Once again Colavito is not impressed by Hancock's half hour.
This week, Graham Hancock celebrated a recent scientific article announcing that a LiDAR survey demonstrated that two previously known archaeological sites in the Bolivian Amazon were larger than previously known, with extensive pyramid mounds around a ceremonial center. Archaeologists have known for decades that the western Amazon had been home to a large population before the Spanish arrival, and articles about the mounds of these collapsed cultures have appeared at regular intervals since 2000. Hancock describes the mounds as “the remnants of a truly monumental civilization.” However, he is not so thrilled with the dating of the sites to 500-1400 CE and implies that some previous culture must have had still greater civilization in the deeper past: “such a sophisticated civilization – no lesser word will do — does not simply spring up out of nowhere. There must be a background to it, either beneath the earliest platform buildings or in the as-yet unexcavated sites that the LiDAR survey has pinpointed in the surrounding jungle.” We don’t know where this particular culture came from, whether it emerged indigenously or from nearby highlands. Nothing about this suggests a hypothetical Atlantis in 10,500 BCE influenced Amazonian mounds in 1000 CE.
Jason Colavito's Newsletter (email) • Vol. 20 • Issue 23 • June 5 2022 •
