80 years after the eruption of the Ilopango volcano in 539, Maya built a giant pyramid near the caldera. This suggests that the restoration of civilization by the Maja’s catastrophe occupied a short time, says the Japanese archaeologist Akira Ichikava in his article in the ANTIQUITY journal.
The eruption located in modern Salvador volcano Ilopango in 539 led to the emission of more than 43 cubic kilometers of Tefra – Pumices and ashes – and cooling in the entire northern hemisphere. One of the ten largest eruptions over the last millennium has led to some estimates, to death more than 100 thousand people. Many researchers associate an eruption with a decline of Mayan civilization, when many of their cities were abandoned.
However, during the excavations of the San Andres settlement, 40 kilometers from the Vicarka volcano, the Researcher of the Colorado University in Boulder managed to find a pyramid from Tefra in 13 meters high and a width of 40 meters located on an earthen embankment with a height of seven meters. The volume of the structure is 33 thousand cubic meters.
Radio carbon dating showed that the construction of the pyramid began at all over a small gap after the eruption – from five to 30 years – and ended in 80 years. According to the estimates of the ICchika, the construction of the pyramid for four months a year would take 13 people, and 1500 people – 11 months. It is assumed that the works were employed from 500 to 1500 people, which requires collective efforts and social integration. The pyramid could build both surviving local inhabitants and immigrants from Copan.
Tephra could be used not only from practical, but also from religious considerations, Ichchika notes: its white color could have cosmological significance, but the pyramid itself is to serve protection from the volcano.