Mexico: discovery of the first whole canoe

A canoe dating from the Mayan period, the first to be discovered whole, was found in a cave at the bottom of a cenote in Yucatan (south-eastern Mexico), announced Friday the National Institute of Anthropology and D history (Inah) of Mexico.

Until now, archaeologists in Mexico had only discovered fragments of Mayan boats.

The one that has just been updated, dating back almost a thousand years, seems to have been preserved thanks to its location.

The workers who were prospecting the land for the construction of a new line of road ferns the Yucatan peninsula, region of the Mayan civilization, indeed found it well hidden in a cave at the bottom of a cenote.

The cenotes, these natural pits which result from the collapse of the limestone base and which expose the groundwater below, are particularly typical of this region.

Their name comes from a Mayan word meaning "

," and they were sometimes used by the Mayans for sacrificial offerings.

Examining the condition of the cenote was part of the prospecting program, and the divers tasked with examining it discovered a cave five meters below the surface of the water in which stood what looked like a large piece of wood 1.60 m long and 80 cm wide, obviously worked by human beings.

Raised to the surface and examined by experts, it turned out to be a canoe used by the Mayans, "

", explained the Inah in its press release. .

New exams in November, with the help of the Sorbonne University in Paris, will seek to determine its age, as well as which tree the wood comes from, added the Inah.