Tula (redirected from Tula (disambiguation))

Tula, ancient city, Mexico

Tula (t`lä), ancient city in the present state of Hidalgo, central Mexico. It was one of the chief urban centers of the Toltec. The city is believed to be Tollán, the legendary Toltec capital mentioned in a number of postconquest sources, including Bernardino de Sahagún's Historia General de las Cosas de Nueva Espana (tr. General History of the Things of New Spain) as well as in documents in indigenous hieroglyphics known as códices. Archaeological investigations in the ceremonial precinct have revealed impressive architectural remains including pyramidal structures and ball courts. One of the former was surmounted by a temple to the Toltec hero-god Quetzalcoatl and had unusual sculptured columns in the form of warriors. These columns have been restored. Besides continuing restoration within the ceremonial precinct, archaeologists in recent work have explored outlying residential areas. Architectural and stylistic correspondences between Tula and several Mayan centers on the N Yucatán peninsula, primarily at the site of Chichén Itzá, indicate that Toltec influence pervaded the area. This influence is believed to stem from splinter groups of Toltec who migrated into the Mayan region and established hegemony in the early Post-Classic period (A.D. 900–1200).

Bibliography

See studies in the Handbook of Middle American Indians, ed. by R. Wauchope (13 vol., 1964–73); M. P. Weaver, The Aztecs, Maya, and Their Predecessors (1972); R. A. Diehl, Tula: the Toltec Capital of Ancient Mexico (1983).

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Tula, city, Russia

Tula (t`lə), city (1991 pop. 545,000), capital of Tula region, N central European Russia, on the Upa River, a tributary of the Oka. It is an important rail and highway hub and a manufacturing city of the Moscow industrial region. Russia's oldest metallurgical center, it also produces heavy and light machine tools. Lignite is mined nearby and is used to support a chemical industry. First mentioned in 1146, Tula was included in the Ryazan principality. In the 16th cent., the city became a key fortress of the grand duchy of Moscow. Peter I built Russia's first arms factory at Tula in 1712, based on the discovery nearby of iron and coal deposits. Tula subsequently became a center of the Russian ironworking industry. Serving as the southern anchor of the Moscow defense line during World War II, the city withstood heavy German assaults. The 16th-century kremlin, with turreted walls, has been preserved. Yasnaya Polyana, the home and burial place of Leo Tolstoy, is nearby.

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Tula

Four statues carved as human figures, each 4.6 metres tall; from the Tula Grande archaeological …

(credit: Juan Barreto—AFP/Getty Images)

Ancient city in Mexico, the capital of the Toltecs, which flourished in the 9th–12th centuries. Its exact location is uncertain; the archaeological site now designated Tula, near the town of that name in Hidalgo state, has been the choice of historians. The Tula site suggests a city that had a population in the tens of thousands. The major civic centre consists of a plaza bordered by a five-stepped pyramid, two other pyramids, and two ball courts. Tula's art and architecture are strikingly similar to those of the Aztec capital, Tenochtitlán, and its artistic themes suggest that the Aztecs' concept of themselves as warrior-priests of the sun god was borrowed directly from Tula.