Catedral de Nuestra Senora de la Purisima Concepcion

The parish church that became Campeche's cathedral was begun in 1540 on the spot where the first Mass in the new settlement is said to have been celebrated, making it one of the earliest religious foundations on the Gulf coast. Construction stretched over more than two centuries, with the main structure largely finished by the mid-18th century, and the building was formally raised to cathedral rank in 1895 when the Diocese of Campeche was created. Its pale limestone facade, built in a restrained baroque-neoclassical style, is flanked by two towers of different design known locally as La Espanola and La Campechana, a nickname reflecting a popular sense that one tower reads as more Spanish and the other as more distinctly local in character. Inside, the white-vaulted nave is comparatively unadorned compared with more ornate Mexican cathedrals, focusing attention on the main altar and side chapels. Its principal treasure is the Santo Entierro, a silver-mounted 18th-century sepulchre containing a reclining figure of Christ, which is carried in procession through the streets of the Centro Historico each Good Friday in one of the city's major religious observances. The cathedral remains an active place of worship rather than a museum, and its restoration history has focused on structural conservation of the facade and towers rather than the addition of formal exhibits.