San Miguel Zinacantepec
Encyclopedia
Zinacantepec is a town and municipality
located just west of the city of Toluca
in Mexico State, Mexico. The community is named after a small mountain which contained two caves which used to be filled with thousands of bats. Zinacantepec is Nahuatl
for Bat Mountain. Its Aztec
glyph
is a bat on a mountain. In the 18th century, the population of this mountain moved to settle alongside the Franciscan
monastery established here in the 16th century. This monastery is the best preserved of a network of missionaries established in the Toluca Valley
in the mid 16th century. Today, the complex functions as the parish church, with the cloister
dedicated as the colonial era museum of the state of Mexico.
. Today, the bat population of the area is limited to a few caves in the Nevado de Toluca National Park
. The mountain is mined for gravel and alongside it is the Hacienda de Santa Cruz de los Patos, which is now part of the Mexiquense College, as a research center and library.
The earliest known ethnicity in the area is the Otomi
, who still are present, especially in smaller communities in the municipality such as San Luis Mextepec and Acahulaco. In the south of the municipality, there are Matlatzinca
s; however, there are very few. The area was conquered by the Aztecs in the latter 15th century by Axayacatl
. Zinacantepec was then ruled from Tlacopan
as a tributary province.
During the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire, the Otomis sided with the Spanish and the Matlazincas against. Gonzalo de Sandoval
came to the Toluca Valley with 18 cavalry and 100 infantry. They were joined by 60,000 Otomi and conquered the Matlatzincas. The area around what is now the city of Toluca, including Zinacantepec, came under the rule of Hernán Cortés
administrated by his cousin Juan Gutiérrez Altamirano in what would become the County of Santiago de Calimaya. The west part of the valleybecame part of the encomendero of Juan de Sámano. This same family founded the Hacienda de laGavia which owned much of the arable land in the municipality.
While no battles were fought here during the Mexican War of Independence
, many here joined the army of Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla against the colonial government, with many fighting at the Battle of Monte de las Cruces
. After the war, Zinacantepec became a municipality in 1826.
During the Reform War
, vandalism and general lawlessness griped the municipality as well as neighboring Toluca. This was finally put to an end by Felipe Berriozabal in the 1860s. During the Mexican Revolution
, Zinacantepec was taken in 1912 by General José Limón and Alberto Sámano in support of Francisco I. Madero
. The Zapatistas
camped in some of the smaller communities of the municipalities, confronting federal forces and sacking homes.
The 2000s to the present are marked by political and economic problems for the municipality. Starting in 2005, the municipality has had serious financial difficulties, mostly due it its debt. These financial problems have caused inadequacies in the drainage, garbage collection and health services. In 2007, residents protested the lack of adequate garbage collection by bringing their garbage to the municipal palace and threatened to leave it there. They claim that in some areas, garbage had not been collected for months, requiring children to wear masks on their way to school. In 2008, councilman Leonardo Bravo Hernandez was sentenced to 18 months for the misappropriation of 100 million pesos during the city council session of 2003-2006. José Consuelo González Xingú, a municipal delegate was shot and killed in January 2010 in San Antonio Acajhualco, a community in the municipality. Gonzalez Xingú had presented a complaint to the Mexico State Commission of Human Rights for acts of intimidation and abuse among the municipal police force. Prior to this, Gonzalez Xingu had also made a formal complaint to the state about the municipal president for nepotism, which was ratified. The municipal president denies involvement. The municipal president, Gustavo Vargas Cruz, has been under investigation for the murder of Jesus Consuelo Xingú. One of the reported gunmen has been apprehended.
Until 2008, Zinacantepec was the only municipality with roads with no right-of-way markers. In that year, the direction and signaling of all the roads was reworked in a systematic way.
The town’s main church, the Parish of San Miguel, was the monastery church until the monastery church was closed during the Reform War. The church remained open but with non-monastic priests. The structure dates from the 17th century, and has typical features for constructions from that time such as a cruciform plan, a central dome and an ornate two tier bell tower. Since it was Franciscan, the facade is a sober Baroque
with minimal ornamentation. Inside, on the south wall is a stone pulpit decorated with carved scales. It also contains an unusual ceramic baptismal font which dates from the early colonial period. The rest of the church is fairly modern but colonial paintings and church furnishings from earlier periods can be found in the sacristy.
Market day is Sunday when the street fill with vendors and local specialties such as red and green mole, local produce, tamales and small tacos made with corn tortillas about 6 cm in diameter. Local drinks include pulque and fruit liquors.
Universidad Politécnica Del Valle de Toluca has its secondary campus in the town. It offers programs of study in engineering and business.
The oldest portion of the complex is the open chapel
, which dates from the time when the structure began as a small mission. The chapel is integrated into a “porteria” (a porch like entrance or arcade) in the front of the building, which was added in the 1560s. The altarpiece of the chapel is recessed into the back wall which has a pediment and contains ten panels. The central figure is of the Archangel Michael, the original patron saint of the mission. Above him is a female saint, possibly Saint Claire with archangels and luminaries of the Church on the surrounding panels. God, the Father looks down from the pediment with the Four Evangelists
at the base.
In a small room on the south end of the porteria is the original mission baptistery. Here is the first baptismal font, which is a huge monolithic basin cut from gray volcanic stone. The outside is carved with both Christian and indigenous symbols. Carved medallions illustrate episodes in Christ’s life, and there is a relief of the Archangel Michael casting Lucifer
from heaven. The indigenous symbolism includes Aztec speech markers and pre-Hispanic water imagery. Encircling the cord rim is a Spanish and Nahuatl inscription which says, “This baptismal font and the room in which it is found was mandated by the venerable guardian Fray Martin de Aguirre in the village of Zinacantepec in the year 1581.” This font is one of the most important pieces at the museum.
Above the low main door into the cloister, there is a mural from the 16th century called the “Tree of Life” which illustrates a genealogical tree of the Franciscan Order, growing from the chest of Francis of Assisi
. Unlike many of the other frescos, this one contains various colors, including red and green accents, flesh tones and framed by bands of color. This murals as well as the font and the panels of the altarpieces were designed for the early evangelical efforts of the monastery.
Inside the main entrance is a vestibule which leads to the main courtyard of the cloister. This area is plainer than the porteria, with only black and white 16th century frescos adorning the walls and some gray gargoyles on the upper parts of the columns. Many of the frescos and gargoyles are now fragmentary. The cloister has two floors and courtyard surrounded by 20 arches supported by Tuscan columns. The ceilings are made from large wood beams and the floors are paved in local stone. On the north and south sides of the upper cloister there are two sundial
s. One is meant to be used in the summer and the other in winter.
The cloister complex is now the Museo Virreinal de Zinacantepec (Viceregal Museum of Zinacantepec) . It has twenty exhibition halls, with more than 275 works of art over the three centuries of the colonial period in Mexico. The collection also include more ordinary items such as cooking utensils, weapons, furniture and clay objects. The collection includes sixty paintings of viceroy
s and archbishops of New Spain, wood sculptures of religious figures, Spanish armour and a Christ figure made of “pasta de cana” or meshed corn stalks. Most of the paintings have been classified an anonymous due to the lack of signatures. The museum is considered to have one of the most important colonial era collections in the state, along with the Ex Monastery of Acolman
and the Museo Nacional del Virreinato in Tepotzotlan
. More than 300 pieces of the collection were the subject of a major restoration project in 2003 at a cost of 500,000 pesos.
Another important aspect of the museum is its library. This library contains 1,587 volumes about 43 subjects including theology, philosophy, law, history and others. The oldest book here is a copy of the Suma Teologia by Thomas of Aquinas. The books had been in the care of the Museum of Bellas Artes
in Mexico City than the Municipal Library of Toluca before coming to Zinacantepec, The books have been available to academics since 2005. The bookshelves and some other furniture are original to the monastery.
As municipal seat, the town of Zinacantepec is the local governing authority for more than 130 other named communities, which together form a territory of 308.68km2. About one third of the municipality’s population lives in the town proper. Despite its rural and traditional nature, very few speakers of indigenous languages are left. The municipality is bordered by the municipalities of Almoloya de Juárez, Texcaltitlán
, Toluca, Calimaya
, Temascaltepec
, Amanalco
, Villa Guerrero
and Coatepec Harinas.
The dominating geographical feature here is the Nevado de Toluca
volcano, with a significant part of the National Park being located in the municipality. Elevation here varies between 3,200 and 2750 meters above sea level and the soil is made of composites from past lava flows and ash deposits from the nearby volcano, which is now dormant. Some other smaller volcanoes exist here, such as the Molcajete, which were formed by the Nevado’s third stage of eruptions. Surface water is mostly in the form of the Tejalpa River, some small streams and some fresh water springs, all of which are fed by the runoff from the Nevado de Toluca. The area has a temperate, mildly wet climate with freezes common in the foothills of the volcano. Highs in the summer are around 28C with lows in the winter can get to -5C. Most rains falls between the months of June to October. Much of the wild vegetation is forest with pines, cedars and fir trees, which mostly exist in the national park, along with most of the wildlife, which includes squirrels, opossums, coyotes, eagles, crows and some snakes and other reptiles.
Agriculture is still the main economic staple of the municipality, employing the vast majority of residents. Crops grown here include corn, potatoes, fava beans, carrots, spinach, onions, radishes and other vegetables, mostly grown on family farms. The raising of livestock is important here with cattle, pigs and sheep being the principle animals. A few haciendas still exist including the San Juan de la Huertas and the San Pedro Tajalpa, where Porfirio Díaz
and his wife spent time in its large mansion, which still exists. There is one small industrial zone which contains a number of industries with the largest being BIMBO
, Coca Cola and Gas CIMSA. Commerce is mostly limited to basic needs. There are sand and gravel mines such as San Juan de las Huertas and Loma Alta in the community of San Cristobañ Tecolit.
Municipalities of Mexico
Municipalities are the second-level administrative division in Mexico . There are 2,438 municipalities in Mexico, making the average municipality population 45,616...
located just west of the city of Toluca
Toluca
Toluca, formally known as Toluca de Lerdo, is the state capital of Mexico State as well as the seat of the Municipality of Toluca. It is the center of a rapidly growing urban area, now the fifth largest in Mexico. It is located west-southwest of Mexico City and only about 40 minutes by car to the...
in Mexico State, Mexico. The community is named after a small mountain which contained two caves which used to be filled with thousands of bats. Zinacantepec is Nahuatl
Nahuatl
Nahuatl is thought to mean "a good, clear sound" This language name has several spellings, among them náhuatl , Naoatl, Nauatl, Nahuatl, Nawatl. In a back formation from the name of the language, the ethnic group of Nahuatl speakers are called Nahua...
for Bat Mountain. Its Aztec
Aztec
The Aztec people were certain ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl language and who dominated large parts of Mesoamerica in the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries, a period referred to as the late post-classic period in Mesoamerican chronology.Aztec is the...
glyph
Glyph
A glyph is an element of writing: an individual mark on a written medium that contributes to the meaning of what is written. A glyph is made up of one or more graphemes....
is a bat on a mountain. In the 18th century, the population of this mountain moved to settle alongside the Franciscan
Franciscan
Most Franciscans are members of Roman Catholic religious orders founded by Saint Francis of Assisi. Besides Roman Catholic communities, there are also Old Catholic, Anglican, Lutheran, ecumenical and Non-denominational Franciscan communities....
monastery established here in the 16th century. This monastery is the best preserved of a network of missionaries established in the Toluca Valley
Toluca Valley
Toluca Valley is a valley located approximately 75 km southwest Mexico City. The modern city of Toluca is located there. Other municipalities within valley and part of the Toluca metropolitan area include Metepec, Calimaya, Almoloya de Juárez, San Mateo Atenco, Lerma, Lago, Temoaya, Otzolotepec and...
in the mid 16th century. Today, the complex functions as the parish church, with the cloister
Cloister
A cloister is a rectangular open space surrounded by covered walks or open galleries, with open arcades on the inner side, running along the walls of buildings and forming a quadrangle or garth...
dedicated as the colonial era museum of the state of Mexico.
History
The history of the town and municipality begins about 1500 years ago at an elevation now named “Cerro de Murciélago” or Bat Mountain. The hill contained two caves that used to be filled with thousands of bats. The presence of these animals was considered a sign of fertility. The hill remained populated until the 18th century, when a plague pushed the population toward the Franciscan monastery, which functioned as a hospital. A deity named Zinacan was associated with the mountain. Shortly after the Spanish Conquest, this deity would be believed to be an incarnation of the DevilDevil
The Devil is believed in many religions and cultures to be a powerful, supernatural entity that is the personification of evil and the enemy of God and humankind. The nature of the role varies greatly...
. Today, the bat population of the area is limited to a few caves in the Nevado de Toluca National Park
Nevado de Toluca National Park
The Nevado de Toluca National Park is located southwest of the city of Toluca, Mexico State. It was decreed a park in 1936, primarily to protect the Nevado de Toluca volcano, which forms nearly the park’s entire surface and is the fourth highest peak in Mexico. It is 45 km from Toluca and 135...
. The mountain is mined for gravel and alongside it is the Hacienda de Santa Cruz de los Patos, which is now part of the Mexiquense College, as a research center and library.
The earliest known ethnicity in the area is the Otomi
Otomi people
The Otomi people . Smaller Otomi populations exist in the states of Puebla, Mexico, Tlaxcala, Michoacán and Guanajuato. The Otomi language belonging to the Oto-Pamean branch of the Oto-Manguean language family is spoken in many different varieties some of which are not mutually intelligible.One of...
, who still are present, especially in smaller communities in the municipality such as San Luis Mextepec and Acahulaco. In the south of the municipality, there are Matlatzinca
Matlatzinca
Matlatzinca is a name used to refer to different indigenous ethnic groups in the Toluca Valley in the state of México, located in the central highlands of Mexico. The term is applied to the ethnic group inhabiting the valley of Toluca and to their language, Matlatzinca.When used as an ethnonym,...
s; however, there are very few. The area was conquered by the Aztecs in the latter 15th century by Axayacatl
Axayacatl
Axayacatl was the sixth Aztec Emperor, a ruler of the Postclassic Mesoamerican Aztec Empire and city of Tenochtitlan, who reigned from 1469 to 1481.He is chiefly remembered for subjugating Tlatelolco, Tenochtitlan's sister city, in 1473....
. Zinacantepec was then ruled from Tlacopan
Tlacopan
Tlacopan , also called Tacuba, was a Pre-Columbian Mesoamerican city-state situated on the western shore of Lake Texcoco.Founded by Tlacomatzin, Tlacopan was a Tepanec kingdom subordinate to nearby Azcapotzalco...
as a tributary province.
During the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire, the Otomis sided with the Spanish and the Matlazincas against. Gonzalo de Sandoval
Gonzalo de Sandoval
Gonzalo de Sandoval was a Spanish conquistador in New Spain and briefly co-governor of the colony while Hernan Cortés was away from the capital .-Arrival in New Spain:Sandoval was the youngest of the lieutenants of Cortés. They arrived together in New Spain in 1519...
came to the Toluca Valley with 18 cavalry and 100 infantry. They were joined by 60,000 Otomi and conquered the Matlatzincas. The area around what is now the city of Toluca, including Zinacantepec, came under the rule of Hernán Cortés
Hernán Cortés
Hernán Cortés de Monroy y Pizarro, 1st Marquis of the Valley of Oaxaca was a Spanish Conquistador who led an expedition that caused the fall of the Aztec Empire and brought large portions of mainland Mexico under the rule of the King of Castile in the early 16th century...
administrated by his cousin Juan Gutiérrez Altamirano in what would become the County of Santiago de Calimaya. The west part of the valleybecame part of the encomendero of Juan de Sámano. This same family founded the Hacienda de laGavia which owned much of the arable land in the municipality.
While no battles were fought here during the Mexican War of Independence
Mexican War of Independence
The Mexican War of Independence was an armed conflict between the people of Mexico and the Spanish colonial authorities which started on 16 September 1810. The movement, which became known as the Mexican War of Independence, was led by Mexican-born Spaniards, Mestizos and Amerindians who sought...
, many here joined the army of Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla against the colonial government, with many fighting at the Battle of Monte de las Cruces
Battle of Monte de las Cruces
The Battle of Monte de las Cruces was one of the pivotal battles of the early Mexican War of Independence. It was fought between the insurgent troops of Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla and Ignacio Allende against the royalist troops of General Torcuato Trujillo in the Sierra de las Cruces mountains...
. After the war, Zinacantepec became a municipality in 1826.
During the Reform War
Reform War
The Reform War in Mexico is one of the episodes of the long struggle between Liberal and Conservative forces that dominated the country’s history in the 19th century. The Liberals wanted a federalist government, limiting traditional Catholic Church and military influence in the country...
, vandalism and general lawlessness griped the municipality as well as neighboring Toluca. This was finally put to an end by Felipe Berriozabal in the 1860s. During the Mexican Revolution
Mexican Revolution
The Mexican Revolution was a major armed struggle that started in 1910, with an uprising led by Francisco I. Madero against longtime autocrat Porfirio Díaz. The Revolution was characterized by several socialist, liberal, anarchist, populist, and agrarianist movements. Over time the Revolution...
, Zinacantepec was taken in 1912 by General José Limón and Alberto Sámano in support of Francisco I. Madero
Francisco I. Madero
Francisco Ignacio Madero González was a politician, writer and revolutionary who served as President of Mexico from 1911 to 1913. As a respectable upper-class politician, he supplied a center around which opposition to the dictatorship of Porfirio Díaz could coalesce...
. The Zapatistas
Liberation Army of the South
The Liberation Army of the South was an armed group formed and led by Emiliano Zapata that took part in the Mexican Revolution. The force was commonly known as the Zapatistas....
camped in some of the smaller communities of the municipalities, confronting federal forces and sacking homes.
The 2000s to the present are marked by political and economic problems for the municipality. Starting in 2005, the municipality has had serious financial difficulties, mostly due it its debt. These financial problems have caused inadequacies in the drainage, garbage collection and health services. In 2007, residents protested the lack of adequate garbage collection by bringing their garbage to the municipal palace and threatened to leave it there. They claim that in some areas, garbage had not been collected for months, requiring children to wear masks on their way to school. In 2008, councilman Leonardo Bravo Hernandez was sentenced to 18 months for the misappropriation of 100 million pesos during the city council session of 2003-2006. José Consuelo González Xingú, a municipal delegate was shot and killed in January 2010 in San Antonio Acajhualco, a community in the municipality. Gonzalez Xingú had presented a complaint to the Mexico State Commission of Human Rights for acts of intimidation and abuse among the municipal police force. Prior to this, Gonzalez Xingu had also made a formal complaint to the state about the municipal president for nepotism, which was ratified. The municipal president denies involvement. The municipal president, Gustavo Vargas Cruz, has been under investigation for the murder of Jesus Consuelo Xingú. One of the reported gunmen has been apprehended.
Until 2008, Zinacantepec was the only municipality with roads with no right-of-way markers. In that year, the direction and signaling of all the roads was reworked in a systematic way.
The town
Although just west of the city of Toluca, Zinacantepec remains mostly rural, preserving much of its traditions and customs from over 300 years ago. Major religious festivals include one in honor of the Virgin of Los Dolores (also called Del Rayo) from 21 to 23 May and one for the patron of the town, the Archangel Michael on 3 December. One legend associated with the Virgin was that the image was left at the local monastery by a woman who had been cured of the plague. In 1762, a bolt of lightning struck and destroyed the church tower, but the Virgin, who was inside, was unharmed.The town’s main church, the Parish of San Miguel, was the monastery church until the monastery church was closed during the Reform War. The church remained open but with non-monastic priests. The structure dates from the 17th century, and has typical features for constructions from that time such as a cruciform plan, a central dome and an ornate two tier bell tower. Since it was Franciscan, the facade is a sober Baroque
Baroque architecture
Baroque architecture is a term used to describe the building style of the Baroque era, begun in late sixteenth century Italy, that took the Roman vocabulary of Renaissance architecture and used it in a new rhetorical and theatrical fashion, often to express the triumph of the Catholic Church and...
with minimal ornamentation. Inside, on the south wall is a stone pulpit decorated with carved scales. It also contains an unusual ceramic baptismal font which dates from the early colonial period. The rest of the church is fairly modern but colonial paintings and church furnishings from earlier periods can be found in the sacristy.
Market day is Sunday when the street fill with vendors and local specialties such as red and green mole, local produce, tamales and small tacos made with corn tortillas about 6 cm in diameter. Local drinks include pulque and fruit liquors.
Universidad Politécnica Del Valle de Toluca has its secondary campus in the town. It offers programs of study in engineering and business.
The monastery complex
The Toluca Valley was evangelized by the Franciscans starting from the 1520s. During the 1550s and 1560s, a network of missions was built spreading out from Toluca, where missionaries would begin by studying the languages and customs of the native peoples of the valley. Of these missions, the monastery at Zinacantepec is the best preserved. The mission with its open chapel was begun in 1550, with the rest of the monastery built between 1560 and 1570. The modern town of Zinacantepec was built around it when the local populace abandoned the nearby hill and settled around the monastery in the 18th century. The monastery remained in operation from the early colonial period until the Reform War when it was closed by the government. It is said that it was occupied by Zapatista forces during the Mexican Revolution. Later in the 20th century, part of it was used to house priests who ran the still functioning Parish of San Miguel. It was declared a national monument in 1933. In 1976, the State of Mexico took over the cloister portion of the complex (leaving the church open for worship) and began to renovate it with the purpose of founding a museum, along with the Fondo Nacional para Actividades Sociales (FONAPAS) . The museum was opened in 1980 as the Museo del Virrenato del Valle de Toluca (Museum of Viceregal Art of the Valley of Toluca. The collection is housed in the rooms of the cloister with the open chapel area serving as the main entrance.The oldest portion of the complex is the open chapel
Capilla abierta
A capilla abierta or “open chapel” is considered to be one of the most distinct Mexican construction forms. Mostly built in the 16th century during the early colonial period, the construction was basically an apse or open presbytery, containing an altar, which opened onto a large atrium or plaza...
, which dates from the time when the structure began as a small mission. The chapel is integrated into a “porteria” (a porch like entrance or arcade) in the front of the building, which was added in the 1560s. The altarpiece of the chapel is recessed into the back wall which has a pediment and contains ten panels. The central figure is of the Archangel Michael, the original patron saint of the mission. Above him is a female saint, possibly Saint Claire with archangels and luminaries of the Church on the surrounding panels. God, the Father looks down from the pediment with the Four Evangelists
Four Evangelists
In Christian tradition the Four Evangelists are Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, the authors attributed with the creation of the four Gospel accounts in the New Testament that bear the following titles:*Gospel according to Matthew*Gospel according to Mark...
at the base.
In a small room on the south end of the porteria is the original mission baptistery. Here is the first baptismal font, which is a huge monolithic basin cut from gray volcanic stone. The outside is carved with both Christian and indigenous symbols. Carved medallions illustrate episodes in Christ’s life, and there is a relief of the Archangel Michael casting Lucifer
Lucifer
Traditionally, Lucifer is a name that in English generally refers to the devil or Satan before being cast from Heaven, although this is not the original meaning of the term. In Latin, from which the English word is derived, Lucifer means "light-bearer"...
from heaven. The indigenous symbolism includes Aztec speech markers and pre-Hispanic water imagery. Encircling the cord rim is a Spanish and Nahuatl inscription which says, “This baptismal font and the room in which it is found was mandated by the venerable guardian Fray Martin de Aguirre in the village of Zinacantepec in the year 1581.” This font is one of the most important pieces at the museum.
Above the low main door into the cloister, there is a mural from the 16th century called the “Tree of Life” which illustrates a genealogical tree of the Franciscan Order, growing from the chest of Francis of Assisi
Francis of Assisi
Saint Francis of Assisi was an Italian Catholic friar and preacher. He founded the men's Franciscan Order, the women’s Order of St. Clare, and the lay Third Order of Saint Francis. St...
. Unlike many of the other frescos, this one contains various colors, including red and green accents, flesh tones and framed by bands of color. This murals as well as the font and the panels of the altarpieces were designed for the early evangelical efforts of the monastery.
Inside the main entrance is a vestibule which leads to the main courtyard of the cloister. This area is plainer than the porteria, with only black and white 16th century frescos adorning the walls and some gray gargoyles on the upper parts of the columns. Many of the frescos and gargoyles are now fragmentary. The cloister has two floors and courtyard surrounded by 20 arches supported by Tuscan columns. The ceilings are made from large wood beams and the floors are paved in local stone. On the north and south sides of the upper cloister there are two sundial
Sundial
A sundial is a device that measures time by the position of the Sun. In common designs such as the horizontal sundial, the sun casts a shadow from its style onto a surface marked with lines indicating the hours of the day. The style is the time-telling edge of the gnomon, often a thin rod or a...
s. One is meant to be used in the summer and the other in winter.
The cloister complex is now the Museo Virreinal de Zinacantepec (Viceregal Museum of Zinacantepec) . It has twenty exhibition halls, with more than 275 works of art over the three centuries of the colonial period in Mexico. The collection also include more ordinary items such as cooking utensils, weapons, furniture and clay objects. The collection includes sixty paintings of viceroy
Viceroy
A viceroy is a royal official who runs a country, colony, or province in the name of and as representative of the monarch. The term derives from the Latin prefix vice-, meaning "in the place of" and the French word roi, meaning king. A viceroy's province or larger territory is called a viceroyalty...
s and archbishops of New Spain, wood sculptures of religious figures, Spanish armour and a Christ figure made of “pasta de cana” or meshed corn stalks. Most of the paintings have been classified an anonymous due to the lack of signatures. The museum is considered to have one of the most important colonial era collections in the state, along with the Ex Monastery of Acolman
Acolman
Acolman de Nezahualcoyotl is a town and municipality located in the northern part of Mexico State, part of the Greater Mexico City area, just north of the city proper. According to myth, the first man was placed here after being taken out of Lake Texcoco. In the community of Tepexpan, the...
and the Museo Nacional del Virreinato in Tepotzotlan
Museo del Virreinato, Tepotzotlán
The Museo del Virreinato, Museum of the Viceroyalty of New Spain, Mexico's Spanish Colonial Period, is located in the former College of San Francisco Javier complex in Tepotzotlán, Mexico State, Mexico. The complex was built by the Jesuits starting in the 1580s...
. More than 300 pieces of the collection were the subject of a major restoration project in 2003 at a cost of 500,000 pesos.
Another important aspect of the museum is its library. This library contains 1,587 volumes about 43 subjects including theology, philosophy, law, history and others. The oldest book here is a copy of the Suma Teologia by Thomas of Aquinas. The books had been in the care of the Museum of Bellas Artes
Palacio de Bellas Artes
The Palacio de Bellas Artes is the most important cultural center in Mexico City as well as the rest of the country of Mexico...
in Mexico City than the Municipal Library of Toluca before coming to Zinacantepec, The books have been available to academics since 2005. The bookshelves and some other furniture are original to the monastery.
The municipality
Texcaltitlán
Texcaltitlán is a town and a municipality of the State of Mexico in Mexico. It is located 65 km from Toluca on the high plains south of the Nevado de Toluca volcano...
, Toluca, Calimaya
Calimaya
Calimaya is a town and municipality located just south of Toluca, the capital of the State of Mexico in central Mexico. The settlement was probably established around 800 BCE, when the city of Teotenango was in existence. It remained an important town through the colonial period, part of the vast...
, Temascaltepec
Temascaltepec de González
Temascaltepec is a city and seat of the municipality of Temascaltepec located in south of the State of Mexico in Mexico. It is southeast of Toluca and , from Mexico City...
, Amanalco
Amanalco
Amanalco is a town and municipality, in Mexico State in Mexico. The municipality covers an area of 219.49 km².As of 2005, the municipality had a total population of 20,343....
, Villa Guerrero
Villa Guerrero, Mexico State
Villa Guerrero is a town and municipality in the State of Mexico, Mexico. It is located on the southern slopes of the Nevada de Toluca, which is also known as "Xinantecatl", is 50 minutes/58 km from Toluca. Its original name was Tequaloyan, which in Náhuatl means "place where there are wild...
and Coatepec Harinas.
The dominating geographical feature here is the Nevado de Toluca
Nevado de Toluca
Nevado de Toluca is a large stratovolcano in central Mexico, located about west of Mexico City near the city of Toluca. It is generally cited as the fourth highest of Mexico's peaks, after Pico de Orizaba, Popocatépetl and Iztaccíhuatl, although by some measurements, Sierra Negra is slightly...
volcano, with a significant part of the National Park being located in the municipality. Elevation here varies between 3,200 and 2750 meters above sea level and the soil is made of composites from past lava flows and ash deposits from the nearby volcano, which is now dormant. Some other smaller volcanoes exist here, such as the Molcajete, which were formed by the Nevado’s third stage of eruptions. Surface water is mostly in the form of the Tejalpa River, some small streams and some fresh water springs, all of which are fed by the runoff from the Nevado de Toluca. The area has a temperate, mildly wet climate with freezes common in the foothills of the volcano. Highs in the summer are around 28C with lows in the winter can get to -5C. Most rains falls between the months of June to October. Much of the wild vegetation is forest with pines, cedars and fir trees, which mostly exist in the national park, along with most of the wildlife, which includes squirrels, opossums, coyotes, eagles, crows and some snakes and other reptiles.
Agriculture is still the main economic staple of the municipality, employing the vast majority of residents. Crops grown here include corn, potatoes, fava beans, carrots, spinach, onions, radishes and other vegetables, mostly grown on family farms. The raising of livestock is important here with cattle, pigs and sheep being the principle animals. A few haciendas still exist including the San Juan de la Huertas and the San Pedro Tajalpa, where Porfirio Díaz
Porfirio Díaz
José de la Cruz Porfirio Díaz Mori was a Mexican-American War volunteer and French intervention hero, an accomplished general and the President of Mexico continuously from 1876 to 1911, with the exception of a brief term in 1876 when he left Juan N...
and his wife spent time in its large mansion, which still exists. There is one small industrial zone which contains a number of industries with the largest being BIMBO
Grupo Bimbo
Grupo Bimbo is the largest Mexican food company and the largest bakery in the world with brands in Americas, Europe, and China.-History:Grupo Bimbo was established in Mexico in 1945 by Lorenzo Servitje, Jose T. Mata, Jaime Sendra, and Jaime Jorba...
, Coca Cola and Gas CIMSA. Commerce is mostly limited to basic needs. There are sand and gravel mines such as San Juan de las Huertas and Loma Alta in the community of San Cristobañ Tecolit.