Tepeyac or the Hill of Tepeyac, historically known by the names Tepeyacac and Tepeaquilla, is located inside

Gustavo A. Madero Gustavo Adolfo Madero González (16 January 187518 February 1913), born in Parras de la Fuente, Coahuila, Mexico, was a participant in the Mexican Revolution against Porfirio Díaz along with other members of his wealthy family. He was als ...

, the northernmost ''delegación'' or

borough A borough is an administrative division in various English-speaking countries. In principle, the term ''borough'' designates a self-governing walled town, although in practice, official use of the term varies widely. History In the Middle Ag ...

Mexico City Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital and largest city of Mexico, and the most populous city in North America. One of the world's alpha cities, it is located in the Valley o ...

. According to the Catholic tradition, it is the site where

Saint In religious belief, a saint is a person who is recognized as having an exceptional degree of Q-D-Š, holiness, likeness, or closeness to God. However, the use of the term ''saint'' depends on the context and Christian denomination, denominat ...

Juan Diego Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin, also known as Juan Diego (; 1474–1548), was a Chichimec peasant and Marian visionary. He is said to have been granted apparitions of the Virgin Mary on four occasions in December 1531: three at the hill of Tepeyac a ...

met the

Virgin of Guadalupe Our Lady of Guadalupe ( es, Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe), also known as the Virgin of Guadalupe ( es, Virgen de Guadalupe), is a Catholic title of Mary, mother of Jesus associated with a series of five Marian apparitions, which are believed t ...

in December 1531, and received the iconic image of the Lady of Guadalupe. The

Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe The Basilica of Santa María de Guadalupe, officially called Insigne y Nacional Basílica de Santa María de Guadalupe (in English: Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe) is a sanctuary of the Catholic Church, dedicated to the Virgin Mary in her invo ...

located there is one of the most visited Catholic shrines in the world. Spanish colonists erected a Catholic chapel at the site, Our Lady of Guadalupe, "the place of many miracles."Diaz, B., 1969, The Conquest of New Spain, London: Penguin Books, It forms part of the Sierra de Guadalupe mountain range.

Pre-Columbian history

Tepeyac Hill "had been a place for worshipping Aztec earth goddesses." Tepeyac is believed to have been a

Pre-Columbian In the history of the Americas, the pre-Columbian era spans from the original settlement of North and South America in the Upper Paleolithic period through European colonization, which began with Christopher Columbus's voyage of 1492. Usually, th ...

worship site for the

indigenous Indigenous may refer to: *Indigenous peoples *Indigenous (ecology), presence in a region as the result of only natural processes, with no human intervention *Indigenous (band), an American blues-rock band *Indigenous (horse), a Hong Kong racehorse ...

mother goddess

Tonantzin Tonantzin ( nci-IPA, Tonāntzin, toˈnáːn.tsin) is a Nahuatl title composed of ''to-'' "our" + ''nān'' "mother" + ''-tzin'' "(honorific suffix)". When addressing Tonantzin directly, males use the suffixed vocative form ''Tonāntziné'' [], and ...

Coatlaxopeuh ("Tonantzin" is a title of the greatest respect and "Coatlaxopeuh" is a name).

Etymology

In Nahuatl language, Nahuatl, ''Tepeyacac'' is a proper noun, a combination of ''tepetl'' ("mountain"), ''yacatl'' ("nose"), and the relational word ''-c'', ("at"). According to scholars of 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 ...

language, "the term would generally be expected to mean 'a settlement on the ridge or brow of a hill.' Since ''yacatl'' (the nose going first) often implies antecedence, here the word may refer to the fact that the hill is the first and most prominent of a series of three."

References

Hills of Mexico Landforms of Mexico City Gustavo A. Madero, Mexico City Our Lady of Guadalupe {{MexicoDistritoFederal-geo-stub

Pre-Columbian history

Etymology

See also

References