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City of Quito
| Site number: | 2 |
|
| Type of site: | Cultural | |
| Date: | 16th century | |
| Date of Inscription: | 1978 | |
| Location: | South America, Ecuador, Province of Pinchinada, City and Canton of Quito | |
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Other languages: Bulgarian, Catalan, Croatian, Czech, Dutch, Esperanto, Finnish, Galician, German, Hebrew, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Limburgish, Norwegian-bokmål, Polish, Romanian, Serbian, Slovak, Swedish, Thai, Turkish
| Description: | Situated 2,850 m above sea level Quito, the capital of Ecuador, was founded in the 16th century on the ruins of a past Inca city. In spite of the earthquake of 1917, the city boasts the best-preserved, as well as the least modified historic centre in Latin America. With their rich interiors, the San Francisco and Santo Domingo monasteries, and the Church and Jesuit College of La Compañía are perfect examples of the 'Baroque school of Quito' (a synthesis of Spanish, Italian, Moorish, Flemish and indigenous art). --WHMNet paraphrase from the description at WHC Site, where additional information is available. | |
| Quito, officially San Francisco de Quito, is the capital city of Ecuador in northwestern South America. It is located in northern Ecuador in the Guayllabamba river basin, on the eastern slopes of the Pichincha, an active stratovolcano in the Andes mountains. With an estimated population of about 2.1 million people as of 2007, Quito is the second most populous city in Ecuador, after Guayaquil. It is also the seat of the Quito Metropolitan District, home to 2 million residents, and the capital of the Pichincha province. As the headquarters of the newly-formed Union of South American Nations, Quito is also the de facto capital of South American integration. The city's elevation is, on average, 2,850 m (about 9,350 ft), making Quito the second highest capital city in the world. There is some confusion about this claim because La Paz, Bolivia, which is higher, is the governmental capital of Bolivia (where the Bolivian government functions). However, Sucre, which is lower, is the legal capital of Bolivia. Quito is located about 15 miles (25 km) south of the equator. A monument and museum marking the general location of the equator is known locally as la mitad del mundo (the middle of the world). Due to its high altitude and position on the equator, Quito has a constant, mild to cool climate year 'round. The typical high temperature at noon is 25°C (77ºF) and the typical night-time low is 6°C (43ºF). The average temperature is 15° C (64ºF). The city experiences only two seasons: dry and wet. The dry season, June through September (4 months), is referred to as summer; the wet season, October through May (8 months), is referred to as winter. Because of its location at the equator, Quito does not experience variations in daylight hours during the course of a year. Except for a few minutes resulting from a slight wobble in the earth as it rotates, sunrise and sunset are always at 6:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m., respectively. --Wikipedia. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. | ||
| Source: | http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/2 | |
| Reference: | 1. UNESCO World Heritage Center, Site Page. | |