Why go
The causeways make Coba particularly useful for understanding a city as a network. Nohoch Mul supplies the monumental scale, while engraved stelae record ceremonial life and important events. Together, the roads and monuments connect movement through the settlement with the public history of its rulers.
The full story
Coba developed around the Cobá and Macanxoc lagoons in what is now Quintana Roo. Its layout was held together by raised roads known as sacbeob, the plural of sacbe, or white road. Stone and plaster surfaces connected the main center with residential groups, water sources and more distant places. These roads also helped archaeologists understand the settlement. Following them made it possible to map relationships between groups of buildings and to recognize the city’s broad extent. One long causeway reached west toward Yaxuna, showing that the network extended beyond movement within the central ruins. Large temple pyramids, including those in the Nohoch Mul group, anchor this dispersed layout. Carved and sculpted stelae add another kind of evidence, recording ceremonial life and events during the Late Classic period. The roads explain how parts of the city were connected; the monuments help explain what its inhabitants chose to commemorate.