Archaeologists Use Lidar Laser Technology To Uncover Pre-Hispanic Towns in Bolivia

Several hundred communities dating from 500 to 1400 AD have long captivated archaeologists in Bolivia's Llanos de Mojos grassland.

Researchers have now visualized the proportions of the biggest known Casarabe culture hamlet.

LIDAR mapping suggested that it is early urbanization with a high population density, which is the only known occurrence so far from the Amazon lowlands.

The findings gave fresh information on how widespread and diversified early urban life was throughout the world, as well as how ancient cultures lived in the Amazon.

Pre-Hispanic cities in the past

(Photo : DANIEL SLIM/AFP via Getty Images)

Dr. Heiko Prümers of the German Archaeological Institute and Prof. Dr. Carla Jaimes Betancourt of the University of Bonn, who was a student in La Paz at the time, began archaeological investigations on two "mounds" near the community of Casarabe in Bolivia more than 20 years ago.

The Mojos Plains is located on the Amazon's southern rim.

Even though the savannah plain, which floods several months a year during the rainy season, discourages permanent habitation, there are numerous apparent relics of the time before Spanish colonization in the early 16th century.

In addition to the "mounds," these traces mostly consisted of causeways and canals that frequently run in a dead straight line through the savannahs for kilometers.

Conventional studies first indicated a terraced core area, a ditch wall surrounding the site, and waterways.

Furthermore, it became clear that some of these pre-Hispanic communities were massive in size.

According to Carla Jaimes Betancourt of the University of Bonn's Department of Anthropology of the Americas, the thick foliage beneath in which these communities were placed prohibited them from observing the structural intricacies of the massive mounds and their surrounds.

"So the entire region was densely inhabited, a pattern that contradicts all prior conceptions," explained Carla James Betancourt, a member of the University of Bonn's Transdisciplinary Research Area "Present Pasts," as per ScienceDaily.

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What is LIDAR?

Lidar, which stands for Light Detection and Ranging, is a remote sensing technology that measures ranges (varying distances) to the Earth using light in the form of a pulsed laser, as per NOAA.

When these light pulses are joined with additional data from the aerial system, they produce exact, three-dimensional information about the shape of the Earth and its surface features.

A lidar device is made up of a laser, a scanner, and a specialized GPS receiver.

The most frequent platforms for collecting lidar data over large regions are aircraft and helicopters.

Topographic and bathymetric lidar are the two forms of lidar.

Topographic lidar generally maps the land with a near-infrared laser, whereas bathymetric lidar measures seafloor and riverbed heights using water-penetrating green light.

LIDAR data reveal anthropogenically changed landscapes

LIDAR imaging reveals the architecture of the settlement's massive squares.These buildings include tiered platforms topped by U-shaped buildings, rectangular platform mounds, and conical pyramids (up to 22 meters high).

Pedestrian bridge walkways and canals connect the various villages, implying a cohesive social network.

There is at least one additional village within five kilometers of each of the designated localities.

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