Willy Wasser and Little Horse in Plaza of the Three Cultures - Tlatelolco

/
0 Comments
Tlatelolco, the rival sister-city of Tenochtitlán, the Aztec capital, is one of the places where you can see the three major periods of Mexico's long history at a glance: the pre-Hispanic temple bases, a colonial church (built in 1610) and convent, and modern office and apartment buildings. For this reason it is also called the Plaza of the Three Cultures.

There are raised walkways threading among the ancient buildings, and from them you get good views of the vatious temple bases. One of the largest structures is the double pyramid opposite the church. It is of typical Aztec design, having double alfardas with vertical upper zones. It now tilts at an odd angle, apparently due to settling of the soil.

Tlatelolco was probably founded in the fourteenth century by a branch of the Aztecs, sometime before another branch founded Tenochtitlan in 1325. The two rival centers grew and prospered but remained independient untin 1473, when Axayácatl, the lord of Tenochtitlán, conquered Tlatelolco. He then installed his own governors.

The city that the Spanish conquistadors entered in 1519 was actually the double metropolis of Tenochtitlan-Tlatelolco, which occupied an area of 20 square miles (51.8 square kilometers) and had a population estimated at 200,000.


Tlatelolco long held a reputation as a great mercantile center even before its subjugation by Axayácatl. It still had the largest market in Mexico at the time of the Spanish conquest. The Spaniards were amazed at its size, variety of merchandise, and orderliness. Bernal Díaz del Castillo wrote a lenthy description of it in his The Discovery and Conquest of New Spain. He ended by saying that "one would not have been able to see and inquire about it all in twodays." It is estimated that between 20,000 and 25,000 people attended the daily market at Tlatelolco and that twice that many assembled for the special market held every fifth day.

The plaza is also important as being the site of three bloody events in Mexican history.
This was the site of the last battle of the Spanish conquest in central Mexico. It took place on August 13, 1521, when Tlatelolco fell to Hernán Cortés. It is said that 40,000 Aztecs died in the desperate struggle and their bodies clogged the local canals for days afterward. A marble plaque near the church records the date and further informs viewers that "it was neither triumph nor defeat, but the painful birth of the Mestizo people that is the Mexico of today."

On October 2, 1968 (two weeks before the 1968 Summer Olympics held in Mexico City), Mexican soldiers, equipped with tanks and machine guns, fired into a crowd of 14,000 unarmed students staging a protest against government for social and political rights. That day came to be known as the Massacre of Tlatelolco also known as The Night of Tlatelolco (from a book title by the Mexican writer Elena Poniatowska) as hundreds of people were murdered and thousands others were wounded and incarcerated (the official number is still unknown).

The repression in Mexico was so strong at the time that the day after the massacre only a few publications even mentioned the incident and even those that published it did not confront it as a governmental injustice. For many years, the Mexican government suppressed information about the event until a few years ago when a few official archives were opened, though authorities are yet to be held accountable for such acts of violence. A huge monument at the site lists the names and ages of some of the students who fell that day.

The plaza was the site of more death on September 19, 1985 when an early morning earthquake caused a modern building adjacent to the plaza to collapse. For days thereafter tents were erected on the plaza as temporary shelter for some of those left homeless by the quake. The earthquake, which affected Mexico City, left at least 8,000 dead.


The part of the ancient city Aztec city of Tlatelolco that is excavated is only a small part of Tlatelolco. Much of the ancient city is under the modern buildings that surround the plaza








































You may also like

About Post Author

“It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.” ― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

No comments:

Powered by Blogger.

Featured Video

The Story of The Three Little Pigs

American Version (Spanish) Mexican Version (English) Mexican Version (Spanish) Japanese Version Spanish Version American Version French Version

Les 3 petits cochons

Team Japan in the USA

Oscar in Mexico

Willy and Horsie in Japan

Willy & Horsie en Montpellier

Team Japan in Spain

Xólotl in Hamburg

Pageviews

Popular

  • Willy y Little Horsie en Nîmes
    Nuestros amigos alemanes visitaron la ciudad de Nîmes a 50 km de Montpellier.  Es famosa por la multitud de restos de la época rom...
  • Alebrijes
    Hi Friends! Every year in November, your Mexican friends work in some Mexican folk art. This year they made ALEBRIJES using the trad...
  • Three little pigs Japanese ver.
    Here is the Japanese "Three little pigs"!
  • Photos
    Bronson in Hamburg Stripy in France Willy and Horsie in Japan Oscar in Mexico Team Japan in New B...
  • Stripy has Arrived in New Buffalo!
    We are super stoked! Stripy, from Valladolid, Spain arrived today. We took him to lunch in our cafeteria (it was pizza day) before readi...
  • Meet Stripy!
    Hola a todos!!! Hello everybody from Valladolid (Spain)!!! Our mascot´s name is Stripy. We are not sure whether it is an orig...
  • Bronson and Xololt suntanning
    Before they left, Bronson and Xololt went to the North of Spain (Cantabria)to the beach. they loved it there. And of course Bronson left his...
  • New Buffalo Learns About Valladolid
    We made a little video when opening the box our first mascot arrived in. We learned a little bit about our new friends' likes and...
  • Feliz día de Reyes
    Hello everybody. We are still waiting for our mascots to arrive to Spain, but we are closed for holidays anyways so I will just tell you a b...
  • The Three Little Pigs, Mexican Version (Spanish)
    Los Tres Cerditos Joseph Jacob