This French documentary explains the rise and fall of a vast network of large ancient Mayan cities, being located in Guatemala with the first city being built in 600 BC, and with all of them being abandoned in the region 1000 years ago.

Following are topics the documentary talks about:

— In 300 AD the Mayans built large stone temples and palace pyramids in the Mayan city of Naachtun with the city rapidly expanding.

— An older city of El Mirado, which is 20 km to the west of Naachtun, was the first big Mayan city that was founded in 600 BC, having tens of millions of residents in its heyday until it was abandoned in 150 to 200 AD.

— The city of El Mirado was in decline when Naachtun was built, with the people apparently migrating to Naachtun in 150 AD.

— The documentary explains that all of the construction to build a gigantic temple pyramid was done only with human workers and without the benefit of animals such as horses or oxen, with the efforts calculated to be 15 million work days, where it was accomplished in only 30 years.

— The Mayans were an agricultural society that grew squash, beans, corn, and cotton, and they usually buried their dead under their homes, often including objects such bowls and plates that had a hole punched into them for ceremonial reasons.  [Note: I think it is fascinating that many cultures performed that same “hole-punching” burial practice.  For example, the ancient Ban Chiang people in Thailand did exactly the same thing.]

— The Mayan people still exist as a society in central America.

— The Mayans had a system of writing that is similar to Egyptian hieroglyphs.

— Evidence shows that the civilization in the region was in contact with the Mayan empire 1000 KM to the northwest in the city of Tenochtitlan in what is now Mexico.

- Examples are shown of ornate jade jewelry that was buried with the more wealthy of the inhabitants.

— Tenochtitlan saw the societies to its south as a threat, so it invaded the city off Tical which is 60 KM south of Naachtun in 378 AD with the help of troops from Naachtun, and they captured and replaced its king.  Tical was the regional center of the lowland Mayan culture that that time.  Pyramids of the style of Tenochtitlan were then built in Tical.

— Funerary practices of the Maya are explained.

— It is explained that the cities in the area constantly fought with each other, with power shifting frequently, with a city of Calakmul then rising to the north and becoming powerful in the region and assuming control over the other cities.

— Due to constantly fighting with each other, the southern Mayan cities were abandoned between 760 and 950 AD, except for Naachtun which had one last boom starting in 750 before also being abandoned in 1000 AD.

— Copan in Honduras is the most southern Mayan city, coming to end in the 700’s just like the cities to its north due to being attacked by a nearby kingdom, however evidence shows that it distributed its political power in a more effective manner, which facilitated the region holding onto health for a longer period of time.

— The Maya worshipped Jaguars and sometimes sacrificed them.

— It is hypothesized that centuries of war, combined with the decimation of the forests in the region, along with other environmental factors, weakened the people and caused them to abandon the cities.