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Secrecy Surrounds Search for Mysterious Maya City October 27, 1997
by Angela M.H. Schuster

For years, rumors have circulated in Central America about a mysterious "White City" of the ancient Maya, whose pristine remains were thought to be deep in the jungle of northeastern Honduras. According to Steve Elkins, a self-described "cinematographer, curious man, and adventurer," the remains of just such a city may have been found along the Mosquito Coast of eastern Honduras with the aid of photographs taken by United States and Japanese satellites, and analyzed by Ron Blom of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. "We've definitely got something," says Elkins, noting that the photographs reveal what appear to be geometric shapes and patterns that could be construed as structures covering about one square mile. "If these features are the remains of an ancient city, it is quite possible that it is undisturbed given the remoteness of the region."

"There are many yet to be discovered sites in Central America," says Harvard University's William L. Fash, "that space-age technologies can be used to identify them is a marvelous advance for archaeology." With the ability to penetrate more than 15 feet through desert sands and see through rain-forest canopies, satellites have been used to map frankincense trade routes through the Arabian Desert, trace the ancient Silk Road, and discover hitherto unknown temples at Angkor.

But scholars are wary of Elkins' discovery, first reported in the October 20/27 edition of The New Yorker. Elkins and his team have yet to disclose the location of the new-found city, out of fear, they say, of exploitation by looters and "potential difficulties with authorities." According to Elkins, he is working with a team of "archaeologists and the right people," yet no one in the Maya archaeological community seems to have been contacted. "It is really quite odd, the secretive manner in which Elkins and his team have gone about their research," says Ian Graham of Harvard's Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, who has not only used satellite data in his own research but worked hand and hand with government authorities to protect sites. Nonetheless, Elkins maintains his need for secrecy. "At the moment," he says, "it is just too early to tell exactly what we have. Once we have checked out the site we will be happy to share our work with other archaeologists." Elkins and his team will ground-truth their findings this spring.

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© 1997 by the Archaeological Institute of America
archive.archaeology.org/online/news/white.city.html

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