Monte Alban

Monte Albán is a large pre-Columbian archaeological site in the Santa Cruz Xoxocotlán Municipality in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca [1]. The partially excavated civic ceremonial center of the Monte Albán site is situated atop an artificially leveled ridge [1]. It has an elevation of about 1,940 m above mean sea level and rises some 400 m from the valley floor [1]. Besides being one of the earliest cities of Mesoamerica, Monte Albán was important for nearly one thousand years as the pre-eminent Zapotec socio-political and economic center [1]. Founded toward the end of the Middle Formative period at around 500 BC, by the Terminal Formative (c. 100 BC – AD 200) Monte Albán had become the capital of a large-scale expansionist polity that dominated much of the Oaxacan highlands and interacted with other Mesoamerican regional states [1]. The city lost its political pre-eminence by the end of the Late Classic (c. AD 500–750), and soon thereafter was largely abandoned [1]. The monumental center of Monte Albán is the Main Plaza, which measures approximately 300 meters by 150 meters [1].