The archaeological zone was documented by the biologist Cyrus Longworth Lundell, on December 29, 1931, while he was working at the Compañía Mexicana de Exploitación, dedicated to the exploitation of chewing gum.

It is reasonable to assume that Calakmul was seen long before this date, by the inhabitants of the area, who were mostly chicle workers. Installed on the site, Lundell sketched a map, in which he specified the location of the Mayan structures and stelae, with their respective plazas.

James C. Brydon, who worked for the same company, received this information and shortly thereafter had the opportunity to show it to Dr. John Merriam, president of the Carnegie Institution, Washington. For his part, Lundell went, on March 5, 1932, to Chichen Itzá and reported the discovery to Silvanus G. Morley, who requested permission from the Department of Pre-Hispanic Monuments, to examine the site.

Calakmul is a pre-Hispanic Mayan archaeological site, located in the southeast of the Mexican state of Campeche, in the Petén region, in the core of the Calakmul biosphere reserve, of more than 700,000 ha, a municipality of the same name and a few kilometers from the border with Guatemala. The site covers approximately 70 km² and has more than 6,000 structures and became the capital of a regional state of approximately 13,000 km², having been, together with Tikal and Palenque, one of the great regional powers, during the classical period of the Mayan culture.

Initially recorded in 1931 by the biologist Cyrus Longworth Lundell, it was first explored by the famous Mayanist Sylvanus Morley, in 1932. However, it was not until half a century later, starting in 1982, when large-scale excavations were carried out, by by William J Folan, from the Center for Historical and Social Research of the Autonomous University of Campeche and the National Institute of Anthropology and History of Mexico. The study initiated by Folan’s team concluded that they were facing a center of the Mayan civilization, of great proportions, determining that, depending on the period, it had more allies and power than Tikal itself. Furthermore, starting in the 90s, it is concluded that Calakmul belonged to a much larger organization; It was part of the so-called Kingdom of the Serpent, the kingdom of Kaan or Kan, of which it was specifically the capital.

The great advance in the study of Mayan writing, which has been achieved during these years, means that researchers have discovered that Calakmul and Tikal were involved in fierce wars for more than a century; clashes that would mark the political, economic and social evolution of the Mayan cities of the region. Calakmul is now the object of a large-scale project of the National Institute of Anthropology and History, which began in 1993. Due to the importance of the site, on July 4, 2002, Unesco granted it the designation of Cultural Heritage of Humanity, extending the distinction to a Mixed World Heritage Site, on June 21, 2014, recognizing the natural values ​​within the Biosphere Reserve.

Cyrus Longworth Lundell gave the name of Calakmul to this site, due to the presence of two large mounds that dominated the landscape. In Mayan, Ca means two, Lak means adjacent, and Mul means a mound or artificial pyramid, so Calakmul means “City of the two Adjacent Pyramids”. In recent times, thanks to advances in Mayan epigraphy, we know that the ancestral name of the site was Ox Te ‘Tuun (three stones or three stelae).

Another name related to the site in its inscriptions, perhaps relative to the surrounding area is Chiik Naab ‘. The lords of Calakmul identified themselves with the title of k’uhul kaanal ajaw (divine lord of the serpent kingdom). Everything seems to indicate that – in its heyday – Calakmul was the seat of the most powerful confederation of Mayan city-states known, called The Kingdom of Kaan.

Politically, the Maya were never unified. They were organized, especially during the classical period, into some 60 different kingdoms, each with its own ruler. This gave rise to tensions between the different powers, generating great fights, alliances, conspiracies, etc; This situation of “constant war” would explain why there was never a single organizing head of the complicated network of kingdoms that existed. Calakmul’s chronology covers a long period of time. There is information on human presence, from the pre-classic period; more specifically, from the Middle Preclassic to the Late Postclassic period, with already marginal and sporadic occupations, once the urban center had been almost totally abandoned. This supposes a continuous occupation, of around 1,500 years.

During the Middle Preclassic period, the first inhabitants of the city were established and it is during this period, when Calakmul begins to be present in the panorama of the southern centers, along with others such as Nakbé, Uaxactún and El Mirador. In this period, Calakmul survives the process of disappearance suffered by other centers during this stage and is perpetuated, until it becomes the city-state, of which information already exists in the Late Classic (around 500 AD). , moment of height and splendor of Calakmul and the kingdom of Kaan. Tikal (or as it appears referred to in the glyphs, Mutal) was the great Mayan center of the south, from the pre-classic period. Its importance was undoubted and its influence, in other territories, notorious. It is at this moment, when it seems that the Cucabal —confederation of states, each guided by its ruler and linked to the power headed by a capital power—, de la Cabeza de Serpiente begins to be noticed, gaining greater importance, both in politics domestic, as in foreign policy.

In the Late Preclassic, Calakmul is going to be noticed in the political panorama of the southern Mayan lands, but it will not be until the Early Classic, around 500 AD. C, when there are power relations with other cities. The political expansion that Calakmul is going to carry out will be based on the establishment, above all, of networks of influence. A concession of goods and services of the dominated lords was established, towards the supreme ruler or king. In this way, as Calakmul obtained greater power and authority over the territory, his political expansion was consolidating.