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Bestseller
BestsellerE-book
Author Wagner, Logan.

Title Ancient origins of the Mexican plaza : from primordial sea to public space / Logan Wagner, Hal Box, Susan Kline Morehead.

Publication Info. Austin : University of Texas Press, [2013]

Item Status

Edition 1st [ed.].
Description 1 online resource (xvi, 254 pages) : illustrations, maps.
data file
Physical Medium polychrome
Series Roger Fullington series in architecture
Roger Fullington series in architecture.
Summary The plaza has been a defining feature of Mexican urban architecture and culture for at least 4,000 years. Ancient Mesoamericans conducted most of their communal life in outdoor public spaces, and today the plaza is still the public living room in every Mexican neighborhood, town, and city - the place where friends meet, news is shared, and personal and communal rituals and celebrations happen. The site of a community's most important architecture - church, government buildings, and marketplace - the plaza is both sacred and secular space and thus the very heart of the community. This book traces the evolution of the Mexican plaza from Mesoamerican sacred space to modern public gathering place. The authors led teams of volunteers who measured and documented nearly one hundred traditional Mexican town centers. The resulting plans reveal the layers of Mesoamerican and European history that underlie the contemporary plaza. The authors describe how Mesoamericans designed their ceremonial centers as embodiments of creation myths - the plaza as the primordial sea from which the earth emerged. They discuss how Europeans, even though they sought to eradicate native culture, actually preserved it as they overlaid the Mesoamerican sacred plaza with the Renaissance urban concept of an orthogonal grid with a central open space. The authors also show how the plaza's historic, architectural, social, and economic qualities can contribute to mainstream urban design and architecture.--description provided by publisher.
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages 233-243) and index.
Contents The Primordial Sea : Forming Open Space in Mesoamerica. Mesoamerican Concept of Space ; Mountains and Altepetls ; Caves, Quatrefoils, and Sunken Courts ; Types of Open Space in Mesoamerica ; Triad Centering ; U-shaped Courts ; Quadrangles ; Quincunx : Symbol of the Cosmos ; Ballcourts ; The Sunken Court of Teopantecuanitlán ; The Dallas Plaque : A Cosmogram -- Forming Spanish Towns in Mesoamerican Culture. People and Ideas ; The Invasion ; The Europeans Making Contact ; European Plazas in the Early Sixteenth Century ; Origins of the Plaza ; Building New World Towns ; Types of Towns ; First Acts and Encounters ; Laws of the Indies ; Conversion ; Quincunx Patios ; Relaciones Geográficas -- Sixteenth-Century Communal Open Spaces (Five Hundred Years Later). Caves and Crevices ; Amecameca, State of México ; Zoquizoquipan, Hidalgo ; Valladolid, Yucatán ; Quincunxial Arrangements ; Atlatlahuacan, Morelos ; Huejotzingo, Puebla ; Huaquechula, Puebla ; Zacualpan de Amilpas, Morelos ; Terraced Mountains ; Molango, Hidalgo ; Achiutla, Oaxaca ; Yanhuitlán, Oaxaca ; Sunken Courts ; Tepoztlán, Morelos ; Tochimilco, Puebla ; Calpan, Puebla ; Ballcourts and Bullrings ; Villa Díaz Ordaz, Oaxaca ; Tlanalapa, Hidalgo ; Tepeapulco, Hidalgo ; Open Space Ensembles ; Tlaxiaco, Oaxaca ; Tlacolula, Oaxaca ; Otumba de Gómez Farías, State of México ; Tlacochahuaya, Oaxaca ; Tepeaca, Puebla ; Etla, Oaxaca ; Bishop Quiroga's Utopias in Michoacán ; Tzintzuntzan, Michoacán ; Pátzcuaro, Michoacán ; Santa Fe de la Laguna, Michoacán ; Erongarícuaro, Michoacán ; Angahuan, Michoacán ; Visible Overlays and Deliberate Alignments ; Mitla, Oaxaca ; Hacienda Xaaga, Oaxaca ; Teposcolula, Oaxaca ; Coixtlahuaca, Oaxaca ; Epazoyucan, Hidalgo ; The Yucatán Experience ; Chapels, Yucatán ; Tibolón, Yucatán ; Izamal, Yucatán -- Origins and Evolution -- Epilogue : Plazas in the twenty-first century.
Local Note eBooks on EBSCOhost EBSCO eBook Subscription Academic Collection - North America
Subject Plazas -- Mexico -- History.
Plazas.
Mexico.
History.
Public spaces -- Mexico -- History.
Public spaces.
Architecture and society -- Mexico -- History.
ARCHITECTURE -- History -- General.
HISTORY -- Latin America -- Mexico.
Architecture and society.
ARCHITECTURE -- Buildings -- Public, Commercial & Industrial.
Genre/Form Electronic books.
History.
Electronic book.
Added Author Box, Hal.
Morehead, Susan Kline.
Other Form: Print version: Wagner, Logan. Ancient origins of the Mexican plaza. 1st [ed.]. Austin : University of Texas Press, [2013] 9780292719163 (DLC) 2012024685 (OCoLC)783173067
ISBN 9780292721487 (electronic book)
029272148X (electronic book)
9780292719163
0292719167