# Ancient Maya mercury use may have come at a severe environmental cost

- Source: Phys.org - latest science and technology news stories
- Published: 2026-11-05T19:20:08+00:00
- Category: Science
- Original: https://phys.org/news/2026-11-ancient-maya-mercury-severe-environmental.html
- Canonical: https://groundlevelnews.com/story/ancient-maya-mercury-use-may-have-come-at-a-severe-environmental-cost-b0ce90/

Ancient Maya communities made extensive use of liquid mercury and a red, mercury-containing pigment called cinnabar to decorate buildings, pottery and burial sites. Unsurprisingly, as previous research has shown, this led to mercury contamination of soils and reservoirs at some Maya sites. And that pollution may have spread even farther into their territory and caused the collapse of two lake ecos

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