OAXACA, OAJACA (from Aztec Huaxyacac), or OAXACA DE

See also:

• JUAREZ, BENITO PABLO (1806-1872)

JUAREZ (

See also:

• OFFICIAL (Late Lat. QJicialis, for class. Lat. apparitor, from officium, office, duty)

official

See also:

• TITLE (0. Fr. title, mod. titre, from Lat. titulus)

title)  , capital of the Mexican state of Oaxaca, in the central part of the state 288 m . S.E. of the City of Mexico, and about 153 M. from Puerto Angel on the Pacific; in lat . 17° 3' N., long . 96° 40' W . Pop . (190o) 35,049, largely Indians, most of whom are Mixtecas and Zapotecas . Oaxaca is connected with Puebla (211 m.) by the Mexican Southern railway . The city lies in a broad, picturesque valley 5085 ft. above sea-level, and has a mild temperate climate; annual rainfall about 33 in.; mean annual temperature 68° F . It forms the see of a bishopric dating from 1535, and has a fine old cathedral (occupying the north side of the plaza mayor), built in the Spanish Renaissance style and dating from 1553; rebuilt in 1702 . According to tradition the Aztec military post and town of Huaxyacac was founded in 1486 . The date of the first Spanish settlement is uncertain, but it was probably between 1522 and 1528 . The Oaxaca Valley, including several native towns, had been given to Cones, together with the title marquez del Valle de Oaxaca .

To injure him, the audiencia then administering the

government, founded the villa of Antequera in close proximity to Huaxyacac and on lands belonging to Cones in 1529, though a settlement had been made at the Indian town at an earlier date . Antequera was made a city in 1532 and the see of a bishopric in 1535, though it had but few Spanish inhabitants and no opportunity to expand . This anomalous state of affairs was eventually settled, Antequera was absorbed by Huaxyacac, and the Spanish corrupted the pronunciation to Oaxaca . The city suffered severely in the earthquakes of 1727 and 1787, the cathedral being greatly damaged in the former . It had a chequered career in the War of Independence, being captured by Morelos in 1812, reoccupied by the royalists in 1814, and recaptured by Antonio Leon in 1821 . In 1823 it was again captured by Nicolas Bravo in the revolution against Iturbide . In ,865 it was besieged by the French under Bazaine and surrendered by General Diaz (4th Feb.) but was recaptured by him on the 1st of November 1866, after his escape from Puebla . In the revolution promoted by Diaz in 1871–1872 the city was captured by the Juarist general Alatorre on the 4th of January 1872, and in a second revolution of x876 it was captured by the friends of Diaz on the 27th of January of that year . OB, or OBI, a river of West Siberia, known to the Ostiaks as the As, Yag, Kolta and . Yema; to the Samoyedes as the Kolta or Kuay; and to the Tatars as the Omar or Umar . It is formed, 8 m . S.W. of Biysk in the government of Tomsk, by the confluence of the Biya and the Katun .

Both these streams have their origin in the

Altai (Sailughem) Mountains, the former issuing from Lake Teletskoye, the latter, 400 M. long, bursting out of a glacier on Mount Byelukha . The Ob zigzags W. and N. until it reaches 55° N.; thence it curves round to the N.W., and again N., wheeling finally eastwards into the Gulf of Ob, a deep (600 m.) bay of the Arctic Ocean . The river splits up into more than one arm, especially after receiving the large river Irtysh (from the left) in 69° E . Other noteworthy tributaries are: on the right, the Tom, the Chulym, the Ket, the Tym and the Vakh; and, on the left, the Vasyugan, the Irtysh (with the Ishim and the Tobol) and the Sosva . The navigable waters within its basin reach a total length of 9300 M . By means of the Tura, an affluent of the Tobol, it secures connexion with the Ekaterinburg-Perm railway at Tyumen, and thus is linked on to the rivers Kama and Volga in the heart of Russia . Its own length is 2260 m., and the area of its basin 1,125,200 sq. m . A system of canals, utilizing the Ket river, 56o m. long in all, connects the Ob with the Yenisei . The Ob is ice-bound at Barnaul from early in November to near the end of April, and at Obdursk, too m. above its mouth, from the end of October to the beginning of June . Its middle reaches have been navigated by steamboats since 1845 .