As divine gift, money and a source of power, cacao, the plant that feeds the present-day chocolate obsession, was even more precious to the ancient Maya of the northern Yucatan. While historians have known that cacao cultivation under the Maya took place only in sacred groves that were jealously guarded by their leaders, the location of these sacred Maya cacao groves has remained a mystery. Now, a new study published in Journal of Archaeological Science Reports has discovered where in the Yucatan Peninsula these Maya cacao trees were grown.

Maya Cacao Grown In An Overly Dry Mexican Climate?

Given the dry climate of the Yucatan Peninsula, which is unsuitable for the cultivation of cacao trees, researchers have been hard put to explain how the plant could have been grown in sufficient quantities for the beans to serve as currency. The researchers from Brigham Young University, in collaboration with archaeologists from the US and Mexico, explain in great detail on the BYU news portal .

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The Brigham Young team, led by Professor Richard Terry and including graduate students Bryce Brown and Christopher Balzotti, realized, that the karst sinkholes dotting the peninsula provided the perfect microclimates for cacao cultivation with just the right amounts of humidity, stillness and shade. To test their hypothesis the team collected soil samples from 11 sinkholes in the Yucatan Peninsula. An analysis of these samples revealed the presence of theobromine, theophylline, and caffeine, combined biomarkers unique to cacao, in nine of them.

Read more: Ancient Origins