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TAXCO |
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Silver has been mined in TAXCO since before the Conquest, and
although its sources have long been depleted it still forms the basis of
the town's fame and its livelihood. Nowadays, though, it's in the shape
of jewellery, made in hundreds of workshops to be sold throughout the
country and in a bewildering array of shops ( platerías ) catering to
the tourists in Taxco itself. It's an attractive place, a mass of
terracotta-tiled, whitewashed houses lining the narrow cobbled alleys
that straggle steeply up the hills like some Mexican version of a Tuscan
village. At intervals the pattern is broken by some larger mansion, by a
courtyard filled with flowers, or by the twin spires of a church rearing
up - above all the famous Baroque wedding cake of Santa Prisca .
Unfortunately, the streets are eternally clogged with VW Beetle taxis
and colectivos struggling up the steep slopes, and forming an endless
paseo around the central Plaza Borda. Once you've spent an hour or so in
the church and a couple of museums there's really nothing to do but sit
around the plaza cafés. Still, it is a pleasant enough place to do just
that if you don't mind the relatively high prices, and the profusion of
other tourists.
Though it might seem a prosperous place now, Taxco's development has not
been a simple progression - indeed on more than one occasion the town
has been all but abandoned. The Spaniards came running at the rumours of
mineral wealth here (Cortés himself sent an expedition in 1522), but
their initial success was short-lived, and it wasn't until the
eighteenth century that French immigrant José de la Borda struck it
fabulously rich by discovering the San Ignacio vein. It is from the
short period of Borda's life that most of what you see dates - he spent
one large fortune on building the church of Santa Prisca, others on more
buildings and a royal lifestyle here and in Cuernavaca - but by his
death in 1778 the boom was already over. In 1929 a final revival started
with the arrival of the American architect and writer William Spratling
, who set up a jewellery workshop in Taxco, drawing on the local
traditional skills and pre-Hispanic designs. With the completion of a
new road around the same time, the massive influx of tourists was
inevitable, but the town has handled it fairly well, becoming rich at
the expense of just a little charm.
The Town
The heart of town is the diminutive Plaza Borda, ringed by recently
restored colonial buildings and dominated by Taxco's one outstanding
sight: the church of Santa Prisca , a building so florid and expensive
that it not surprisingly provokes |
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