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Cholula, Puebla

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

*Cholula* is a city in the Mexican state of Puebla . The official, though
little used, full name of the city is *Cholula de Rivadavia*. The city of
Cholula is divided into two municipalities, San Andrés Cholula and San
Pedro Cholula , which are considered to be part of the conurbation of the
city of Puebla .

Cholula is located about 15 km west of the city of Puebla , at an
approximate elevation of 2135 meters (about 7000 ft) above sea level . The
population of Cholula de Rivadavia as of the 2005 census was 82,964
people, and the population of San Andrés Cholula was 35,206. The
municipality of San Pedro Cholula has an area of 51.03 km² (19.7 sq mi)
and a population of 113,436, and the municipality of San Andrés Cholula
has an area of 61 km² (23.55 sq mi) and a population of 80,118. Most of
the residents of the municipality of San Andrés Cholula who do not live
in the city of San Andrés Cholula reside in the city of Tlaxcalancingo ,
which, at a population of 38,541, is actually more populous than the
municipal seat.

Cholula, or in Nahuatl Cholōllān, was an important city of pre-Columbian
Mesoamerica , dating back to at least the 2nd century BC , with settlement
as a village going back at least some thousand years earlier.

Cholula was a major center contemporary with Teotihuacan and seems to have
avoided, at least partially, that city's fate of violent destruction at
the end of the Mesoamerican Classic period. Cholula thus remained a
regional center of importance, enough so that, at the time of the fall of
the Aztec empire, Aztec princes were still formally anointed by a Cholulan
priest in a manner reminiscent, and perhaps even analogous, to the way
some Mayan princes appear to have come to Teotihuacan in search of some
sort of formalization of their rulership.

At the time of the arrival of Hernán Cortés Cholula was second only to
the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan (modern Mexico City ) as the largest city
in central Mexico, possibly with a population of up to 100,000 people. In
addition to the great temple of Quetzalcoatl and various palaces, the city
had 365 temples.^[/citation needed /]

During the Spanish Colonial period, however, Cholula was overtaken in
importance by the nearby city of Puebla .

Cholula is most famous as the site of the Great Pyramid of Cholula , the
largest man-made pyramid and monument by volume in the world.

Etymology

The original Nahuatl name was /Cholōllān/. Probably composed of the two
roots "/choloa/" "to flee" or its nominalized form "/chololiztli/"
"flight" and the locative suffix -/tlān/ meaning "place of" - making the
names meaning something close to "place of flight".

It is possible that this meaning has to do with the original inhabitants
of the city having been forced to leave by the expanding Nahuas. Some
historians [1] have posited that Cholula was originally inhabited by the
Oto-Manguean Chorotega people who were driven from central Mexico with the
incursions of the Nahuas.

Coordinates  : 19.06 � N 98.31� W