Cerros Mayan Archaeological Site. Cerros is located at the mouth of the New River as it empties into Corozal Bay in the northern Corozal District of Belize.
Cerros was inhabited from about 400 BC (Preclassic Era) to 400 AD (Classic Era) when it was abandoned. At the height of its importance, almost 2,000 people lived in and around Cerros, working as farmers and as merchants in the trade between the sea coast and inland communities.
Altun Ha Mayan Archaeological Site. Altun Ha was occupied from about 900 BC to 1000 AD, with the highest level of population in the Classic Period, from about 400 to 900 AD.
Altun Ha showed a sharp decline in population after 900 AD, unlike Lamanai, which continued to be occupied for almost 700 years.
Altun Ha appears to have been an important trade center, trading as far south as Panama and as far north as what is now Mexico City. In fact, archaeological evidence indicates that Altun Ha had a particularly strong connection to the pre-Columbian Mexican city of Teotihuacan, located about 30 miles northeast of the Mexico City area. Teotihuacan was the largest pre-Columbia city in the Americas, with a population of approximately 125,000 people in the city core, making it one of the largest cities in the world between 1 and 500 AD.
Colha Mayan Archaeological Site. Colha is located near Orange Walk Town in northern Belize, and was occupied from the Archaic Period (pre-3400 BC) to the Middle Postclassic Period (1150-1300 AD).
Colha was most heavily populated from 400 BC - 100 AD (Late Preclassic) and from 600-850 AD (Late Classic).
Altun Ha appears to have been an important trade center, trading as far south as Panama and as far north as what is now Mexico City. In fact, archaeological evidence indicates that Altun Ha had a particularly strong connection to the pre-Columbian Mexican city of Teotihuacan, located about 30 miles northeast of the Mexico City area. Teotihuacan was the largest pre-Columbia city in the Americas, with a population of approximately 125,000 people in the city core, making it one of the largest cities in the world between 1 and 500 AD.
Archaeologists believe that Colha may have been settled almost 1500 years before any other Maya site, and that chocolate was consumed at Colha as early as 1000-400 BC - making Colha one of the earliest Mayan settlements to process and eat chocolate.
The Maya produced chert and obsidian tools at Colha for most of the time it was inhabited and may have traded stone tools as far away as the Greater Antilles. Colha was also an important source of "eccentric flints," which are sacred objects made from chert and obsidian for the Maya elite and include sacrificial knives, parts of sceptres and burial offerings.
Colha appears to have come to a violent end in the Terminal Classic Period (700-875 AD). This conclusion is based on archaeological evidence that includes the discovery in a pit within a shrine at Colha of the burned skulls of 10 men, 10 children and 10 women, all members of the Colha elite, as evidenced by the cranial shaping of their skulls and their filed teeth.
Colha was abandoned until approximately 950 AD (Postclassic Period), when it was re-inhabited by what archaeologists believe was a group of people closely related to the Yucatan Mayan and not to the previous inhabitants of Colha. The primary occupation for these later inhabitants of Colha was farming, although they did also produce some stone tools, as had the original Colha residents.
Colha was first excavated in the early 1970s when large deposits of "lithic debitage" (the waste from producing stone tools) were discovered at the site. The Colha Project began in 1979 and is a long-running archaeological excavation in and around Colha, including Ladyville, Lowe Ranch and Sand Hill. Archaeologists have recovered over 4 million stone tools from 36 workshops at the core of the Colha site. The Colha site includes paved plazas, a ball court and public buildings.
Latitude: 17°56'60.00"N/Longitude: 88°22'1.20"N
San Estevan Mayan Archaeological Site. San Estevan was settled in the Preclassic Period and reached its greatest occupation levels in the Late Classic Period.
Between the 1960s and the mid-1990s, much of San Estevan was mapped by archaeologists exploring the last incarnation of San Estevan as a Late Classic Period site.
However, the focus of archaeological research on San Estavan abruptly changed in the late 1990s when bulldozers mining for limestone destroyed most of the Late Classic Period structures at San Estevan.
(Ironically, the limestone mined from the San Estevan site and used in the construction of the Western Highway in Belize has caused many, many accidents and deaths due to the slickness of the limestone.)
La Milpa Mayan Archaeological Site. La Milpa is the third largest Maya site in Belize (after Caracol and Lamanai) and includes more than 20 courtyards, 19 stelae, 2 ball courts, 4 temple pyramids (the largest almost 79 feet high) and over 85 structures, with the Great Plaza being one of the largest public spaces constructed by the Maya. Archaeologists estimate that over 46000 people lived in La Milpa in its heyday in the Early Classic Period.
However, despite many archaeological digs since the early 1930s, most of La Milpa remains unexplored.
La Milpa is located within the Rio Bravo Conservation and Management Area, owned by Programme for Belize, a Belize non-governmental organization. Coca Cola purchased the property that became the Rio Bravo Conservation and Management Area in 1988 for the purpose of clearing the land for a citrus plantation. International outrage stopped Coca Cola's plans and Coca Cola eventually donated the land to Programme for Belize.
La Milpa and Rio Bravo are located within the Three River region of Northwest Belize bordering Mexico and Guatemala. Programme for Belize operates La Milpa Jungle Lodge on the Rio Bravo property, and the La Milpa lodge is the best place from which to access the La Milpa ruins.
Latitude: 17°48'0.00"N/Longitude: 88°58'60.00"W
Lamanai Mayan Archaeological Site. The Lamanai site is one of the oldest continuously occupied Maya sites in Belize, from about 1500 BC when maize was being grown at the site, to 1680 AD.
The name "Lamanai" means submerged insect.
However, archaeologists realized in 1978 that Franciscan monks had corrupted the name from "Lam'an/ayin" to "Lamanai," and that adding the correct suffix of "ayin" changed the meaning of the name to submerged crocodile, a conclusion supported by the large number of crocodile representations found at Lamanai, including figurines, pottery decorations and the headdress of a 13 foot limestone mask found on a 6th century temple platform.
Lamanai, located on 950 ares (the site's core is about a 12 square miles), is one of the largest Maya ceremonial sites in Belize, including more than 100 minor structures, a ball court and about 12 major buildings, most notably the Temple of the Mask, thought to be an Olmec God or Kinich Ahau, the Maya Sun God, the Temple of the Jaguar Masks and the High Temple (so-called because of its height).
Lamanai's lay-out was quite different from most other Maya sites in Belize that were generally organized in plazas around a ceremonal structure. However, at Lamanai, most ceremonial buildings were built along the west bank of the New River and the New River Lagoon, with residential structures to the north, west and south.
Only about 5% of the site has been investigated and much remains buried or covered by jungle and bush. However, archaeologists do know that structures were built on top of other structures, with the older structures frequently at least partially razed, sometimes leaving masks and other ornamental features from the older buildings in odd places in the new buildings, such as in stairwells.
In addition to Mayan buildings and artifacts, the Lamanai site also includes the remains of a 19th century sugar mill, a brick-lined reservoir and the charred remains of two 16th century Catholic churches. The church remains are charred because the Maya burned each of them down after the Spanish built the churches in an attempt to convert the Maya inhabitants of Lamanai to Catholicism. The first church building particularly incensed the Maya -- the Spanish built the church on the foundations of a Mayan temple that they demolished to make way for the new church.
Lamanai continued to flourish in the Post Classic Period primarily because of its trade of metals, particularly copper objects, thought to have been produced on-site at Lamanai beginning by approximately 1150 AD. More copper artifacts have been found at Lamanai than at any other Mayan site, and the artifacts have included bells, rings, tweezers, various clothing ornaments, pins, axes, chisels, needles, and fish hooks.
Access to the Lamanai ruins is by boat up the New River from Orange Walk. Crooked Tree Wildlife Sanctuary is located 8 miles west of the Lamanai Archological reserve.
Latitude: 17°45'9.36"N/Longitude: 88°39'16.20"W
