Monument

Lake Texcoco presented itself to Hernán Cortés as an enormous inner sea: from the shoreline that today is but a dot on a busy street of the city of Texcoco, the conqueror observed that the lake’s “tide” rose and sank between rainy and dry seasons. He was surprised to find that, in its immense surface, the opposite shore was out of sight, showing the lake as an uninterrupted ocean losing itself in the horizon. In this exact place, it seems, Cortés unloaded the dismantled ships he had been carrying along, to then re-assemble them. He would sail the salty waters and conquer Tenochtitlan with his fleet of colossal vessels. The Bridge of the Brigs Memorial, that anonymous landmark in the city of Texcoco, signals the lake’s shore towards 1521, in the early days of the Valley of Mexico conquest. This monument today comprises a column made of stone, crowned by a spire and an etched plaque. It’s located in the middle of a esplanade of about ten square meters, framed by three pink walls, a couple of park benches, and a plant vase. On the walls of the small plaza there are two cursive inscriptions in bronze, not entirely readable, since a few letters have been removed, probably to cast them and sell their weight as metal.  [...]

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