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Templo Mayor

Templo Mayor

Photo: Gary Todd from Xinzheng, China · CC0 · Wikimedia Commons

Location
Mexico City, Mexico
Client / Owner
Aztec rulers of Tenochtitlan
Year
Completed 1487
Access
Tickets required
Style
—

The Templo Mayor stood at the heart of the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan. The article names no architect. It describes seven building stages, each built over the last, from the first temple of about 1325 to the final stage, altered in 1520. The largest expansion came between 1440 and 1481, under Moctezuma I and Axayacatl. A commemoration stone dates the dedication of Ahuízotl's stage to December 19, 1487.

The base measured about 328 by 262 feet (100 by 80 m), and the pyramid rose about 197 feet (60 m) in four terraces. Twin shrines on top honored Tlaloc and Huitzilopochtli. The first temple was earth and wood, and the whole was originally covered in stucco and paint.

The Spanish destroyed it in 1521. The Coyolxauhqui stone was found on February 21, 1978, and the Templo Mayor Project followed from 1978 to 1982. Pedro Ramírez Vázquez designed the site museum, built in 1987. The site had 801,942 visitors in 2017.

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