Yarumela also known as El Chircal, is one of the archeological sites located in Honduras and based around the Middle Formative era in Mesoamerican history, occupied between 1000 BC and AD 250 by the ancestors of the Lencan culture, also known as the Proto-Lencan people. During its heyday at the end of the Preclassic mesoamerican period was a popular trade center, especially for precious commodities.

Yarumela also called Hiarumela, llarumela, or "El Chilcal", was a Lenca settlement from the Middle Formative period in Mesoamerica, a period that ran from approximately: 900 BC-300BC. The Lenca are an indigenous Mesoamerican people from southwestern Honduras and eastern El Salvador. Yarumela was part of a region that covered around 16,000 square kilometres and shared the region with other archaeological sites such as: La Venta, Los Naranjos, Lo de Vaca and Playa de los Muertos.

Located sixty kilometres south of the Los Naranjos, the site of Yarumela yielded information that led archaeologists to believe that it was another imposing Middle Formative center. This information also led archaeologists to believe that Yarumela as a center had a focus on precious commodities. Much like the settlement found at Los Naranjos, Yarumela's area was protected by the location in which it was found. On the eastern side, the settlement at Yarumela was protected by the Humuya River, which was a branch off of the Ulua, and on the western side it was protected by a large man-made ditch.

The settlement at Yarumela was considered to be a large and prosperous trade center; archaeologists determined this from the numerous large structure mounds they found on the site as well as some of the material artifacts located there as well. Artifacts like shells, jadeite, obsidian fragments as well as exotic ceramics.

According to the archaeological studies carried out in the area, this settlement was first inhabited approximately 1,000 B.C during the Mesoamerican pre-classic period by the ancestors of the Lenca culture known as the Proto-Lenca. The El Chircal de Yarumela settlement covered approximately 74 acres (30 hectares) of territory in the Comayagua Valley, and due to its location, the site took advantage of its fact of being an important passageway between the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean Sea.

This was evidenced by the large number of ornamental shells found at the site, the shells that were native to both coastal regions, this together with the amount of Guatemalan jade and other exotic items found by archaeologists at the site location makes the researchers believe that this was the case. In fact, several discoveries indicate that it was a central trade route that connected Mesoamerica with the intermediate zone.

Peak time

Over the centuries, thanks to its commercial importance and its wealth, the city would become the capital of a chiefdom later known as Señorío de Yaruma which was founded around 400 B.C thanks to the union of various tribes from both the Valley of Comayagua and other surrounding areas. It is possible that it was during this period that most of the major structures and urbanization projects were carried out, although this is the time when the most visible structures on the site were built. When conforming as capital its estimated population at the end of the pre-classic period was about 6,400 inhabitants. Thus, the Yarumela society began to become a more cosmopolitan city, receiving new settlers who moved in search of being able to better sell their products and by the beginning of the classical period it would end up becoming the most populated city in what is now Honduras by the time.