is certainly a major upheaval.
02:00However, the exploration of the Mayan cities that have disappeared dates back to the 19th century.
02:05Modern technologies, such as LiDAR imaging, allow archaeologists to scrutinize dense forests without being trapped by vegetation.
02:14This means that it is no longer necessary to venture into the tropical jungle at the risk of getting lost, as you did at the beginning of this video.
02:21LiDAR works a bit like a radiography.
02:24It projects laser beams that detect traces of ruins or old buildings.
02:30According to Sarah Parkak, an archaeologist specializing in space teledetection,
02:34satellite images have played a crucial role in the discovery of ancient cities in South America, Egypt and elsewhere.
02:41She devotes most of her days to carefully analyzing these images to locate possible traces of ancient cities.
02:49According to her, the ruins are often buried under vegetation, earth or sand, making their identification particularly complex.
02:57However, thanks to these remarkable tools,
03:00researchers have also discovered ancient Mayan slopes that crossed the ancient territories of this civilization.
03:07So admire these ancient passages.
03:09We are more used to seeing such ruins in countries of the old continent.
03:13But imagine roads 40 meters wide, whitewashed in the heat, to guide travelers in the dark.
03:20Scientists have recently developed a network of more than 170 kilometers of these roads,
03:25which they consider to be prior to the first officially listed Mayan roads to date.
03:32These roads, which sometimes crossed swampy terrain and were even overgrown by places,
03:37are now considered the world's first superhighway.
03:41Although no animal traction index has been found,
03:45it is likely that the Mayans used them to move within a network,
03:49counting up to 964 settlements.
03:52Built in the form of a vast spider web,
03:55these slopes, according to the information collected by archaeologists,
03:59served to form an extensive system of economic and social exchanges between the different cities.
04:04This discovery completely questions the idea that the pre-classic Mayan period,
04:09which dates back to 2000 BC, was limited to small tribal villages.
04:14Imagine the extent of human resources and engineering expertise
04:18that had to be mobilized to build these huge white roads.
04:21Archaeologists believe that the construction of these roads followed a process similar to that used for the pyramids,
04:27an amalgam of mud and quarry stones,
04:29completed by several layers of limestone to give them this brilliant hue.
04:35Impressive enough, isn't it?
04:37However, let's take a step back to better understand the context.
04:40The Mayans represented one of the largest pre-Columbian civilizations in the Americas.
04:45Until now, specialists estimated that at its peak,
04:49the Mayan civilization included more than 40 cities,
04:52grouping millions of inhabitants.
04:54It is a considerable population.
04:56Their empire extended from the Mexican peninsula of Yucatan to Guatemala and Belize,
05:01with an economy based mainly on agriculture.
05:04However, the peninsula presented a particularly hostile environment for culture.
05:09The Mayans therefore had to design sophisticated irrigation systems in most of their cities.
05:14In addition to the construction of pyramids, ceremonial buildings and squares,
05:19they also developed an astronomical system like no other.
05:23Thanks to the ancient technologies they had,
05:26they were able to accurately predict the position of planets such as Venus and Mars,
05:31as well as the exact dates of the eclipses.
05:34If you have never seen examples of ancient Mayan cities, here is Tikal.
05:39Located in the heart of the Guatemalan jungle,
05:41Tikal is reputed to have been the capital of an ancient conquering Mayan state.
05:45At its peak, this city was as influential as metropolises like London or New York are today.
05:51It is made up of a set of complex monuments,
05:54including the North Acropolis, one of the oldest in Tikal.
05:57Designed exclusively by human hands around 350 BC,
06:02it served as a sepulcher for kings and dignitaries.
06:05The monuments, which could reach up to 60 meters in height,
06:08were once adorned with a splendid red paint, a color dear to the Mayans.
06:13But nowadays, only limestone remains.
06:19Chichen Itza, meanwhile, houses one of the best preserved pyramids in the world.
06:23Located in the state of Yucatan, this Mayan city dates back more than 1,500 years.
06:28At its peak, it had about 35,000 inhabitants and stretched over an area of 10 square kilometers.
06:35The site is dominated by El Castillo, a majestic pyramidal temple 24 meters high.
06:41What distinguishes it particularly are the 91 steps of each of its four faces,
06:46which, by adding the upper platform,
06:49totals 365 steps, corresponding to the number of days of the solar year.
06:56It is obvious that it was a large-scale civilization, isn't it?
07:00It is for this reason that the mystery of its decline remains so difficult to elucidate.
07:05The clues relating to the collapse of this once powerful empire are rare.
07:10What could have been the cause? A devastating drought, perhaps?
07:14Research carried out in 2017 brought some new elements likely to clarify this mystery.
07:21From the data collected on the site of Ceibal, southwest of Tikal,
07:26researchers examined the results of radiocarbon analysis,
07:29as well as the discoveries from archaeological excavations and ceramics,
07:33to obtain new information on the unexpected decline of this great civilization.
07:38The results indicate that the Mayans probably did not suffer a sudden collapse,
07:43but rather a series of waves of social instability and political crisis.
07:47These upheavals would have led to the degradation of urban centers
07:51and started the dispersion of the Mayan population.
07:54Nevertheless, it remains difficult to determine with precision the exact causes of this decline.
08:00That said, recent discoveries bring important enlightenment on the history of humanity,
08:05affecting not only the Mayan Empire, but also other disappeared civilizations in South America.
08:10A major discovery in Brazil, carried out thanks to satellite imaging,
08:14also arouses the astonishment of scientists.
08:17Images taken near the Rio Chengu, in the Amazon region,
08:21suggest that cities populated by millions of people could not have existed in the heart of the jungle,
08:27long before the emergence of our modern civilization.
08:30If this does not surprise you, it is difficult to say what would.
08:36Satellite images have also revealed a network of trenches dating from 200 to 1200 AD,
08:43within the Bolivian forest.
08:45These traces suggest the presence of communities
08:48that could have sheltered about 60,000 people in the heart of the jungle.
08:52When researchers from the University of Florida went out into the field to check the satellite data,
08:57they were surprised to discover several hills, accompanied by ditches and geoglyphs.
09:03Archaeologists have also discovered carefully crafted wall remains,
09:07organized around places and recalling the typical constructions of the ancient Mayans.
09:13NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology