El monolito de Tláloc que cuida el Museo de Antropología

The stone at the door. The monolith standing outside the National Museum of Anthropology represents Tláloc, the Nahua god of rain — one of the most widely venerated deities in Mesoamerica, because the agricultural year depended on him. It is the largest carved monolith on the continent and among the five largest in the world.

How it was identified. When the stone came to wider attention in 1889, the painter José María Velasco recorded it where it lay, in the Santa Clara ravine near San Miguel Coatlinchán, in the State of Mexico — though he believed it depicted Chalchiuhtlicue. In 1903 Leopoldo Batres, the pioneer of modern Mexican archaeology, confirmed it as Tláloc.

The move, which is the real story. In 1964 it was decided to bring the stone to the capital for the newly built museum. It weighs 168 tonnes. A steel frame had to be built at the quarry to lift it, and a special trailer with more than twenty axles to carry it. Negotiations with the village that had lived alongside it for centuries were not straightforward.

16 April 1964. At three in the morning the monolith reached Mexico City, passing the cathedral and running the length of Paseo de la Reforma, with crowds out along the route; the day turned into something close to a civic festival. An unseasonal downpour is said to have fallen as it arrived — a detail nobody in the city has been willing to let go of since.

Practical notes. The monolith stands outside the museum entrance on Paseo de la Reforma, so you can see it without paying. Metro Auditorio, line 7, is the nearest station. The museum closes on Mondays.