02-07-2025
Cavers find 500-year-old burials hidden deep inside Mexico mountain. Take a look
Reports of looting led archaeologists to explore an easily overlooked cave in northern Mexico. Eventually, the team found several 500-year-old burials in a hard-to-reach chamber of the cave.
Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology and History received a citizen complaint about historic bones being looted from a site in Coahuila and decided to investigate, the institute said in a July 1 news release.
Working with Coahuila officials and the volunteer Coahuilense Speleology Association, archaeologists located a promising cave entrance in the mountains of Ocampo Natural Protected Area. A photo shows the small rocky hole.
The cave entrance led to a narrow vertical shaft, measuring less than 2 feet wide, the institute said. Cavers lowered themselves about 13 feet before reaching the bottom. There, the cave opened into a room with a second vertical shaft.
Again, the team rappelled down about 26 feet before reaching the bottom, officials said. They found themselves in a more spacious, semi-circular chamber with a collection of bones.
Archaeologists identified the chamber as a burial site used by pre-Hispanic desert-dwelling communities. Originally, the site likely contained several burial bundles, a type of burial where the body is wrapped in fabric with various objects and carefully deposited on the ground, officials said.
When the team found the site, however, the bones were scattered about with fabric fragments but no artifacts, the institute said. The site had likely been looted and generally altered.
To prevent further loss or damage, archaeologists decided to collect the remaining burials. In total, they found 12 complete skulls, five of which were infant skulls, and hundreds of other bone fragments. The remains likely belonged to at least 17 people.
Archaeologists also found 15 textile fragments from four types of mats, the institute said. A photo shows one of these delicate woven artifacts.
Yuri de la Rosa Gutiérrez, an archaeologist involved in the project, described the site in the release as a typical pre-Hispanic mortuary cave. The communities that created these burials included expert rope-makers, who used ropes to reach chambers deep underground, a process similar to modern-day cavers.
Researchers packed up the 500-year-old burials, carefully removed them from the cave and transferred them to the Regional Museum of La Laguna for further cleaning and analysis.
The discovery will provide valuable insight into that region's nomadic populations, per the release.
The Ocampo Natural Protected Area in Coahuila is near the United States border and roughly 50 miles south from Big Bend National Park in Texas.
Google Translate was used to translate the news release from Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology and History.
