Montana (Mesoamerican site)
The investigating archaeologists consider that Montana was founded as a colony by the great metropolis of Teotihuacan in the distant Valley of Mexico in order to supply that city with locally produced products such as cacao, cotton and rubber and to provide a trade route to the great highland city of Kaminaljuyu and to the Maya lowlands across the Sierra Madre de Chiapas.[1] The establishment of the Teotihuacan colony at Montana resulted in the collapse of the important nearby site of Balberta and the new capital flourished until about AD 600, dominating the region for about 200 years.[4] The site core covers an area of about 1 square kilometre (0.39 sq mi) and contains a number of enormous earth constructions.[5] The site core had a complex drainage system that channelled runoff rainwater through sections of ceramic pipe in order to maintain the structural integrity of the architecture.[8] The investigations uncovered the only complete Teotihuacan-style censer ever recovered from a controlled excavation in the entire Pacific Coastal region of Guatemala.