Catedral Metropolitana

The Metropolitan Cathedral of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary to the Heavens of Mexico City is located in the place of the constitution. It is built in Spanish Baroque style and has a set of niches 64 meters high with eighteen bells. Three years after the Spanish conquest of the Aztec city of Tenochtitlán, Hernán Cortés undertook the construction of a church in this place. Transformed into a cathedral by Charles V and Pope Clement VII in 1530, it received the title of metropolitan in 1547 by order of Paul III. The cathedral soon became too small and was demolished in 1571. The construction of the new cathedral was ordered by Viceroy Martín Enríquez de Almanza and Archbishop Pedro Moya de Contreras, who placed the first stone in 1667.

Did you know?
The últimos elements, two bell towers and a central cúpula, are the work of the Spanish neoclassical architect Manuel Tolsá and were completed in 1813.