Quito.

Title

Quito.

Description

Decorative total view of Quito in Ecuador, Southamerica. Quito is the capital city of Ecuador, and at an elevation of 2,850 metres (9,350 ft) above sea level, it is the highest official capital cityin the world and the one which is closest to the equator It is located in the Guayllabamba river basin, on the eastern slopes of Pichincha, an active stratovolcano in the Andes mountains. The historic center of Quito has one of the largest, least-altered and best-preserved historic centers in the Americas. As with other places colonized by the Spanish, the colonizers promptly established Roman Catholicism in Quito. The first church (El Belén) was in fact built even before the city had been officially founded. In January 1535, the San Francisco Convent was constructed, the first of about 20 churches and convents built during the colonial period. The Spanish converted the indigenous population to Christianity and used them as labor for construction. In 1743, after nearly 300 years of Spanish colonization, Quito was a city of about 10,000 inhabitants. On August 10, 1809, an independence movement from Spanish domination started in Quito.

ca. 1880

Artist

Anonymus

Historical Description

Quito is the capital of Ecuador. According to archaeological finds, the Quito plateau has been inhabited since around 1500 BC. Historical data from this period is not known. In the 14th and 15th centuries, there were several settlements with local chiefs in the Guayllabamba Basin. The Incas probably began to conquer the plain around Quito in the middle of the 15th century, although Túpac Yupanqui's efforts probably failed due to resistance, especially from the settlements in the northern area, and it was only under Huayna Cápac around 1480 that a final conquest was achieved. In the course of the conquista, the Andean highlands of present-day Ecuador were also conquered by the Spanish in 1534 and Quito remained the regional center throughout the 16th century. The indigenous population of the surrounding settlements were grouped together in encomiendas or repartimientos, in which their villages remained and grew. The Franciscans were initially tasked with missionary work, but in the course of the 16th and 17th centuries, the Dominicans, the Mercedarians, the Augustinians and the Jesuits were added, whose members shaped social life and whose churches shaped the cityscape. The production of woollen textiles in particular, which had been flourishing since the beginning of the 17th century, ensured lasting links between the city and the countryside as well as rapid urban growth, as it attracted both Spanish hidalgos and indigenous workers to the city and its surroundings. At the beginning of the 18th century, Quito's economy entered a slow, century-long and worsening crisis, the main cause of which was the increasingly restrictive tax and trade policy of the Spanish state, which had fallen into financial difficulties with its colonies. In Quito, this meant that many wool weaving mills producing for export had to close. n the context of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars in Spain, a revolution took place in Quito in August 1809, which removed the Spanish governor and installed a junta under the leadership of Juan Pío Montúfar. The fight for the influence of the mestizo upper class was also an important motivation for the subsequent wars for independence, which finally came to Quito after the battle of Pichincha was won in May 1822. In the newly founded Republic of Greater Colombia under Simón Bolívar, Quito was initially the capital of the so-called Departamento del Sur before it withdrew from the federation in 1830 and was constituted as the Republic of Ecuador with Quito as its capital.