The Mayans who lived in the ancient city of Palenque knew the land they lived on used to be underwater due to fossils found in the region.

Fossils found at the ancient city of Palenque, Chiapas shows Maya people conceived their beliefs of the underworld from them, associating the beliefs with water. To the Palenque, these fossils were convincing proof that the land was covered by the sea a long time ago, and from this they created their ideas on the origin of the world.

A three-year study by archaeologist Martha Cuevas and geologist Jesus Alvarado, was aimed at connecting the symbolism made by ancient Mayans to remains from Prehistoric times.

The interdisciplinary investigation, by the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) and the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), concentrates on 31 specimens found at the Palenque Archaeological Zone which they believe are vital to the study of Maya cosmogony.

The 31 fossils discovered so far are from different periods, with the oldest from the Paleocene Era, nearly 63 million years ago.  The fossils, from different marine animals and shark teeth and stingray spines, were used in ritual context during the Late Classic Period (600-850AD).  Most often they are discovered in a funerary context: as part of funerary offerings, used by the Mayans as tombstones or offered to deities.

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USA Today has posted an interesting article about the fountain found late last year in the Mayan city of Palenque.

Excavations reveal the 217-foot-long, spring-fed “Piedras Bolas” aqueduct underneath Palenque was designed to narrow at its end, producing a high-pressure fountain.  It’s the first example of deliberately-engineered hydraulic pressure in the New World, prior to the arrival of the conquistadors in the 1,500′s. Now eroded, the conduit dates from 250 A.D. to 600 A.D.

“Palenque is unique in that it is a major center where the Maya built water systems to drain water away from the site,” says archaeologist Lisa Lucero of the University of Illinois, by email. Most Maya centers stored water in reservoirs for the winter dry season.  ”Palenque, thus, is a unique site; we would not expect to find such water systems elsewhere. That said, there is lots of lit on the different kinds of water systems. For example, all centers with large plazas have drainage systems to keep the plazas dry during rain. “

The conduit lay underneath several households and could have stored water during the dry season, suggest the study authors. Another possibility, the conduit’s flow may have, “created the pressure necessary for an aesthetically pleasing fountain, and perhaps served as an aid in the filling of water jars.”

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The ancient Mayans had enough engineering know-how to master running water, creating toilets and even fountains.

Perhaps the earliest known example of the intentional creation of water pressure was found on the island of Crete in a Minoan palace dating back to roughly 1400 BC. In the New World, the ability to generate water pressure was previously thought to have begun only with the arrival of the Spanish.

Scientists investigated the Mayan center at Palenque in Chiapas, Mexico. At its height, this major site, inhabited from roughly 100 to 800 AD, had some 1,500 structures – residences, palaces, and temples – holding some 6,000 inhabitants under a series of powerful rulers.

The center at Palenque also had what was arguably the most unique and intricate system of water management known anywhere in the Maya lowlands. These involved elaborate subterranean aqueducts to deal with the spring-fed streams that naturally divide the landscape and could otherwise cause flooding or erosion.

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