The Lost Cities of Central And South America - The White City (La Ciudad Blanca)

It is said that in the remote regions of Honduras lies the legendary White City that, since the 16th century, has been attracting many travellers and explorers. There are still a lot of stories being circulated about curved white stones, statues made of gold, monkey deities, and bloody sacrifices.

[The representation of The White City by Virgil Finlay. Image Source]

The city was mentioned by the famous Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés (1485 - 1547). La Ciudad Blanca, as it was originally called, was described by Cortés, in his report to the then king of Spain, as a city set in the deep jungle and abundant with stupendous amount of gold. It's distinctive landmarks were the enormous statues of monkey "gods", that were worshipped by the natives.
It is known that the local Pre-Columbian cultures were famous in their skill of gold metallurgy, and of other precious metals. Although, the people from those cultures ascribed to these resources a completely different meaning. For them, the gold served an aesthetic role, and much later it started to be considered as a precious material. The existence of temples or cities decorated with gold cannot be ruled out.
The question is, are we every going to discover them?
La Ciudad Blanca seems to be one of the hottest contenders.

[La Mosquitia region in eastern Honduras is suspected to contain La Ciudad Blanca. Image Source]

There Is No Way Back

Cortés himself never found this extraordinary city, although he heard many stories about it. Also, the other explorers have not had much luck. Some of them have never found The White City, and those found it have never returned from their expeditions. Are those places being protected by the secretive natives, much like The City of Z?
This version became popular after the tragic death of American adventurer and explorer, Theodore Morde (1911 - 1954). He went on his search of this lost city in 1940, and is currently considered to be the one who got the closest to revealing the truth about this golden legend.

[Theodore Morde. Image Source]

In fact, his travelogue describes the discovery. He wrote, "I am convinced that we have found the site of the legendary Lost City of the Monkey God". Unfortunately, before he managed to enjoy his discovery, and share it's exact location with the world (he refused to disclose the location to prevent it from being plundered), he committed suicide. Some other sources recently claimed that he died in a car accident in London, soon after he came back from his expedition to Honduras. Of course, this led to various conspiracy theorists argue that there must have been some mysterious power protecting the secret.

The Lasers Uncover New Evidence

The city has had a status of just being an ordinary legend until 2012, when the new research discovered it's possible ruins. Archaeologists Christopher Fisher and Stephen Leisz of Colorado State University were responsible for it's discovery.

[LIDAR scan of the area shows some unknown structures. Picture Source]

They used advanced LIDAR technology to map the vast terrain in La Mosquitia, on the Mosquito Coast. By using the laser light, they managed to penetrate the treetops of this incredibly thick rain forest. They discovered some structures that resembled stone pyramids. According to more recent research, it appears to be a deserted city, that was inhabited by some unknown civilization, thousands of years ago. The team of archaeologists extensively searched the area and found out that this complex contains structures which resemble plazas, earthworks and mounds. They also discovered a pyramid with cache of stone sculptures at it's base. They collected 52 artifacts in total, with the most interesting being the sculpture of what looked like a “were-jaguar".

[One of the artifacts found near the scanned site that resembles a "were-jaguar". Source]