Casa de Montejo

The Casa de Montejo fills much of the south side of Mérida's Plaza Grande, at Calle 63 No. 506. It was built between 1542 and 1549 as the family home of the Montejos, the conquerors of Yucatán: Francisco de Montejo the Adelantado, his son Francisco the Younger, who founded Mérida, and his nephew of the same name. The Adelantado reserved this lot on the main square for himself, and the builders used cut stone from the Maya buildings of T'Hó. An inscription carved in the limestone records that he ordered the work in 1549 (MDXLIX). It is thought to be the only 16th-century house in Mexico in the Plateresque style, the ornate Spanish Renaissance manner of carving a facade like silverwork.

The doorway is the reason to stop. Above the entrance the stone is covered in carving: the Montejo coat of arms over the balcony, busts thought to be members of the family, and two conquistadors standing on the heads of conquered Maya figures, a blunt statement of who now ruled the land. The Montejos' descendants kept the house for almost three centuries. Around 1840 it passed to the hacienda-owning Peón family, who reworked the inside with a balcony, a corridor, a dining room and parlors; the caryatids, columns in the form of women framing the windows, were added in 1896, when the interior was redone in a French-influenced style.

In 1981 the Banco Nacional de México bought the building through its cultural foundation and fitted it out for bank offices, and part of it still holds a branch and cash machines. On 2 December 2010 it opened as a museum and cultural center, Casa Montejo, run by Fomento Cultural Banamex after restoration work supervised by INAH. Four permanent rooms show how a wealthy Mérida family lived around the turn of the 20th century: a study and library, a parlor, a bedroom and a dining room, with dark carved furniture, chandeliers and painted ceilings from the henequen-boom years. Three more halls hold temporary exhibitions; in early 2025 they showed Goya's etching series Los Caprichos. Entry and guided tours are free.