Overview
- The study published in Nature in early August 2026 mapped 432 Aquiry-associated earthworks across flights totalling more than 4,400 km and recorded 396 sites that had never been documented before.
- Researchers report more than 20,000 earthworks visible in the lidar data and extrapolate a regional total of roughly 24,000 to 30,000 monuments, a figure the team says implies peak populations of about 1.25 million to 3 million people.
- The identified features include geometric ditched enclosures with deep ditches and high embankments, roads, plazas, evidence of multifamily longhouses, and signs of agroforestry and managed useful trees.
- The authors date the Aquiry complex to roughly 600 BCE through AD 850 with broad site abandonment around AD 850–950, but they emphasize that radiocarbon dating and excavation are needed to confirm chronology and cultural attributions.
- Because the lidar survey covered less than 3 percent of Greater Amazonia, the findings prompt calls for extensive ground verification, multidisciplinary fieldwork, and consultation with local and descendant communities to refine population estimates and guide conservation and heritage policy.