The famous Museum of the Mummies at the panteón (cemetery) is a quintessential example of Mexico's obsession with death. Visitors from all over come to see scores of corpses disinterred from the public cemetery. The first remains were dug up in 1865, when it was necessary to remove some bodies from the cemetery to make room for more. What the authorities uncovered were not skeletons but flesh mummified with grotesque forms and facial expressions.

The mineral content of the soil and extremely dry atmosphere had combined to preserve the bodies in this unique way.

Today, more than 100 mummies are on display in the museum, including the first mummy to be discovered, the 'smallest mummy in the world', a pregnant mummy and plenty more. Since space is still tight in the cemetery, bodies continue to be exhumed if the relatives can't pay the upkeep fees. It takes only five or six years for a body to become mummified here, though only 1-2% of the bodies exhumed are 'display quality' specimens.