Criminal Charges Considered After Construction Company Bulldozes 2,300-Year-Old Mayan Pyramids

by Lorraine Devon Wilke

Bulldozing history, Mayan ruins  

The world stood horrified when the Buddhas of Bamiyan were blown to bits by the Taliban in 2001. The two 6th century statues, one about 125 feet tall, the other around 200, were carved into the side of a cliff in Afghanistan, doomed after the fundamentalist group deemed them to be ‘idols’ and were therefore ordered destroyed by Taliban leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar. Anyone paying attention to such events in 2001 found the wanton and unconscionable destruction of a country’s ancient heritage, artwork both breathtaking and sacred, to be a horrifying example of man’s desecration of history. Now, in a surely lesser but similarly shocking incident, a construction company in Belize brought its bulldozers to the location of an ancient Mayan ruin and knocked the entire complex down… for road fill.
It’s hard to say if the destruction would have been any less painful if the back story included wild-eyed Taliban leaders and hordes of soldiers with dynamite, but for the people of Belize, particularly those in the Nohmul complex of Northern Belize where the Mayan pyramid, one of the largest in the Caribbean nation, had stood for over 2,300 years, the loss is incalculable. From RedOrbit:

Jaime Awe, head of the Belize Institute of Archaeology, said the destruction was detected late last week.
“It’s a feeling of Incredible disbelief because of the ignorance and the insensitivity … they were using this for road fill,” Awe said in a statement picked up by Mail Online. “It’s like being punched in the stomach, it’s just so horrendous.”
The pyramid also sat in the middle of a privately-owned sugar cane field, and while it lacked the even stone sides seen in better-preserved pyramids, the mistake should not have occurred, Awe said. “These guys knew that this was an ancient structure. It’s just bloody laziness.”
Awe explained that it’s “mind-boggling” just how ignorant this construction firm could have been. What took years for ancient Mayans to build, using stone tools and materials from stone quarries, took only minutes for modern-day construction workers to undo using sophisticated equipment.

Despite the fact that the structure was on private land, all pre-Hispanic ruins are protected by the Belizean government; currently criminal charges against the construction company are being investigated.
Apparently this disregard for the antiquities of their country has plagued Belize throughout history. It is a country of about 350,000 people with hundreds of ruins, many of which are embedded in the dense jungles that cover and surround the region, and it’s difficult for the government to be as vigilant to the destruction of their ancient heritage as they intend. In fact, the destruction is rampant enough that archeology experts and academicians the world over have spoken out loudly about the issue:

Norman Hammond, an emeritus professor of archaeology at Boston University (BU) who used to do research in the region in the 1980s, said Mayan ruins have been targeted in the past by workers seeking materials.
He told Mail Online via email that destroying Mayan ruins for construction materials is “an endemic problem in Belize (the whole of the San Estevan center has gone, both of the major pyramids at Louisville, other structures at Nohmul, many smaller sites), but this sounds like the biggest yet.”

Others have found the destruction of the Nohmul complex particularly egregious, as it was a large and very obvious structure, tall and covering a significant area of flat land. In other word, impossible to miss.

It is a disturbing scenario, added Arlen Chase, chairman of the Department of Anthropology at the University of Central Florida (UCF). But “there is only a very limited infrastructure in Belize that can be applied to cultural heritage management. Unfortunately, they [destruction of sites] are all too common, but not usually in the center of a large Maya site,” he noted.

Others mourn the specific and irrevocable loss of historic structures the speak to the history of the people and the place. The Nohmul complex was certainly one of those. It was first noted in 1887 by Europeans traveling the region; discovered in a private field in what is called the Orange Walk District, it is spread out over a 12-square mile area and was likely the residence for around 40,000 Mayans during the era of 500 – 250 BC. Its vastness, noted by many stunned by its destruction, made it hard to miss: it was comprised of duel structure clusters abutted by plazas and walking areas and traversed by a overhead causeway, set atop a very flat area of land. Despite comments to the contrary by the construction company, it was unmissable.
And now it is rubble.

All that’s left of 2,300 years of history

Francisco Estrada-Belli, a professor at Tulane University’s Anthropology Department, said, “I don’t think I am exaggerating if I say that every day a Maya mound is being destroyed for construction in one of the countries where the Maya lived.
“Unfortunately, this destruction of our heritage is irreversible but many don’t take it seriously,” he added. “The only way to stop it is by showing that it is a major crime and people can and will go to jail for it.” [Source]

And that’s the result many would like to see. For now the excavation has been halted but clearly it’s too little, too late. Both the landowner and the construction company, D-Mar Construction, are being investigated. The company owner, Denny Grijalva, who is also running for a legislative seat in a local election, claims he “knew nothing about the project” and told reporters to speak to his foreman; no information was forthcoming.
Sadly, while prosecution and conviction of those involved would bring some justice and would, hopefully, deter further destruction, the Nohmul complex is gone after standing for 2,300 years against time and nature. It took human beings to destroy what the ancient Mayans had built.

“We can’t salvage what has happened out here… It is an incredible display of ignorance. I am appalled.” John Morris, the Institute of Archaeology.

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