Exploring the Mayan World of the Yucatán Peninsula
Photography by Samantha Demangate For over three millennia, the Maya have shaped the culture, politics, and environment in Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula and beyond. Their massive city-states formed a web of trade, intellectual exchanges, and war throughout their homeland and beyond. They developed an effective hieroglyphic writing system, advanced astronomical calendars and observation systems, expansive civil engineering projects, and architecture that rivals anything in the ancient world. Although their cities collapsed, possibly because of environmental and…