A series of prehistoric caves and rock shelters located 35 kilometers east of the city of Oaxaca, in the Tlacolula Valley, between the archaeological zones of Yagul and Mitla. Some of these shelters provide archaeological and rock-art evidence for the progress of nomadic hunter-gathers to incipient farmers.

Until now, a total of 115 prehistoric caves of Yagul and Mitla are known. Caves here have yielded evidence of the earliest plant domestication in North America, about 10,000 years ago, and other valuable details about the transition from hunting and gathering to agriculture over a period of several thousand years.

The Guilá Naquitz cave has provided extraordinarily well preserved botanical evidence of bottle gourds, beans and squash and the earliest known maize cobs. These discoveries provide clues of the transition from nomadic to sedentary life.

Other two interesting caves are Cueva Blanca and Gheo Shih, both sites have provided evidence of Pleistocene animals and stone tools and the seasonal use of the abundant summer resources of fruit and small mammals.

Approaching Yagul from the main road, you can make out a large white rock painting of a person/deity/tree/sun on a cliff face on the Caballito Blanco rock outcrop to your right. Other important caves in the region are: Silvia, Blanca, El Candelabro, Caballito Blanco, La Paloma, Los Mochines. The Unesco-protected caves are difficult to visit independently.

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