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The hill
The castle stands on the hill of the grasshopper
The Nahuatl name Chapultepec means on the hill of the grasshopper. The hill was a sacred place for Aztecs, and the castle on top has served as a military academy, imperial residence, presidential residence, observatory and museum.
2,325 metresabove sea level
A viceroy's house
A viceroy began a house on the hill in 1785 and the Crown could not sell it
In 1785 Viceroy Bernardo de Gálvez ordered a stately home at the highest point of the hill. Without a head engineer, the Spanish Crown ordered it auctioned. No buyers came, and in 1806 the municipal government of Mexico City bought it.
The emperor
Emperor Maximilian had a boulevard laid out to link the castle to the city
From 1864 the castle was the residence of Emperor Maximilian and Empress Carlota. Architects renovated it in a neoclassical style. Maximilian ordered a straight boulevard to the city center, now the Paseo de la Reforma.
Presidents
Presidents lived in the castle from 1882 until 1934
In 1882 President Manuel González declared the castle the official residence of the president. With few exceptions, all later presidents lived there until 1934, when Lázaro Cárdenas stayed at Los Pinos instead. It became a museum in 1939.
1847
The castle fell to United States forces in the Battle of Chapultepec in 1847
The Military College had been here since 1833. On September 13, 1847, the Niños Héroes died defending the castle while it was taken by United States forces. A large mural above the main entrance honors them.
Day 2, afternoon
It comes after Chapultepec Park.
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The words are a retelling of the Wikipedia article Chapultepec Castle, and are shared under CC BY-SA 4.0. They are checked against those articles, and a fact that is not in them is left out.