Scientists have found two extremely unusual artifacts in Belize: a jadeite chisel and a rosewood handle. Their discovery casts doubt on the theory that the materials were used by the Maya for religious purposes only, archaeologists write in the journal Antiquity.
The Mayan civilization lasted several millennia, leaving behind many "dead cities" and cultural monuments in the Yucatan Peninsula, disappearing from the face of the earth around the ninth century AD, when most of the Mayan city-states were abandoned by their inhabitants. The reasons for this civilizational collapse are still the subject of controversy among scientists.
One of the possible reasons for the collapse of this civilization, according to a number of archaeologists today, could be droughts caused by climate change and overpopulation of Mayan cities. The first serious confirmation of this theory was found in 2012 during excavations in the territory of Tikal, one of the largest cities of the Indians, where scientists have discovered a complex system of reservoirs and canals, indicating the importance of water in the lives of its inhabitants.
Subsequent excavations in other Mayan city-states gave more contradictory results: they showed that the collapse of their culture could be associated not only with the climate, but also with political conflicts between the Indian "policies." This leads scientists to argue about the place of climate, politics and religion in Indian life.
For example, archaeologists and historians have long debated the role jadeite - a translucent greenish mineral - played in the life of various Mayan cities. On the one hand, in the northern part of this civilization, it can be found in the tombs of the rulers of these cities, in the pyramids and ancient temples, as well as other ritual structures.
On the other hand, archaeologists often find low-quality beads, jewelry and tools made of jadeite, as well as other green minerals in the cities and villages of the Maya Indians located in the south of the Yucatan Peninsula, which existed in the so-called pre-classical period, long before the appearance of Chichen Itza and other well-known "Megacities" of this civilization.
Such differences lead scientists to argue about whether the status of this mineral changed during the classical period and why the Maya mined and used it. McKillop and her colleagues found a definitive answer to this question by conducting underwater excavations in southern Belize, where her team discovered ancient Mayan salt mines back in 2004.
Rosewood handle, discovered in the same mine of the ancient Indians.
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A thousand years ago, these mines were located on the shores of the Gulf of Honduras, but the rise in sea level in the past few decades has led to their complete flooding and a significant complication of excavation.
Recently, the scientists were lucky - while digging up a kind of "saline", McKillop and her team discovered two things on its territory that did not fit into its usual status. Next to the skeleton of the wooden platform, which covered the floor of the mine, archaeologists found a jadeite chisel and a rosewood handle.
Both the one and the other artifact were made around 600-800 AD, in the last eras of the Mayan city-states. Both jadeite and rosewood were of very high quality and were in no way inferior to those materials that were usually used to make ritual objects and ornaments for the nobility.
At the same time, the pattern of scratches on the surface of the tool indicates that its owner actively used it to extract salt, as well as other relatively soft materials that do not leave noticeable scratches on the lateral surfaces of the chisel, but smoothed its tip.
How did such an expensive artifact end up in a salt mine? Scientists suggest that salt played as important a role in the life of the Maya as in other peoples, and therefore its extraction and trade was very profitable and prestigious.