Lost ancient Mayan city discovered ‘by accident’ in deep jungle [Video]

Archaeologists have stumbled upon a vast ancient Mayan city built centuries ago beneath dense jungle in Mexico.

The hidden urban centre in the south-eastern state of Campeche had sports fields, amphitheatres and pyramids, the BBC reports.

The discovery was made by using the advanced mapping technology Ltdar – a laser survey that maps structures buried under vegetation.

A heat map from the laser survey of three sites in Mexico. Analysis revealed a lost ancient city from the Mayan era. (Image: Cambridge University Press) (Supplied)

The newly-discovered city, known as Valeriana, is second in density behind only Calakmul, in Mexico regarded as the largest Maya site in ancient Latin America.

It was found by American researcher and PhD student Luke Auld-Thomas when he was browsing figures on the internet.

“I was on something like page 16 of Google search and found a laser survey done by a Mexican organisation for …