Sticky Notes to Remind | Unsplash by Kelly Sikkema
Sticky Notes to Remind | Unsplash by Kelly Sikkema
Restoration Work at the San Xavier Mission Church
Enjoy this short video produced by a Tucson TV station about current work to restore and conserve the highest dome inside the church at San Xavier. It is a labor of love on a priceless cultural heritage site.
The Sobaipuri O'odham invited Father Eusebio Kino to come to them in 1692, 150 years after the Coronado Expedition fled the area. A visíta (church without a permanent priest) was established at a village named Wa:k (meaning water) by Kino in 1700. Kino gave it a Spanish name - San Xavier del Bac.
A second visíta was established seven miles to the north at another Sobaipuri village. It was named San Augustín del Tucsón, from which modern Tucson gets its name. Tucson derives from the O'odham word Ts-iuk-shan, describing the dark rock of "A" Mountain, at whose base the village was located.
This combination of native name and a saintly designation was typical of the names applied by the Spanish. The saint was generally chosen based whose day it was from the Catholic Calendar of Saints on the day of discovery or christening.
The current church structure at San Xavier was completed in 1797 by the Franciscan missionaries, built on the same spot as Kino's church. The White Dove of the Desert, as it is called, is one of the treasured landmarks of the Hispanic period of the American Southwest.
https://www.kgun9.com/.../rare-look-inside-dome...
Original source can be found here.
Alerts Sign-up