A 1,200-Year-Old Murder Mystery in Guatemala - New York Times

A 1,200-Year-Old Murder Mystery in Guatemala - New York Times: "A 1,200-Year-Old Murder Mystery in Guatemala



By JOHN NOBLE WILFORD
Published: November 17, 2005

Archaeologists and forensic experts in Guatemala have made a grisly discovery among the ruins of an ancient Maya city, Cancu?n.

In explorations during the summer, they found as many as 50 skeletons in a sacred pool and other places, victims of murder and dismemberment in a war that destroyed the city and, it seems, served as a beginning of the collapse of the classic period of the Maya civilization. The precipitous decline of the Maya is one of the enduring mysteries of American archaeology."