About Tres Zapotes

  • Location

    Tres Zapotes was the northern and westernmost Olmec capital. It was geographically separated from the rest of Olman by the Tuxtla volcanic range to its east. This meant that Tres Zapotes was near important deposits of basalt, the stone of choice for monumental Olmec carvings.

  • Oligarchical

    Historian Christopher Pool argues that in contrasts to its predecesors of San Lorenzo and La Venta where there is a clear goal of monopolizing economic and ideological sources of power by a select few, the cityscape of Tres Zapotes implies less political centralization in favor of a system that manifests the interests of powerful factions in a ruling assembly.

  • Oligarchical cont.

    More specifically, Tres Zapotes seems to have been a city that did not explicitely demarcate restricted areas of the city. Instead different collections of mounds and plazas reflect the possibilty that no one ruler or lineage ever claimed an overwhelming dominance of the city.

  • Column

    Nonetheless, Tres Zapotes was a city of impressive size and opulence. It was the enduring cultural and economic center of Olman long after the decline of San Lorenzo and La Venta. While San Lorenzo and La Venta fell from glory around 1000 and 400 BCE respectively, Tres Zapotes lasted as an important regional center well into the first millenia CE. 

  • Stela C

    Stela C is arguably one of the most influential Olmec artifacts ever found. At the time of its discovery in 1956, the Olmec were poorly understood. However, a date inscription on Stela C (which coincides with 32 BCE), opened the possibility that the Olmecs were the Oldest civilization of Mesoamerica. Although initially highly contested, carbon dating and further archeological research proved that the Olmecs were in fact Mesoamerica's mother civilization.
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Inspired by Stela C

In our Tres Zapotes collection we pay homage to Tres Zapotes' most influential artifact, Stela C. This massive stela contains the second oldest date inscription ever found in Mesoamerica and it was instrumental in making archeologists realize that the Olmecs were the oldest of the Mesoamerican civilizations.