![Detail from a panoramic photograph of Nacimiento. Photograph courtesy of C. R. Chiriboga.](https://i0.wp.com/openrivers.lib.umn.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/FeatureImage-e1707162206366.jpg?fit=330%2C184&ssl=1)
Water and the Preclassic Maya at El Tintal, Petén, Guatemala
As part of the 1931 Carnegie Institution of Washington’s Uaxactun expedition, geologist C.W. Cooke (1931: 286) noted, “If the bajos were restored to their former condition, the Petén would be a region of many beautiful lakes. Travel in it would be easy, for one could go from place to place by boat, with only short journeys overland, from one lake to another, across country that offers little impediment to travel at any season.” These bajos mentioned by Cooke, low-lying swampy areas prone to flooding, are spread throughout most of the northern lowlands of Petén, Guatemala, characterizing the region with seasonal and perennial wetland systems.