Mexico

Cacaxtla

Battle murals hold their colour after more than 1,300 years, warriors and jaguars still vivid.

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The paint should not have survived, and yet the wall still argues. Warriors in jaguar and bird regalia stand locked in battle, faces individual enough to read, blues and reds still holding their ground.

Cacaxtla's battle murals depict a war in extraordinary detail, victors in jaguar skins facing warriors in bird headdresses, their colour still vivid after more than 1,300 years. Villagers of San Miguel del Milagro found the site in 1975, and a vast roof of some ten thousand square metres now shelters the painted core. The surrounding Tlaxcala countryside adds the pulque haciendas and the village cradle of the taco de canasta.

19.244° N · 98.336° W

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Best For

Solo

Study the battle mural panel by panel under the site's great roof.

Couple

Pair the murals with Tlaxcala's pulque country on the drive.

Why This Place

The battle murals depict a war in extraordinary detail, with individual warriors given distinct faces.
The murals were painted between 650 and 700 CE and still hold their colour.
Looters found the murals in 1975, and archaeologists rescued the site before the walls were lost.

What to Eat

In San Vicente Xiloxochitla, a village near the site, eight in ten families make tacos de canasta; the town calls itself the taco's cradle.

Tlaxcala's old pulque haciendas keep the fermented agave tradition on the same plain.

Best Time to Visit

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