Cave of the Jaguar God

Overheard at National Geographic

National Geographic

Science, Society & Culture

4.5 • 10.1K Ratings

🗓️ 5 November 2019

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Crawl into the Maya underworld, where science meets spirits, shamans, and snakes. A long-forgotten cave could shed light on one of history's most enduring questions: why did the ancient Maya collapse? For more information on this episode, visit https://www.nationalgeographic.com/podcasts/overheard Want more? See the incense burners, plates and grinding stones found in the Cave of the Jaguar God. Learn how Guillermo de Anda uses ground-penetrating radar and other high-tech tools to investigate Chichen Itza. Read about jaguars and their place as the divine feline in Mesoamerican cultures. Also explore: Travel inside the world's longest underwater cave system -- spanning 215 miles underneath the Yucatan Peninsula. What can you find inside the longest underwater cave? Remains of ice age giant sloths and an ancient relative of the elephant. Check out more of Guillermo's work through the Great Maya Aquifer Project. If you like what you hear and want to support more content like this, please consider a National Geographic subscription. Go to natgeo.com/exploremore to subscribe today. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Knock, knock, who's there? It's the land of same day. What?
0:02.7	Iceland.co.uk? It's only been two hours. That's right.
0:06.1	With St. Dave Leverie, we'll have your shopping with you in no time.
0:09.0	Shop online today at Iceland.co.uk.
0:11.7	Delivery from £2 minimum, more than £25 dear restrictions in terms of life.
0:16.0	Back in the 1960s, a teenager in Mexico noticed something strange.
0:22.0	He was helping his dad with some farm work.
0:24.0	And he realized how dry is all the land right now
0:28.3	because there has not been rain.
0:31.3	But he spotted a tree in the middle of this dryness.
0:35.7	And this tree had flowers.
0:38.3	And he said, how come this tree could be so green and have flowers?
0:42.0	Guillermo De Ande is an archaeologist on Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula.
0:46.7	And what this teenager found decades ago would change Guillermo's career.
0:51.4	So he approaches there.
0:53.3	He sold this little depression on the ground.
0:56.7	He said, there must be water down there.
0:58.9	And he started excavating.
1:00.8	And as the teenager dug deeper,
1:03.4	he started noticing bursts of cool air.
1:06.0	It felt like air conditioning.
1:08.1	And he thought, well, maybe it's a sign of water.
	...

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