In the depths of the Amazonian wood , long believed to be uninhabitable , archaeologists say there is evidence that a thriving civilisation exist . 20 million people lived there , managing the forest , and left evidence of their complex live behind .
Over at the Washington Post , Juan Forero cover on the archaeologists looking for evidence of a lost social club in the Amazon :
Archaeologists , many of them Americans , say . . . this patch of timberland , and many others across the Amazon , was home to an advanced , even spectacular civilization that managed the woods and enriched sterile dirt to feed grand .
The findings are discredit a once - bedrock hypothesis of archeology that long hold in that the Amazon , unlike much of the Americas , was a historical dark hole , its surround too hostile and its earth too pathetic to have ever sustained big , sedentary societies . Only small and archaic hunter - accumulator tribe , the assumption went , could ever have eked out a support in an unforgiving environment .
But scientist now think that rather of Harlan Stone - age tribes , like the groups that occasionally come forth from the forest today , the Indians who populate the Amazon centuries ago numbered as many as 20 million , far more hoi polloi than live here today .
This is a fascinating read – check out the eternal rest over atthe Washington Post .
Image of clayware determine in the Amazon by Fernanda Preto / Getty Images
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