Settlement
Beneath the new Tren Maya Cargo terminal in Progreso, archaeologists have found a settlement that was never meant to be remembered: a modest coastal home site with no written record and, its excavators say, a story worth telling anyway.Photo: INAH

Tren Maya Dig in Progreso Uncovers Unknown Maya Site

ByYucatán Magazine

Archaeologists working ahead of Tren Maya Cargo construction near Progreso’s Terminal Multimodal have uncovered a previously unknown Maya settlement, offering a rare look at how ordinary people, rather than rulers or priests, once lived on Yucatán’s northern coast.

Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History, known as INAH, named the site K’oxol Ja’, which combines the Maya words for mosquito and water, roughly “mosquito water,” a nod to the insects that still swarm the low-lying area.

Settlement
Beneath the new Tren Maya Cargo terminal in Progreso, archaeologists have found a settlement that was never meant to be remembered: a modest coastal home site with no written record and, its excavators say, a story worth telling anyway.Photo: INAH

The settlement covers 2,257 square meters (about 24,300 square feet, or a little over half an acre) and includes 21 structures and related natural features. Archaeologists located it in mid-2025 and have since decided to preserve it in place rather than relocate the finds.

David Medina Arona, the field director overseeing the discovery at the Progreso terminal, said the site’s stone foundations point to a residential settlement rather than a ceremonial or administrative one. Researchers date it to between 400 BCE and 900 CE, spanning the Preclassic and Late Classic periods.

One notable feature is a cenote at the site’s center, its opening modified with a stone rim, or brocal, that researchers believe was built to manage access to the water.

“One of the patterns we observed is the presence of bodies of water, whether permanent or seasonal,” Medina said of the site’s layout.

Because of its size and the presence of the managed water source, INAH believes K’oxol Ja’ may have been a settlement of intermediate importance, one that would have answered to a larger, governing community. Archaeologists believe that larger site is El Chiik, another find from the same rescue archaeology project, located nearby to the northwest.

El Pueblo Mérida

Other clues point to a modest community. Pottery is scarce at the site, suggesting many household items were made of materials that have since decomposed, and researchers found no human burials, unusual for a Maya settlement. Medina said the coastal site sits close to bedrock, leaving little soil depth for interring the dead within homes, a common Maya practice elsewhere.

INAH crews have cleaned and stabilized the 21 structures and fenced them with protective mesh. The institute and Mexico’s Defense Ministry, which is building the Progreso cargo terminal, have agreed to establish a protected zone around K’oxol Ja’ to allow further study.

“These are sites that complete the story of the Maya people,” Medina said. “A lot of people go to the great pyramids and the urban centers, but here we have those other Maya who left nothing written and are often forgotten. Domestic archaeology lets us give them back their voice.”

The find is the latest in a long string of archaeological discoveries tied to Tren Maya construction, which has documented thousands of sites and artifacts across the railway’s route since work began in 2020.

Fast Facts

  • Site name: K’oxol Ja’ II, Maya for “mosquito water”
  • Location: Near the Terminal Multimodal de Progreso, on Tren Maya Cargo’s route
  • Size: 2,257 square meters (about 24,300 square feet)
  • Structures found: 21, plus a central cenote with a modified stone rim
  • Estimated age: 400 BCE to 900 CE (Preclassic to Late Classic periods)
  • Status: Preserved in place, inside a protected zone agreed to by INAH and Mexico’s Defense Ministry

With reporting from La Jornada Maya

Read More