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Zacatlán (Spanish ) is a city and municipal seat of Zacatlán Municipality located in the Sierra Norte de Puebla region of Puebla in central Mexico. The area is known for its production of apples, other fruit, cider and fruit wines, which are promoted through the annual Feria de la Manzana and Festival de la Sidra. It is also home to the Relojes Centenario company, the first clock factory in Latin America and the builder of the city’s double sided flower clock in the main square. The historic center of the city is filled with traditional houses with red tile roofs and Zacatlan was designated a “Pueblo Mágico” in 2011. Outside of the city proper, there is a significant indigenous population, the Piedras Encimadas Valley with its rock formations and various waterfalls and ravines. ==The city== The city of Zacatlán is located at an altitude of 2000 meters above sea level in the Sierra Norte de Puebla region of the state, 130 kilometers from the state capital. Its main economic activities relate to agriculture and commerce. The city is next to the Ajajalpan River, a tributary of the Necaxa and whose waters eventually flow into the Gulf of Mexico via the Tecolutla. It is surrounded by hundreds of thousands of apple and other fruit trees, which fill the air with their scent during blossom season.〔 The historic center of the town is marked by large houses and other buildings, some over a hundred years old, with pitched roofs covered in red clay tile, as well as stone paved streets.〔 This and other features of the area and the surrounding area made the city the 39th Pueblo Mágico in Mexico. The city centers on its main square, which like many others in Mexico has a kiosk which hosts live music on Sundays.〔 However, it most famous feature is its flower clock, made by the workshops of León Olvera, founder of the Centenario Clock company. This clock has two faces, each of which is five meters in diameters. It is unique in that it is the only double faced flower clock whose hands are moved by a single mechanism. On one side of the plaza is the municipal palace or government building. This structure dates to 1876 and has a Neoclassical facade, with seventeen arches that contain the names of the communities that contributed to the building’s construction. On the opposite side is the former Franciscan monastery founded in 1567, which was the center of evangelization efforts for the area.〔 It is the oldest such construction in the state of Puebla and the church is the only one in Latin America which has been in continuous use since its founding.〔 In the courtyard of the monastery, there is a fountain called the Fuente de las Sirenas (Fountain of the Mermaids).〔 After years of abandonment, the complex underwent extensive restoration in the 2000s. This work discovered colonial era murals on the interior walls. This mural work contains images of deer, bees and jaguars, houses with thatched roofs and daily scenes with Spanish and indigenous people.〔 The San Pedro parish church is located near the monastery, just off the main square.〔 It is a basilica type church in Renaissance style with its main portal dating from 1564. The facade has a sculpture of Saint James the Greater flanked by angels which wear Totonaca style loincloths and boots.〔 Its main doors are made of wood and the Virgin of Guadalupe chapel displays gold leaf work and a number of oil paintings, which were done by local artists. In the cupola, there are portraits of the Four Evangelists.〔 Zacatlán has a reputation for tinkerers, including Abraham Trejo, who created his own car and Gabriel Melecio, who invented a machine to toast coffee beans.〔 However, the best known of these is Alberto Olvera Hernandez, who founded the Centenario Clock company. Olvera Hernandez grew up on a farm outside of Zacatlán called Coyotepec. He became interested in clocks and watches after taking apart a broken clock at his home. He was self-taught, even making the needed tools himself with only the materials and other items found on the farm. He began to build and sell clocks in 1909 and created his first monumental clock in 1918, when he was seventeen years old.〔〔 This prompted the founding the first clock factory in Latin America, Centenario, which specialized in monumental clocks, located on Calle Nigromante near the town center.〔 Its monumental clocks have been installed in buildings, parks, plazas and commercial centers in Mexico and other countries. One of the first clocks produced by Olvera Hernández is over eighty years old and still functions in a church bell tower in Chignahuapan. There are examples of Centenario clocks in most parts of Mexico today. One of these clocks is in Tulantepec, Hidalgo, and plays the Mexican national anthem in the morning and evening and his distinct melodies for each quarter hour. It is not electric but completely mechanical using counterweights. However, the factory’s most famous piece is the flower clock in the Zacatlán main square. Today, the Centenario factory employs about fifty people and is open to visits by the public. In the upper part of the building, there is a clock museum inaugurated in 1993 and dedicated to the founder. It contains original and reproduction timepieces over history in the world.〔〔 They include timepieces using water, the sun, sand and candles. One is a figure of Merlin, whose arms indicate the time but only for 12 hours during the day. At the end of the day, his arms lower to “rest.”〔 The cultural center has a Regional Museum, which displays pre Hispanic artifacts which come from a local ceremonial center as well as arms from the Mexican War of Independence and the report from the autopsy of Venustiano Carranza.〔 The city’s main annual festival is the Feria de la Manzana or Apple Fair, which has been held each August since 1941.〔 This event attracts about 300,000 visitors over the course of a week, offering about 140 different activities.〔 These include the crowning of an Apple Queen, clock exposition, food, other exhibits and concerts by symphony orchestras as well as popular artist such as Juan Gabriel, Alejandro Fernández, Aleks Syntek and Grupo Elefante.〔〔 There is a local version of danzón called Zacatlán de la Manzanas performed here, a work by local musician Pedro Escandon. The festival generally exhibits and sells over 100,000 crates of apples as well as hundreds of crates of plums and pears. The festival is dedicated to Our Lady of the Assumption.〔 Another major apple-related event is the Cider Festival in November, which draws about 10,000 visitors each year. The town produces about a million bottles of cider each year, using about 10,000 tons of apples. It also promotes other local projects such as jams, soft drinks, preserved fruit and other fruit wines.〔 The Festival Cuaxochitl, which occurs in May, is dedicated to the area’s indigenous ethnicities.〔 The town hosted its first Feria de Activación Física Regional (Regional Physical Activity Fair) in 2011 as part of federal efforts to combat obesity. The event included classes in aerobics, exhibitions of tae kwan do and a basketball tournament. A cheese filled bread is a local specialty, sold only in the city.〔〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Zacatlán」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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