Taxco el Viejo (Old Taxco) is a town in

Guerrero Guerrero is one of the 32 states that comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 81 municipalities and its capital city is Chilpancingo and its largest city is Acapulcocopied from article, GuerreroAs of 2020, Guerrero the pop ...

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

. As of 2010, it had a population of 3,172. It is located approximately ten kilometers south of the city of

Taxco Taxco de Alarcón (; usually referred to as simply Taxco) is a small city and administrative center of Taxco de Alarcón Municipality located in the Mexican state of Guerrero. Taxco is located in the north-central part of the state, from the cit ...

History

The name Taxco is most likely derived from the

Nahuatl Nahuatl (; ), Aztec, or Mexicano is a language or, by some definitions, a group of languages of the Uto-Aztecan language family. Varieties of Nahuatl are spoken by about Nahua peoples, most of whom live mainly in Central Mexico and have smaller ...

place name ''Tlachco'', which means “place of the ballgame.” However, one interpretation has the name coming from the word ''tatzco'' which means “where the father of the water is,” due to the high waterfall near the town center on Atatzin Mountain. “De Alarcón” is in honor of writer

Juan Ruiz de Alarcón Juan Ruiz de Alarcón (c. 1581 - 4 August 1639) was a New Spain-born Spanish writer of the Golden Age who cultivated different variants of dramaturgy. His works include the comedy ''La verdad sospechosa'' ( es), which is considered a masterpie ...

who was a native of the town. Like many municipalities in central Mexico, the municipality’s coat-of-arms is an

Aztec The Aztecs () were a Mesoamerican culture that flourished in central Mexico in the post-classic period from 1300 to 1521. The Aztec people included different Indigenous peoples of Mexico, ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those g ...

glyph A glyph () is any kind of purposeful mark. In typography, a glyph is "the specific shape, design, or representation of a character". It is a particular graphical representation, in a particular typeface, of an element of written language. A g ...

. This glyph is in the shape of a

Mesoamerican ballcourt A Mesoamerican ballcourt ( nah, tlachtli) is a large masonry structure of a type used in Mesoamerica for over 2,700 years to play the Mesoamerican ballgame, particularly the hip-ball version of the ballgame. More than 1,300 ballcourts have been i ...

with rings, players and skulls, derived from the most likely source of Taxco’s name. Before the arrival of the Spanish in Mexico, Taxco el Viejo was known simply as "Taxco". In pre-Hispanic times, this village was the most important in the area as it was the seat of the Aztec governor who presided over tribute collection in the surrounding seven districts. The modern Spanish city of Taxco was founded by Hernán Cortés in an area previously known as Tetelcingo.

Ex Hacienda de San Juan Bautista

The Ex Hacienda de San Juan Bautista is a colonial silver mining hacienda in Taxco el Viejo. The first thing that makes it notable is that the main structure is built in the style of a medieval castle. This structure was built in 1543 and was ordered by

Hernán Cortés Hernán Cortés de Monroy y Pizarro Altamirano, 1st Marquess of the Valley of Oaxaca (; ; 1485 – December 2, 1547) was a Spanish ''conquistador'' who led an expedition that caused the fall of the Aztec Empire and brought large portions of w ...

, but he never saw it built as he returned to

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , i ...

for good in 1540. His son,

Martín Cortés, 2nd Marqués del Valle de Oaxaca Martin may refer to: Places * Martin City (disambiguation) * Martin County (disambiguation) * Martin Township (disambiguation) Antarctica * Martin Peninsula, Marie Byrd Land * Port Martin, Adelie Land * Point Martin, South Orkney Islands Austra ...

, inherited it but he probably never set foot in it as he arrived to Mexico in 1563 and was practically deported back to Spain in 1566. Like the "El Chorrillo", it used large quantities of water and

mercury Mercury commonly refers to: * Mercury (planet), the nearest planet to the Sun * Mercury (element), a metallic chemical element with the symbol Hg * Mercury (mythology), a Roman god Mercury or The Mercury may also refer to: Companies * Merc ...

to extract silver from mined ore, but this method eventually contaminated the large reserves of groundwater in this part of Guerrero. The state is now the home of the Regional School of Earth Sciences on the Universidad Autónoma de Guerrero. This facility has a small museum with fossils and geological specimens.

References

{{reflist Populated places in Guerrero Nahua settlements