The archaeological zone of Cholula is a historic site located seven kilometers west of Puebla de Zaragoza, capital of the Mexican state of Puebla. It is a federal area located between the municipalities of San Pedro Cholula and San Andres Cholula, and its name derives from the Nahuatl word Cholollan, which means "water that falls in place of escape." This is one of the oldest settlements in Mexico, and has a continuous occupation from the upper Preclassic. However, its importance in Mesoamerica was variable along the two thousand year history of the native civilization of Central America. The first settlement of Cholula was located in the vicinity of a lake that has disappeared. This happened in the Middle Preclassic and Superior, approximately between the VIII and III century BC. At that time, Mesoamerican populations were small villages whose main occupation is subsistence agriculture, especially focused on the cultivation of corn. Around the first century BC, in Cholula the first major ceremonial center was built, from which grow what would be one of the main religious centers of Mesoamerica. During the Mesoamerican Classic Period, Cholula was the main ally of Teotihuacan in the Valley of Puebla-Tlaxcala. Provided to the metropolis of the central highlands of prized items in the Mesoamerican trade network, such as ceramics Thin Orange, which, as its name suggests, are products of pottery distinguished by the fineness of its finishes and the characteristic orange. Thin Orange ceramics was a good of luxury consumption in Mesoamerica, destined only for the ruling elites.

According to some hypotheses, Cholula would have fallen at about the same time than Teotihuacan decline around the seventh century was. In other proposals, the city would have received regional force in the context of the power vacuum emerged from the decline of Teotihuacan metropolis. Whatever it was, the great temple of Quetzalcoatl was abandoned around the eleventh century AD, when its population began to decline and the city lost economic and commercial importance. The latest research found that the area belonged to Cholula in the classic period of Mesoamerica was under the influence of carriers villages Ñuiñe culture, whose main centers are located in the southwestern state of Puebla and the northwest of Oaxaca, the call Mixteca region. After its decline in the classical period, Cholula resurface in the early post-classic as one of the leading commercial and religious nodes of Mesoamerica. The Tolteca-Chichimeca History (Fernando de Alva Ixtlilxochitl) noted that the arrival of the first Teochichimecas migrations to the highlands, the city of Cholula was populated by a group that is known as Olmec-xicalanca or --with the historical Olmecs in order to differentiate those archaeologies -- Olmecs. The Olmec-xicalancas also were an ethnic group with a significant presence in other areas of central Mexico as Cacaxtla, Cantona, Xochitécatl and Chalcatzingo Xochicalco and probably in the state of Morelos. It has been suggested that the Olmec-xicalancas have been originating from the eastern coast of the Gulf of Mexico, and they were bearers of a culture related to the Maya, reflected in his artistic style. After a struggle against the native peoples, the Toltecs could impose its hegemony, including Cholula in its area of influence. Since then, the city acquired the full name of Tollan-Chollollan-Tlachihualtepetl, meaning Large City where water falls in place of escape from the hill fact earth. In early post classic is likely to maintain relations with Cholula other areas of Mesoamerica, especially the Mixtec Lord Eight Deer kingdom, as suggested by some interpretations of documents as the Codex Tonindeye.

The city was governed by two chiefs, who also served as a sort of priests of the two main deities of the Olmec-xicalanca: the Feathered Serpent and the Rain God (Tlaloc), a fact that reveals the agricultural vocation of Cholula. Later, with the expansion Mexica, Cholula was one of the main allies of Tenochtitlan. According to those who knew Cholula in the sixteenth century, this was a great city, known for being a center of pilgrimage of comparable importance to Rome and Mecca (De Rojas, 1985). The settlement included many temples, shrines and temples (Cortés, 1928), but undoubtedly the focal point of the ritual activity was the site of the Great Temple of Quetzalcoatl. Unfortunately, there are minimum apparent vestiges of what was once the majestic architectural cholulteca amazed at the time that the conquerors. The famous Great Pyramid, today symbol of the town, had fallen into disuse for several centuries before the arrival of the Spaniards, but still continued to perform some rituals in it, looked like a small, simple natural hill, and as such was described by the chroniclers; So perhaps it saved him from the fate of the buildings themselves were in office at the time. Compared to Tenochtitlan, Cholula surprised by the scarcity of sculptures that should be associated with the buildings of the sacred precinct. Certainly have not been held here the big infrastructure projects that have brought to light in Mexico City such materials, but would expect the various public works that have severed underground to place drainage and wiring had revealed some evidence. However, it has not. Thus, the archaeological indicators that have some way to verify the existence and location of structures over the old city are practically nonexistent. The Temple of Quetzalcoatl is perhaps the only monument of indigenous Cholula whose location is provided in reference to the trace of the colonial city, as in 1581 Cholula ratio, Gabriel de Rojas (1985) notes that in the place where the Franciscan convent of San Gabriel rose. However, some data seem to cast doubt on that assertion. For example Adolph Bandelier (1976), in his 1881 trip reports that the friars found no "antiques" during the many excavations that took place in those years to modify its facilities.

Meanwhile, archaeological explorations in 1971 (Castro and Garcia Moll, 1972) outside the south wall of the Chapel Royal were not localized structural remains, more than a plaster floor that once was cut for the placement of several hundred corpses, probably the result of epidemics of early colony. However, these investigations showed that, to be in the area of the Temple of Quetzalcoatl did not extend at least until the current convent garden. In contrast, on the walls of the royal chapel you can see some carved stones, all with the same design, which seem to be parts of a decorative element of a prehispanic building; It is very likely to be many other carved stones whose faces cannot find exposed and would have been part of the pre-Cortesian facades, now incorporated into the walls of the convent, in the Portal de Peregrinos or in other churches and buildings. The builders probably did not belong to a single language group. On the contrary, it can be assumed that this great center dominated an area inhabited by many different cultural and linguistic groups area. Several sources identify the builders of Teotihuacan and Cholula as a group called Olmec-xicalanca. The Indian historian Chimalpain calls these Olmec-xicalanca quiahuiztecas, or "people of the rain," Nahuatl word for the name you gave the Mixtecs themselves: Ñusabi. It is increasing the possibility that these Olmec-xicalanca was a popoloca or Mixtec-speaking group. Cholula is a city that was saved from ruin as a religious center and it was never destroyed, but if he knew a change of masters, but gained popularity in the militarist period. Indeed it is likely that this city from benefiting the destruction of Teotihuacan and perhaps beyond taken part in it. After removing his rival, Cholula extended its influence into the eastern and southern Mexico despite not being able to ever rival the direct heirs of Teotihuacan in the Valley of Mexico and in the border province of Hidalgo. Every era has its own brand; however, each age is only in the background, a bridge between the past and the future. Theocratic Mesoamerican societies were strongly characterized and were not, however more than the simplest transitions between militaristic societies that replaced them. Every society is a battleground between its past and its future; a conflict of this nature is that the theocratic building stagger. It is thought that the most probable dates of the fall of the capital of Tula, the Toltec capital, appear to have been 1156 or 1168. At disintegrate Nahua and Otomi families that formed the fragments that remain, and are known historically migrated as tribes nahualtecas. One of these tribes, the cholulteca, still have clear memories of his Toltec origin; by sources it knows that they were the Toltec-Chichimec, who walked shitting until settled in Cholula as slaves of the Olmecs there, until battled away and using his own weapons. Those evicted, they had to fight related peoples, those Xochimilca appear to have been Olmec descent, and perhaps are the xochimeca who lived in Chalco-Amaquemecan. But those themselves Olmecs, were driven in two directions after Cholula: one saw Zacatlan, in the state of Puebla (the Olmec-Zacatecas) and other south (the Olmec-Xicallanca).

The archaeological zone of Cholula is located in the street of Puebla-Tlaxcala. With this name an extensive area that includes most of the states of Puebla and Tlaxcala. This valley is limited to the northeast by the Malinche volcano, also known as Matlacuéyetl west, the Sierra Nevada, which include two large volcanic cones: Popocatepetl and Iztaccihuatl. To the north, the valley is separated by small elevations in the plains and south borders the basins of Valsequillo and Atlixco. The Valley of Cholula is a sub area of the region of Puebla -Tlaxcala, which echo its geographical characteristic and its location in the Central Highlands was the scene of a major and ancient cultural development in Mesoamerican history. Thus, the archaeological zone of Cholula shares the three major cultural horizons established by archaeologists to subdivide the Mesoamerican Development: Preclassic, Classic and Post Classic. By the year 1100AD, in the middle Preclassic, Cholula emerged as a modest human settlement; over time become to be among the largest cities of ancient Mexico and made their presence felt in the area for centuries. Currently they give continuity both cities: San Pedro Cholula or Cholula and San Andrés Cholula. It is known that Cholula was inhabited since ancient times. Inside this building structures have been found belonging to the Middle Preclassic (1100 to 200 BC); however, from the upper Preclassic (200 BC to 1) a type of architecture that reaches its peak in the Classic is developed; in this horizon large buildings are made in the ceremonial center, among which the huge pyramidal base known as the Great Pyramid. Around the ceremonial center of Cholula population of that time it settled. For reasons are still unknown, the ceremonial site of Cholula, in the current archaeological zone, fell into disuse in the late Classic, but a new focus of ceremonial activities was erected in what is now the center of the city of Cholula, which it was running at the time of the Conquest. To be abandoned, the old buildings were destroyed and covering of earth and rubble by the action of water, wind, the roots of the plants and the man himself. In the Post Classic, the Great Pyramid took the form of a natural mound, on whose slopes and filling small human groups settled. The most important building in the archaeological site is the Temple of Tlaloc, locally by its calendar name: 9 Rain or Chiconquiáhuitl 6 pyramidal base built in different phases, dedicated to the pre-Hispanic deity whose worship was one of the most important in all the Mesoamerican area. It is one of the most voluminous pyramids in the world, and has long remained forgotten, believing it was a mountain, on which was built a Catholic church in colonial times. This temple was abandoned 100 years after the fall of Teotihuacan, Toltec time hegemony in Mesoamerica (Early Postclassic). By 1300 AD, Cholula was abandoned by the Toltecs and the arrival of the Spanish in 1519, the cholultecas were privileged tributaries of Tenochtitlan, and enemies of the Tlaxcalans. Upon arrival of the Spaniards the Temple of Quetzalcoatl, was located to the west side of the Great Pyramid, which was destroyed and its stones the main colonial monuments were built. Cholula also has notable examples of mural painting, as called Mural of the Drinkers.

The Great Pyramid of Cholula or Tlachihualtepetl (Nahuatl "handmade hill") is the world's largest pyramidal base with 400 meters each side is also the largest pyramid by volume with 4,500,000 m³ (four million five hundred thousand cubic meters) but not in height; is 65 m high (similar to the Sun in Teotihuacan has surpassed by 64 m Temple IV Tikal has 70 m) while the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt has a height of 139 m. The construction is part of the archaeological zone of Cholula, in the center of the Mexican state of Puebla. It is not known exactly when it began building the pyramid but archaeologists believe it was in 300 BC or at the beginning of the Christian era. It is estimated that lasted between 500 and 1000 years until the pyramid was finished. The construction of the temple Chiconaquiahuitl (god of the nine rains) was conducted over several generations. It began in the second century BC, and ended at the fall of Teotihuacan, which was the last pre-Hispanic culture that left its mark on the large base (900 AD -1100 AD), before Spaniards arrived. One of the construction practices of Mesoamerican was the remodeling of old buildings, renovations that were aimed at the expansion and maintenance of the original buildings, so that the long period of construction of this temple must be understood in this context. The end of the Classic in the Mexican plateau was a time of great violence in the archaeological record is expressed in the desecration of symbols and iconic monuments established power. In Cholula, the anger focused on the Patio of the Altars, which was the seat of political-religious ceremony in the holy city. By 1300 AD, Cholula was abandoned by the Toltecs and the arrival of the Spaniards in 1519, the Cholula and Tenochtitlan were privileged enemy’s tlaxcaltecas. At that moment, the Temple of Quetzalcoatl was located on the west side of the Great Pyramid, which was destroyed and its stones the main colonial monuments were built. Cholula also has notable examples of mural painting, as the so-called "Mural of the Drinkers."

El Patio de los Altares. Located on the south side of the Great Pyramid of Cholula, this set is a contemporary of the various structures found inside the large base and, like these shows at least six construction phases. Its original floor about nine meters below the current level is located. It is a large open courtyard at its southern end which originally must have more than 80 meters wide and appears limited in its extreme east and west by long rectangular buildings; they commonly found in paints on their boards. It owes its name to three symmetrically placed altars: one north, one east and one west. Despite the large number of overlays that can be observed in various ends of the yard, its construction falls within the Cholula II and III (200-450 years) phases. Ceremonial Altar. Chroniclers relate that when in Cholula water was scarce, and this was very serious given that most of the population was engaged in farming, farmers flocked to the priests for help; these pilgrimages aa rose in the top of the hill where they sacrificed children between six and seven years, since, according to customs, children are the messengers of Tlaloc and the sacrifice would go to ask for water. In the ceremonial altar built after the abandonment of the Great Pyramid and Patio de los Altares, had, as offerings in front of his steps west side, two skulls of decapitated children, in what was also possible to distinguish strong cranial deformation . Mural drinkers. The central theme mural ceremony drunkenness. Men who appear in the mural are slender, large containers holding liquid, which has been interpreted as the drink was consumed at that time called pulque. The mural shows drinkers 110 people drinking, this mural is considered an extraordinary work of great format in Mesoamerica. Parties in the s. XVI when celebrating the god of pulque, drunkenness was allowed in society. Sahagun, ever thought that if interpretation would fit so well in scenes of 1400 years ago. To Fray Bernardino it was contrasting that alcoholic drinks were granted for elders and warriors only, while in Cholla consumption of alcoholic beverages were from ancient traditions that allow increased consumption by the general public. The mural was discovered by archaeologist Ponciano Salazar in the year 1969 6 levels courtyard of the altars, the painting has a length of 56 m by 2.5 m high. The mural is defining a palatial space and uninhibited subject has given importance as an outstanding paintings in Mesoamerica. The product was Tlachihualtepetl seven superimposed pyramids, each of which covered all the previous pyramid. This led to the gradual enlargement of the base, which reached four hundred fifty meters side, reaching a height of sixty-six meters. The current appearance of the Great Pyramid is a hill atop which is a Catholic church dedicated to Our Lady of Remedios. It was built in 1594, after three attempts of the Spaniards to destroy it entirely during previous decades. The Catholic church is now a major destination for pilgrimages to Catholic believers in the region, and is also used for the celebration of indigenous rites. Because the Catholic Church has been declared historical heritage of the Mexican history, the pre-Hispanic pyramid could not be excavated in its entirety, since this pyramid was made of earth. What can be seen is the core of what was the last great pyramid of culture, there are only isolated limestone, and the rest were abandoned to deteriorate for more than 200 years. However, archaeologists have excavated building about eight kilometers of tunnels that allow observation of the different construction phases of the pyramid and belonging to other than the Teotihuacan culture, the murals still relevant drinkers of pulque, the grasshoppers and dedicated to Chiconaquiahuitl.