Orizaba is a city and
municipalityMunicipalities are the second-level administrative division in Mexico . There are 2,438 municipalities in Mexico...
in the
MexicanThe United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
state of
VeracruzVeracruz, formally Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave is one of the 31 states that constitute the United Mexican States. Veracruz is borderd by Tamaulipas to the north, the Gulf to the east, Tabasco to the southeast, Oaxaca and Chiapas to the south and Puebla, Hidalgo, and San Luis Potosi to the west...
. It is located 20 km west of its sister city
CórdobaCórdoba is a city and is the seat of the municipality of the same name in the Mexican state of Veracruz.The city is composed of 15 barrios, bounded to the north by Ixhuatlán del Café and Tomatlán, and in the south borders with Amatlán de los Reyes and Naranjal...
, and is adjacent to
Río Blanco-United States:*Rio Blanco & Rio Blanco County, Colorado*Rio Blanco, Puerto Rico*Blanco River -Uruguay:*what would be the native name of the city of Río Branco, Uruguay, actually named in Portuguese in honor of a Brazilian diplomat...
and
IxtaczoquitlánIxtaczoquitlán is a city in the Mexican state of Veracruz. It is located 2 km. from Orizaba. It is close to the Fortín–Orizaba railroad and stands on Federal Highways 180 & 190.....
, on
Federal Highways 180 and 190Mexican Federal Highways, are roads maintained and built by the federal government of Mexico, through the Secretariat of Communications and Transportation ....
. The city had a 2005 census population of 117,273 and is almost coextensive with its small municipality, with only a few small areas outside the city. The municipality's population was 117,289 and it has an area of 27.97 km² (10.799 sq mi).
The name
Orizaba comes from a Hispanized pronunciation of the Nahuatl name
Ahuilizapan [
āwil-lis-ā-pan], which means (more or less) "place of playing waters".
Orizaba is a city and
municipalityMunicipalities are the second-level administrative division in Mexico . There are 2,438 municipalities in Mexico...
in the
MexicanThe United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
state of
VeracruzVeracruz, formally Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave is one of the 31 states that constitute the United Mexican States. Veracruz is borderd by Tamaulipas to the north, the Gulf to the east, Tabasco to the southeast, Oaxaca and Chiapas to the south and Puebla, Hidalgo, and San Luis Potosi to the west...
. It is located 20 km west of its sister city
CórdobaCórdoba is a city and is the seat of the municipality of the same name in the Mexican state of Veracruz.The city is composed of 15 barrios, bounded to the north by Ixhuatlán del Café and Tomatlán, and in the south borders with Amatlán de los Reyes and Naranjal...
, and is adjacent to
Río Blanco-United States:*Rio Blanco & Rio Blanco County, Colorado*Rio Blanco, Puerto Rico*Blanco River -Uruguay:*what would be the native name of the city of Río Branco, Uruguay, actually named in Portuguese in honor of a Brazilian diplomat...
and
IxtaczoquitlánIxtaczoquitlán is a city in the Mexican state of Veracruz. It is located 2 km. from Orizaba. It is close to the Fortín–Orizaba railroad and stands on Federal Highways 180 & 190.....
, on
Federal Highways 180 and 190Mexican Federal Highways, are roads maintained and built by the federal government of Mexico, through the Secretariat of Communications and Transportation ....
. The city had a 2005 census population of 117,273 and is almost coextensive with its small municipality, with only a few small areas outside the city. The municipality's population was 117,289 and it has an area of 27.97 km² (10.799 sq mi).
The name
Orizaba comes from a Hispanized pronunciation of the Nahuatl name
Ahuilizapan [
āwil-lis-ā-pan], which means (more or less) "place of playing waters". The town lies at 1200 m. (4000 ft.), at the confluence of the
Río Blanco with several tributaries, including the Río Orizaba, near the mouth of a large valley heading westward into the eastern
Sierra MadreSierra Madre may refer to one of several mountain ranges:*In Mexico:**Sierra Madre Occidental, a mountain range in northwestern Mexico and southern Arizona...
. This location, at the bottom of the ascent into the mountains, is an important transition point along what has been for centuries the main trade route between
Mexico CityMexico City is the capital city of Mexico. It is the economic, industrial, and cultural center in the country, and the most populous city, with about 8,836,045 inhabitants in 2008...
and Veracruz on the
GulfThe Gulf of Mexico is the ninth largest body of water in the world. Considered a smaller part of the Atlantic Ocean, it is an ocean basin largely surrounded by the North American continent and the island of Cuba. It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United...
Coast. The climate is generally pleasant, though often cloudy and rainy, and the soil of the Orizaba valley is extraordinarily fertile. Overlooking the valley from the north is the
Pico de OrizabaThe Pico de Orizaba, or Citlaltépetl , is a stratovolcano, the highest mountain in Mexico and the third highest in North America. It rises 5,636 meters above sea level in the eastern end of the Eje Volcánico Transversal mountain range, on the border between the states of Veracruz and Puebla...
(Citlaltépetl), a volcano that, at 5636 m. (18,490 ft.), is the highest mountain in Mexico and third highest in North America.
In the town of Ixhuatlancillo north of Orizaba, and in a large mountainous area to the south (the Sierra de Zongolica), live many thousands of people who speak a variant of Nahuatl which is often called
Orizaba NahuatlOrizaba Nahuatl is a native American language spoken in the southeastern Mexican state of Veracruz mostly in the area to the south of the city of Orizaba. It is also known as Orizaba Aztec and Náhuatl de la Sierra de Zongolica. It has 79 percent intelligibility with Morelos Nahuatl. There is a...
[
ISOThe International Organization for Standardization , widely known as ISO , is an international-standard-setting body composed of representatives from various national standards organizations. Founded on 23 February 1947, the organization promulgates worldwide proprietary industrial and commercial...
code nlv].
Orizaba was already an important town at the time of the Spanish conquest, and it was in Orizaba that
La MalincheLa Malinche , known also as Malintzin, Malinali or Doña Marina, was a woman from the Mexican Gulf Coast, who played an active and powerful role in the Spanish conquest of Mexico, acting as interpreter, advisor and intermediary for Hernán Cortés...
,
Hernán CortésHernán Cortés de Monroy y Pizarro, 1st Marqués del Valle de 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 King of Castile, in the early 16th century...
's interpreter and mistress, was married to the Spanish gentleman Juan Jaramillo. A plaque in Orizaba commemorates this event.
During the colonial period, Orizaba became an important city. On January 27, 1774, the Spanish king
Carlos IIICharles III was the King of Spain and the Spanish Indies from 1759 to his death in 1788.Eldest son of Philip V of Spain and his second wife, Princess Elisabeth of Parma, he became the Duke of Parma and Piacenza under the name of Charles I ; later on in 1734 while Duke of Parma he conquered...
conceded town status (
villa) to Orizaba, and in November 29, 1830 Orizaba was declared a city.
When
Lucas AlamánLucas Ignacio Alamán y Escalada was a Mexican scientist, politician, historian and writer. He studied at the Real Colegio de Minas de la Nueva España. He frequently traveled on his credentials as a scientist and diplomat, becoming one of the most educated men in Mexico...
established, in 1836, the first textile factory (
Cocolapan factory) of Orizaba, the city started its economic life as an industrial city.
In 1839 the newspaper
La Luz was created and the Veracruz governor Francisco Hernández y Hernández gave the name of
Veracruz-Llave (remembering the General
Ignacio de la LlaveIgnacio de la Llave y Segura Zevallos was a general and the governor of the Mexican state of Veracruz from 1861 to 1862. He was born in Orizaba, Veracruz, a nephew of Dr. Pablo de la Llave...
, who was born in Orizaba) to this state of Mexico.
On May 8, 1874, Orizaba was declared the capital city of
VeracruzVeracruz, formally Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave is one of the 31 states that constitute the United Mexican States. Veracruz is borderd by Tamaulipas to the north, the Gulf to the east, Tabasco to the southeast, Oaxaca and Chiapas to the south and Puebla, Hidalgo, and San Luis Potosi to the west...
, but in 1878 the status was transferred to
XalapaXalapa-Enríquez, commonly Xalapa or Jalapa is the capital city of the Mexican state of Veracruz and the name of the surrounding municipality. In the year 2005 census the city reported a population of 387,879 and the municipality of which it serves as municipal seat reported a population of 413,136....
.
During the government of
Porfirio DíazJosé de la Cruz Porfirio Díaz Mori was the President of Mexico from 1876 to 1880 and from 1884 to 1911, and one of the most controversial figures of the country...
, Orizaba was declared the most educated city in the Mexican province.
The old City Hall
El Palacio de Hierro (The Iron Palace) in the centre of the city was designed by
EiffelAlexandre Gustave Eiffel , was a French structural engineer and entrepreneur and a specialist of metallic structures...
. Built with 600 tons of Belgium steel, its parts were shipped from
AustriaAustria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.3 million people in Central Europe. It borders both Germany and the Czech Republic to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the west...
during
El Porfiriato (the government of
Porfirio DíazJosé de la Cruz Porfirio Díaz Mori was the President of Mexico from 1876 to 1880 and from 1884 to 1911, and one of the most controversial figures of the country...
), to be built in Orizaba. The palace cost $100,000 pesos (sterling Silver) a very large sum at the time, and it was Don Manuel Carrillo Tablas who not only loaned the money to the city, but also had to pay the additional cost of unloading the palace from the port and having it reassembled at its present location "the Plaza de Armas". Unfortunately Don Manuel Carrillo Tablas died New Years Eve of 1899 without ever having received a cent from the city for his loan. He was a very charitable man though, having donated the land where the present Cathedral of Orizaba now stands as well as the adjacent shopping center known as "El Mercado." El Palacio de Hierro served as the City Hall until the city felt it was not large enough for the growing needs of the local government and therefore moved to its present location.
Orizaba has an important industrial life. There is, for example, the Cervecería Cuauhtémoc Moctezuma company (a
breweryA brewery is a dedicated building for the making of beer, though beer can be made in the home, and has been for much of beer's history. A company which makes beer is called either a brewery or a brewing company....
), which was established in 1896 in Orizaba.
In the late years of Porfirio Díaz' Government, two important workers strikes occurred, those of Cananea and Río Blanco, the latter taking place in Orizaba and being an important prelude to the
Mexican RevolutionThe 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...
.
Monuments and buildings
- The Iron Palace
- El Palacio Municipal (The City Hall)
- The Church of Nuestra Señora Del Carmen
- The Church of La Concordia
- State Art Museum
Notable Orizabeños (people from Orizaba)
- Sara García
Sara Garcia, affectionately known as "Mexico's Grandmother", was a famous Mexican actress who made her biggest mark during the "Golden Age of Mexican cinema". She most often played the part of a no-nonsense but loveable grandmother in these movies. She starred most famously in numerous Mexican...
- Ignacio de la Llave
Ignacio de la Llave y Segura Zevallos was a general and the governor of the Mexican state of Veracruz from 1861 to 1862. He was born in Orizaba, Veracruz, a nephew of Dr. Pablo de la Llave...
- Francisco Gabilondo Soler
Francisco Gabilondo Soler was a Mexican composer and performer of children's songs. He recorded and performed those songs under the name of Cri-Cri: El Grillito Cantor -Biography:Gabilondo was born in the city of Orizaba, Veracruz...
- Humberto Vélez
Humberto Vélez is a Mexican voice actor. He is most widely known for dubbing the voice of Homer Simpson in the Latin American version of The Simpsons.-Animation:*Homero Simpson in the Latin American dub of The Simpsons...
External links