Quelepa

Quelepa is an important archaeological site located in eastern El Salvador. The site was founded around 400 BC, in the Late Preclassic period (500 BC - AD 250). The inhabitants constructed a platform from plaster and pumice and rebuilt it a number of times. Artefacts recovered during the excavations of the site indicate that the local population depended upon subsistence agriculture, these artefacts included metates (a kind of mortar) and comales (a type of griddle). The site belonged to the Mesoamerican cultural region. Quelepa is generally considered to have been settled by the Lenca people. Quelepa means "stone jaguar" in the Lenca language, probably in reference to the large Jaguar Altar found at the site.

Throughout its occupational history, the inhabitants crafted stone tools from obsidian. The site appears to have been linked to trade routes extending to western El Salvador and the Guatemalan Highlands and also to the north in Honduras.

Although sites in western El Salvador were severely affected by the eruption of the Ilopango Volcano in the Early Classic, its only effect on Quelepa was the severance of trade routes into Mesoamerica. This cutting off did not result in stagnation at the site, but rather resulted in the florescence of a local culture.

The Quelepa archaeological site is located 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) outside the small village of the same name. The ruins are situated along the north bank of the San Esteban River, a tributary of the Río Grande de San Miguel which flows into the Pacific Ocean. The site is located 8 kilometres (5.0 mi) west-northwest of the town of San Miguel. Quelepa is 13 miles (21 km) north of the neighbouring site of Los Llanitos. The archaeological site divided into East and West groups by a small stream called the Quebrada Agua Zarca, which has high, steep banks. The ruins have an altitude of between 160 and 180 metres (520 and 590 ft) above mean sea level.

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