Teotihuacan, located in the central Mexican state of México, was one of the earliest urban, ethnically plural societies in the Americas, a cosmopolitan blend of people and cultures from all over Mesoamerica. Between AD 1 and AD 600/650, the metropolis was densely populated within its 20-25 square kilometer (8-10 square mile) limits, reaching an estimated population of 125,000 people from AD 200-600.


Today most people visit the glorious monumental architecture at the heart of the city, the Pyramid of the Sun, Pyramid of the Moon and the lovely Palace of the Quetzal Butterfly. Tourists can also still travel the city's massive avenues running north/south (the famous Street of the Dead) and east-west (East and West Avenues). What tourists typically don't see are over 2,000 large-scale residential units, apartment complexes built by the Teotihuacan state to accommodate a massive influx of immigrants, from all over Mesoamerica and from all socioeconomic statuses.

What Were the Residential Compounds Like?

The residential compounds--sometimes called barrios or neighborhood enclaves--were solid, roofed clusters of buildings separated by open patios and with built-in drainage systems. They were single-story buildings with adobe walls, plastered or packed earthen floors and flat roofs. The buildings had multiple rooms, with patios, porticoes, ritual courtyards and passageways organized into separate living quarters identified as apartments.

The apartments held kitchens, sleeping quarters, storage areas, and refuse sectors. Shared sections included ritual courtyards which sometimes held an altar for domestic cult activities; there were patios for communal activities; and both private and public cemetery spaces.

The architecture of the residential blocks which have been excavated to date exhibits a wide variation in size, quality and internal arrangement. Some shared architectural features suggest they were constructed by or within a set of rules defined by the state, including the thickness of the exterior walls and the orientation of close to 15.5 degrees east of north, the same or similar to that of Teotihuacan's major monuments and streets. Archaeologist George Cowgill has estimated that between 3-5 extended family groups lived in each compound, with about 5-12 persons in a unit.

Living in the Residential Compounds

Some of the compounds were clearly occupied by families, a core group of people who were biologically related; but archaeological excavations have discovered that many housed immigrants who were not blood relatives. All of the compounds, regardless of their relatedness, were organized by shared residence and economic production--workshops where the residents made things such as pottery and stone tools. Many of the compounds were continuously occupied for several centuries, from their construction in the Early Tlamimilolpa phase (200-300 AD) until the dissolution of the Teotihuacan state around AD 650.

Burials in the compounds were typically a pit dug beneath the floor of private patios and rooms or under public altars, courtyards and stairways. Grave goods varied widely, with some ceramic vessels, mica, obsidian, slate, marine shells from both oceans the most common. Some more exotic materials include precolumbian jade, incense burners, and seeds or plant parts of squash, maize, amaranth and cotton. Highest status burials were typically placed in deeper pits in public areas, with larger and complex offerings, more frequently cremated and/or painted with red ochre.

Varying rituals, including burial processes and workshops, as well as pottery styles and types of obsidian: all of these are keys archaeologists have used to identify the foreign origins of the occupants of the residential zones.

Non-Residential Compounds: Teopancazco

A recent investigation by Linda Manzanilla (2015) has revealed that some of the foreigner barrio neighborhoods were closer to workhouses than domestic clusters. Manzanilla looked at the neighborhood center of Teopancazco, occupied between AD 150 and 650. This neighborhood was a functional center, occupied by immigrants and devoted to ritual and specialized craft production. The people who lived there came from several different areas near and far from Teotihuacan, including the nearby Basin of Mexico, the Central Highlands and the Gulf Coast.

Paleopathological studies on the burials in Teopancazco indicated the people were heavy laborers who manufactured cotton cloth and garments, made stone tools and pottery, made nets and fished. Luxury items of greenstone, travertine, onyx, marble and pyrites were manufactured by lapidary specialists there; military personnel resided in this barrio and there may well have been a medical sector where childbirth was assisted. A single ritual event included 29 individuals, mainly young foreign males who were decapitated and ritually buried in the barrio.

Teopancazco's burials were predominantly men--in fact only 15% were women--suggesting either that the occupants were primarily male, or that women belonging to the neighborhood were buried elsewhere.