A Window to the Past

 After visiting a number of churches in the Historic Center of Mexico City on Wednesday, I also visited a colonial palace which I believe has just recently opened to the public... at least I have never been inside before.

The Palace of the Marqués del Apartado was built between 1795 and 1805 for Francisco de Fagoaga, the Spanish nobleman who was in charge of the minting of coins and the collection the King's share of precious metals mined in Mexico.  The palace was designed by Manuel Tolsá, the Spanish architect and sculptor who transformed the face of Mexico City with buildings in the newly fashionable neoclassical style.

At one point, the top floor was prepared as a residence for the King of Spain should he decide to flee to Mexico during the Napoleonic Wars.  Today the palace serves as the headquarters for the INAH, the National Institute of Archaeology and History.

I have written before about the urban archaeology excavations which are going on throughout the city center.  Just beneath the city are the remains of the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan which the Spanish conquerors leveled.  

The palace now has a small exhibition open to the public dealing with urban archaeology.

In the courtyard of the palace, the staircase of an Aztec temple was discovered under the floor.  

It is believed that the steps were part of the Coateocalli, a temple dedicated to the gods of the tribes conquered by the Aztecs.

Also found here was a large sculpture of a jaguar.  It was a sacred receptacle for placing offerings to the gods.

The sides of the receptacle are decorated with bands of designs representing flowing water, precious stones and eagle feathers.  The bottom of the basin has images of Aztec gods.

Another sculpture discovered on the site is of an eagle.  It too was a receptacle for offerings, perhaps the hearts of human sacrifices.

As I have written in past posts, archaeologists have discovered remains of other Aztec buildings beneath the city.  This exhibit includes models of what those structures might have looked like.

I wrote that in 2015 archaeologists discovered the remains of the skull rack on which the Aztecs displayed the thousands of skulls of sacrificial victims.

A couple of the skulls found there are on display.  Holes were made in the sides of the skulls so that they could be placed of the wooden beams of the rack.

The "Calmécac" was the school for the sons of Aztec nobles.  The remains of the structure were discovered when the nearby Spanish Cultural Center was being expanded.

That excavation is open to the public in the basement level of the Spanish Cultural Center.  A few years ago I visited it, and you can read the blog post that I wrote HERE.

There is also a model of what the ceremonial center of Tenochtitlan looked like.

And with the click of a button, the street plan of present day Mexico City is superimposed upon the model.

Just across the street from the palace are the ruins of the Templo Mayor, the main Aztec temple, which were excavated beginning in 1978.  The archaeological site has been closed to visitors while work continues to repair damage that was done last April in a freak hail storm.  A metal roof which covered the remains of the House of Eagles next to the temple collapsed under the weight of the hail.  Fortunately very little damage was done to ruins beneath, but they are still building a new, and hopefully stronger, canopy.