Museo de la Ciudad
Housed in the oldest building of the city, the Museo de la ciudad is in the heart of the Historical center of Quito. It was founded in 1565 by order of the King of Spain, as Our Merciful Lord Christ Jesus´ Hospital. It adopted the name of Saint John of God's Hospital in the XIX century as it is still known today. The installation of hospitals in the recently established Spanish cities was in response to the medieval, Christian mentality that emphasized the importance of the well-being of the common people and its values of the solidarity and attention to the needy. Hospitals, a name derived from the word ¨hospitality¨, completed multiple functions in early Spanish society. Besides assisting sick persons, they were authentic charity houses that gave a welcome respite for orphans and homeless.
From the walls of the old Hospital, the Museo de la ciudad pays homage to all the anonymous men and women who day by day, throughout the centuries, have continued expanding the city with their work, ideas, passions, joys, pains, and highly expressive work born from the diverse identities that they embody. For that reason, the Museum presents the History of daily life, because only through this can the diverse identities of the inhabitants of Quito be rescued and reconstructed. In the field of History, the Municipality of Quito has been able to cover a cultural demand in the area of museums.
While these, traditionally, have concentrated on areas like that of archaeology, art, or on important characters and events, the Museo de la ciudad shows the history of Quito from the vantage point of the anonymous citizens that have lived here. This focus allows one to include the comprehension of the mentality and imagination of a complex city inhabited by multiple communities in which the past attests to the present and the futures from a socioeconomic standpoint.
Throughout the Museum, it is possible to appreciate that their patrimony, besides a collection of exceptional works and daily objects, is compounded by intangible, underlying manifestations of the urban culture: the intimacy, anecdotes, legends and traditions: the scents and the flavours, the dress, the norms and social prohibitions, the activities and the parties. Through the constant change in the exhibitions and of the policy involving the community in the activities and objectives, the Museum has become a live and active participant in contemporary Quito. The Museo de la ciudad offers the citizens a dynamic space of integration and social participation, an alternative place of learning in which the diversity is a factor of wealth, and the culture offers every day like development alternative. Inside the centennial walls of the Hospital, the Museum recovers the old functions of solidarity and service to the community for those that this building was originally built.
Museum Sections:
Pre Hispanic The region of Quito was the centre of interregional trade and a point of exchange of ideas, products, cultures and races. Here, merchants could exchange goods from the most diverse origins, languages, and religious beliefs. With time, ethnic dominions of great power and enormous population concentration were constituted. In the last decades before the arrival of the Spaniards, Quito was an important, complex commercial and defense for the Inca conquerors. Their constructions served as the foundations on which those who settled the Spanish city and the colonial society was built upon.
Address: García Moreno S1-47 and Rocafuerte Quito Pichincha Ecuador.
Open: Tuesday - Sunday from 09h30 to 17h30 (last group enters at 16:30)
Telephone: 228 3882, 228 2883, 2283879
Services: Tours.
