Itsapa

This book is the focus of the internationally televised debut of "America Unearthed" on the History Channel. The program ends with stating that this book has turned the history books upside down. It is one of the most remarkable archaeological discoveries ever in North America. All evidence suggests that Itza Maya farmers took refuge here after volcanoes and drought devastated their homeland. Around the year 1000 AD, Native Peoples built at least 200 stone masonry terraces up a 700 feet high mountain slope near the State of Georgia's highest mountain.

The book contains 380 color photographs and computer-generated virtual reality images; most by the author. It includes newly discovered information about mining expeditions into the Southeast by the Mayas.

Richard Thornton is the national architecture and Native American history columnist for the Examiner, and in 2009 was the architect of Oklahoma's Trail of Tears Memorial in Tulsa. He has studied Mesoamerican architecture in Mexico.