This advertisement, featuring Mexican soap opera actress Irán Castillo, isn't upsetting government officials there for being too risqué, too sexy, too revealing.

It's what's covering up Castillo that has Mexico's National Institute for Anthropology and History upset.

Those images Photoshopped all over her – of the ancient Atlantes of Tula de Allende – break the law. Or so it's being argued.

Castillo, who last year posed semi-nude for a lad mag, is also the face of Hidalgo State's tourism campaign. Thinking it'd be wise to promote its national treaures à deux, they wrapped the soap star in the monuments, leading the Institute to call foul. It's undignified, they say. These artifacts are to be treasured, not exploited for the silly purpose of, uh, getting tourists to want to visit them.

The country’s anthropology institute, based in Mexico City, does more than just serve as Mexico’s monument police. It oversees a vast collection of pyramids, shrines and other attractions, all more than a century old. With 800 researchers, the institute churns out academic treatises that seek to make sense of the country’s past. It also rejects anything seen as exploiting a historical artifact’s dignity.

That means that when a paint company recently asked if it could feature artifacts in a commercial, the institute said no.

The current crop of requests in a thick binder in Mr. Taibo’s office also includes one from the BBC seeking to film a documentary at a pyramid (Sí), another from a university professor seeking to do research at a site (Sí) and a third from a real estate developer who wanted to publish photographs of pyramids in his ads (No).

The institute’s staff pores over a movie script when a production company asks permission to film at a historical site to determine whether the story line is objectionable. “Apocalypto,” Mel Gibson’s 2006 film on the decline of Mayan civilization, received a no.

“We said, ‘You can film anywhere except in our historical zones,’ ” said Mr. Taibo, who is also a published poet. “It was a film loosely based on history, but it was a particularly bloody interpretation of our past.”

The institute is barraged with all kinds of requests. Many famous Mexicans request permission to hold their weddings atop pyramids or to pose on them for photo sessions.

“Our pyramids are not churches or chapels or clerk’s offices,” Mr. Taibo said of the wedding requests, which are rejected no matter the couple’s star power. “It’s a distorted idea of our patrimony.”

As for the rejection letters, Mr. Taibo said: “We are very polite and we are very kind, but. …”

His voice trailed off and he rolled his eyes. [NYP]