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The city
Yagul was the capital of a Postclassic city-state
Yagul was a Zapotec city-state, first occupied around 500 BC. Most of the visible remains date from 1250 to 1521 AD, when it was the capital of a Postclassic city-state.
The name
The name means old tree, and locally it is called Old Village
Yagul comes from the Zapotec words for tree and old, hence old tree. Locally it is also known as Pueblo Viejo, Old Village. Just before the Spanish Conquest it had a population of more than 6000 people.
6000people living there in the Late Postclassic
Ballcourt
Its ballcourt is the largest in the Valley of Oaxaca
The restored ballcourt was built between 500 and 700 AD and widened between 700 and 900 AD. It has a total length of 47 meters. A carved serpent's head found on its south wall is now in the Regional Museum in Oaxaca.
47 meterstotal length of the ballcourt
Six Patios
The Palace of the Six Patios is a maze of passages and rooms
The Palace of the Six Patios is a labyrinthine structure of passageways and many rooms, formed of three elite complexes, each with two patios. A tomb entrance is found in each patio. The same layout is found at nearby Mitla.
The fortress
A fortress on the cliffs looks over the whole Tlacolula Valley
The fortress sits atop cliffs to the northeast, protected by natural and artificial walls. It has several lookout points, including one reached by a narrow bridge. After the Conquest the population was moved to the nearby town of Tlacolula.
Day 4, morning
It comes after Tlacolula de Matamoros. Then Mitla.
More stories from this trip idea
The words are a retelling of the Wikipedia article Yagul, and are shared under CC BY-SA 4.0. They are checked against those articles, and a fact that is not in them is left out.