It is widely recognized that the Olmec civilization influenced many neighboring cultures and later civilizations. La Venta in the Mexican state of Tabasco is the most important city erected by the Olmecs. This ancient civilization established cultural and ceremonial patterns in this part of the world. The Maya culture that developed later was inspired to build cities and pyramids in a similar layout to the Olmecs. The Maya also used stone to build altars, erect stelae, and for carvings.
La Venta thrived about 2500 year ago. However, this archeological site is not extremely impressive. For many years in the second half of the 20th century, it was a part of the oil extraction field. While here, we were able to see the overgrown pyramidal structure out of compacted earth and a large number of stone sculptures. Unfortunately, all of them are the replicas because the originals were transferred to another park in a distant Villahermosa, the capital city of Tabasco. Probably the most interesting are Olmec colossal heads, which are the distinctive feature of this civilization. To date, 17 of them have been found, four in this location. Three heads facing north are aligned along east-west. It is not fully explained how large quantities of heavy stone were transported to this location, since the stones used here are not present in the immediate vicinity.
