La Iglesia (The Church)

20.4933°N, 87.7369°W.

La Iglesia ("The Church") is the principal pyramid of the Cobá Group, the central architectural complex at Cobá in Quintana Roo, Mexico. Constructed in stages from roughly 500 to 900 CE during the Late Classic period, the pyramid rises 24 metres in nine receding terraces of dressed limestone, fronted by a long ceremonial plaza bordered by stelae bearing carved portraits of the city's rulers. The structure takes its colonial-era nickname from the Spanish chroniclers who first encountered it. The summit temple has lost most of its roof, but architectural traces and adjacent altars confirm its ritual use through the Postclassic. La Iglesia stands at the convergence of three major sacbeob within Cobá itself, anchoring the radial causeway plan that defines the layout of the city. The Carnegie Institution under J. Eric Thompson conducted the first systematic mapping in 1926, followed by INAH consolidation work from the 1970s onward.

La Iglesia is a building the conquistadors named after their own architecture without ever entering its summit chamber.