With Tres Zapotes, San Lorenzo Tenochtitlán, and La Venta, Laguna de los Cerros is considered one of the four major Olmec centers.

[7] Due to its location in a pass between the river valleys to the south and the northwest, and its proximity to basalt[8] sources in the volcanic Tuxtla Mountains to the north, Laguna de los Cerros was occupied over an uncharacteristically long period – perhaps close to 2,000 years, from Olmec times until the Classic era.

[9] One of these satellite sites was Llano del Jícaro, largely a workshop for monumental architecture due to the nearby basalt flows.

Monuments carved from Llano del Jícaro basalt can be found not only at Laguna de los Cerros, but also the large Olmec center of San Lorenzo Tenochtitlán some 60 kilometres (37 mi) to the southeast.

[10] Llano del Jícaro was abandoned sometime after 1000 BCE and Laguna de los Cerros itself shows a significant decline at that time.

Laguna de los Cerros was briefly investigated by Alfonso Medellin Zenil in 1960 and by Ann Cyphers in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

Chronologies in neighboring areas have been refined (for instance Pool 1990, 1995; Stark 1989, 1995, 2001; Daneels 2002), and they represent a major comparative support for the present study.