Mexico City

Timeline

1. c. 1581–1584Mexico City · MexicoThe Viceroyalty of New Spain and the royal audiencia sat at the city's center, governing a vast territory from California to Central America; in the early 1580s the city hall and church courts stood side by side, and the colonial bureaucracy had fully replaced the old Aztec regime.
2. c. 1585–1588Mexico City · MexicoPotosí silver ingots brought overland from Acapulco were melted and struck into Spanish coin here, with the royal fifth and local levies collected centrally; in the 1580s Mexico City was the dispatch center for American silver entering the Atlantic trade system.
3. c. 1588–1590Mexico City · MexicoConstruction of the metropolitan cathedral advanced, parts of Tenochtitlan's old canals were filled to become streets, and indigenous barrios interlaced with Spanish quarters; mestizo and indigenous laborers formed the bulk of the population, creating a distinctive colonial urban culture.