Temple of the Feathered Serpent

19.6856°N, 98.8439°W.

The Temple of the Feathered Serpent at Teotihuacan — also called the Temple of Quetzalcoatl in Aztec terminology — within the Ciudadela complex at the southern end of the Avenue of the Dead. Construction is dated to approximately 200 CE. Original base 65 metres per side; original height 22 metres on six terraces, faced with the most elaborate stone sculptural programme surviving from any pre-Aztec Mesoamerican monument: alternating relief sculptures of feathered serpents and a second deity (variously identified as Tlaloc the rain god, the Storm God, or a primordial reptilian creator) projecting from the façade in three dimensions. Excavations by Sugiyama and Cabrera from 1988 to 1989 recovered more than 200 sacrificial victims interred in dedicatory burials beneath the structure — soldiers in full military regalia, hands tied, with greenstone and shell offerings — the largest documented mass dedication in Mesoamerican archaeology.

A pyramid whose façade is carved with the only surviving high-relief sculptural programme of its civilisation, with two hundred sacrificed soldiers buried under its foundations to consecrate it.