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This spacious square was the heart of the Mayan city of Ti’ho, and so was taken as the hub of the new city by Conquistador Francisco Montejo when he founded Mérida in 1542. The square is still surrounded by the city’s main public buildings, while its colonnades and benches under a canopy of giant laurel trees provide favorite meeting places.

Built between 1562 and 1598, this is the oldest cathedral on the American mainland (in the entire continent, only Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic is older). Massive and monumental, it was built in the sober style of the Spanish Renaissance, with a soaring façade and few decorative flourishes.

Neighboring the Cathedral, the elegant seat of the Yucatán state government was built in 1892 to replace a Spanish governors’ palace. Its patios, open to the public, are decorated with striking murals by Fernando Castro Pacheco.

The astonishing portico of the first Spanish stone house completed in Mérida, built for the Montejos themselves in 1549, bears a very graphic celebration of the Conquest. The rest of the house has since been rebuilt and is now a bank.

Mérida’s main drag for strolling and souvenir shopping, running from Plaza Mayor through Parque Hidalgo, another fine square with a clutch of cafés and restaurants.

The Jesuits built this church in 1618, favoring ornamentation and a little flair over the plain style of the Franciscans, who built most of the town’s other religious buildings.

The arcaded square of Santa Lucía, dating in part from 1575, is the most romantic of all Mérida’s old squares. Free concerts of traditional music take place every Thursday (see Serenatas Yucatecas, Mérida).

Shopping hub of the Yucatán, Mérida’s market is a huge bazaar. Stalls are piled high with chilis, fabulous fruit and other food, hammocks, sandals, panama hats, and embroidery (see Places to Shop).

Laid out in the Yucatán’s early 1900s boom in imitation of Parisian boulevards, Paseo de Montejo is lined with lavish mansions, some using fabulous iconography, such as this eagle-and-snake motif.

The grandest of all the Paseo Montejo mansions, built for General Francisco Cantón between 1909 and 1911, houses one of Mexico’s most important archeological museums. It has many treasures excavated from sites all across the Yucatán, and is especially rich in ceramics and jade. Its displays provide an overview of the Mayan world that illuminates visits to the ruins themselves.