Plaza de la Constitución (Mexico City)
The Plaza de la Constitución (German: "Constitution Square" ), also called Zócalo (German: "Base" ), is the central square of Mexico City .
The Zócalo of Mexico City is one of the largest and most famous city squares in the world. Measured between the building edges bounding it, its dimensions are around 235 m in east-west and 215 m in north-south direction. In contrast to many other megacities , Mexico has a distinct center, which is not only the center of the urban region of over 20 million inhabitants, but the center of the national identity of the entire country.
There are several legends about the origin of the name Zócalo . The most common one says that after the beginning of Mexico's war of independence against Spain (1815), the base was all that was left of the statue of the hated Spanish King Charles IV , which had dominated the square until then .
The Zócalo is home to some of the country's most important institutions, including the seat of the President of Mexico ( Palacio Nacional , 1792), the Mexico City Cathedral ( Catedral Metropolitana , 1573–1667, the largest cathedral in the country) and the City Hall ( Palacio Municipal , 1720, seat of the governor of the federal district ( Distrito Federal ) and the city parliament).
Before the conquest and destruction of the Aztec capital Tenochtitlán , Mexico's predecessor city, by the Spaniards (1521), the palace of King Moctezuma II (1465–1520) stood on the northeast corner .
During the 1968 Summer Olympics , the course of the marathon ran across the square .
literature
- Kathrin Wildner: Zócalo - the center of Mexico City. Ethnography of a place (= cultural analyzes. Vol. 7). Reimer, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-496-02761-4 .
Competition venues for the 1968 Summer Olympics
Coordinates: 19 ° 25 ′ 58 ″ N , 99 ° 8 ′ 0 ″ W.