rio papaloapan

RIO PAPALOAPAN

River of Life Source to Mouth

The Papaloapan river flows down to the east from the volcanic highlands of the Mexican plateau, originating from cold water springs on the border between the states of Veracruz and Oaxaca in south-eastern Mexico. The name Papaloapan has its origins in the náhuatl language. Papalotl means "butterfly” and apan means “place of” and this explains why the Papaloapan is also known as Rio de las Mariposas (“river of the butterflies”). The Papaloapan is one of the richest ecosystems in the world. It is born from the union of two rivers, the Tehuacan and the Quiotepec, and its course takes it 76 miles (122 km) in a north-easterly direction. At first a rapid mountain stream, further downstream the river becomes wider and flows peacefully across a landscape characterized by tropical lowland vegetation, eventually emptying via mangrove swamps and beautiful salt lagoons into the

Gulf of Mexico at the city of Alvarado. The towns Otatitlan, Tlacojalpan, Tuxtilla, Cosamaloapan, Carlos A Carrillo, Amititlan, Tlacotalpan and Alvarado are situated on the banks of the Papaloapan. The river and its tributaries drain an area of some 47,300 sq km – about twice the size of the Netherlands. Two large dams, the Miguel Aleman and the Cerro de Oro, were built to provide hydroelectric energy for the surrounding area and to control the sometimes severe flooding of the lower basin. The dams have formed a very large joint lake which is quite scenic and the northwestern shore and islands have been declared a nature reserve called the Parque Natural Laguna de Temascal.

Rio Papaloapan was compiled by Adrian Evans in 2008 Rivers of the World is a Thames Festival project delivered in partnership with the British Council’s Connecting Classrooms with support from HSBC Global Education Programme www.riversoftheworld.org

RIO PAPALOAPAN

River of Life Conquistadors

Christopher Colombus, the Genoese explorer, set sail aboard the Santa Maria from Spain on Friday 3 August 1492. He sighted the islands of Bahamas on 11 October and the first meeting between Americans and Europeans took place the following day. Colombus discovered Cuba on 5 December and Haiti soon after. He returned back to the port of

Lisbon on 4 March 1493. The story of his trip caused a sensation. Within the month, the Pope issued a decree recognizing Spain’s rights over the new territories and desired that the natives be converted to Christianity. Further expeditions followed. In 1504, the Spaniards landed on Panama and by 1511 had trekked through the jungles to discover the Pacific Ocean. In 1513 King Ferdinand of Spain issued the “Requerimento” (the requirement). Before attacking any group of natives, a document had to be read aloud requiring the natives to embrace Christianity and to acknowledge the authority of the Spanish king. If they refused or gave no response then any attack against them was legitimized. In 1513 an expedition embarked looking for a fabled ‘fountain of youth’. Rather than the elixir of life, they returned with stories of a kingdom with unimaginable quantities of gold. A 1517 expedition manned by soldiers of fortune bound to the glory of God and their own profit set off for the Yucatan. They met with fierce resistance and had to return. The next expedition in 1518, led by Juan de Grijalva, made a brief foray into the mouth of the Papaloapan before their final stopping point near present day Veracruz. Before the arrival of the Spaniards, the areas around Veracruz were populated by many different peoples: Huastecan, Totenac and Tepehua Indians in the north; Nohoatl in the central and southern areas; and Olmecs, Tepehua and Zapotecs in the south. The Nohoatl Indians, who identified the Papaloapan with their mystical earthyl paradise of Tlalocan, actually welcomed the Spaniards and Grijalva took possession of the country in name on behalf of the Spanish crown.


RIO PAPALOAPAN

River of Life Quetzalcoatl

In 1519, Hernan Cortes, a rich and powerful man in Cuba, then aged 33, set sail south to seek the fabled gold of the Aztec people and to carve his name in history. He had eleven ships manned by 580 Spaniards, 200 Cubans, assorted African slaves, cannon, muskets, crossbows and sixteen horses. Actually, exploration and discovery, the conversion of natives to the Christian faith and their acceptance of Spanish sovereignty were the stated aims of the voyage. According to Aztec legend, the god Quetzalcoatl (“the Feathered Serpent” pictured left) had departed the shores of Mexico from a town close to the mouth of the Papaloapan and had promised to return during a Ce Acatl (“One Reed”) year, which occurs every 52 years. By extraordinary coincidence, 1519 was a One Reed year in the Aztec calendar. Remarkably too, Quetzalcoatl was reputed to have departed from Mexico on the same coastline (just west of the Papaloapan) on which Cortes chose to land. In their first skirmishes, the Conquistadors were

outnumbered by more than 300 to 1, but their artillery and armoured horsemen prevailed. As part of their settlement with the locals, Cortes was gifted twenty local women and one of these, named Dona Maria by the Spaniards, quickly learned Spanish. As their interpreter, she was to have a powerful influence on the conquest. She is pictured above left standing behind Cortes. When Cortes landed at Cempoala, north of present day Veracruz, the Aztec emperor Moctezuma sent men to greet him together with the regalia of Quetzalcoatl. The message was, “these are the gifts with which Moctezuma welcomes you home to Mexico”. It took just two years for Cortes and his men to ravage the city of Mexico and plunder its riches. By 1521, Moctezuma together with 80% of the Aztecs living in the city of Mexico had been slaughtered by the conquistadors. In 1524, Cortes invited a group of Franciscan missionaries to follow the military conquest with a religious one. But when the missionaries demanded that the Mexicans abandon their religion, the priests of Quetzalcoatl decided to confront them in a remarkable debate. Even more remarkable, their dialogue was written down in Nahuatl (the language of the Aztecs) and sent to Rome, where it lay in the Vatican’s Secret Archive for 400 years. Forgotten until 1924, it is an extraordinary record of one civilization defending its view of the world against another. Initially there was no compromise and in 1525, the Franciscans drove the Mexican priests from their temples and began “the battle against the devil”. So thorough was their desire to eliminate the indigenous culture that they ordered the native population to learn Spanish. Faced with an impossible task, the missionaries changed tactics and they themselves learned the local languages, translated the bible and integrated Catholic iconography into the indigenous religions. Today, 70% of Mexicans are Catholic but in rural communities the old gods are still in evidence. And, out of a population of 110 million, a million still speak Nahuatl.


RIO PAPALOAPAN

Polluted River Situation Critical

Between 70 and 75% of the pollution in the river is man-made. Rubbish thrown into it like plastic bags, cans, bottles and organic waste seriously damages the river as does industrial waste and untreated produce dumped into it by slaughterhouses and other factories. As a consequence, the river’s ecosystem has been seriously damaged, perhaps even beyond its natural capacity to restore itself. Some inhabitants remember the time when it was possible to drink the waters of the Papaloapan freely and when fish were abundant. These days however, there are some stretches of the river that are considerably polluted, where the water smells foul and where many fish and birds have disappeared and where

the water is even unsuitable to irrigate adjacent land. Some springs and streams have become clogged by rubbish and have become unfit for human consumption. Experts acknowledge that the river is in a serious and critical situation which affects the entire ecosystem of the area. The use of chemical pesticides on land adjacent to the river is also a problem. The area around the lower reaches of the Papaloapan is intensively cultivated with sugar cane, mangoes, banana and other vegetables, and contaminated waters run off into the river. Unfortunately, industries on the Papaloapan have shown no interest in applying strategies to reduce and control river pollution. For instance, there are run-off pipes into the Papaloapan from the sugar mills of San Cristobal just outside Cosamaloapan

that stain the river red and makes it smell foul. The most visible crop in the Papaloapan area from Otaitlan near the source to Cosamaloapan is undoubtedly sugar cane. Over 15 million tons of it are grown a year. Water pollution is blamed as the main cause of intestinal problems, skin diseases and mosquito proliferation. Further upstream, the Modelo beer brewery in Tuxtilla is also contaminating the river.


RIO PAPALOAPAN

Resourceful River Flooding & Dams

The Papaloapan is a huge river that has been fairly tranquil since the building of the Aleman Dam. It has, in the past, habitually overflowed its banks causing deadly flooding, and the annual festival of “El Paseo de la Virgen de la Candelaria” is a supplication for protection against this event. The Papaloapan area has one of the highest annual rainfalls in Mexico and associated run-off and, in recent years, there have been serious floods in 1944 and 1969. Both to protect against flooding and, more importantly, to generate electricity, plans were drawn up in 1948 for five

hydroelectric dams in the upper reaches of the Papaloapan. Of those, just two have been built, and in the process they have created the largest artificial lake in Mexico (pictured left). The first, the Presidente Miguel Alemán Dam (or Temascal Dam, the name of its location) was started in 1957. It flooded the original town of San Miguel Soyaltepec and forced the relocation of about 22,000 Mazatecs. The dam does protect the lower Papaloapan of devastating floods, and generates 725 million kilowatts of electrical power. The dam’s artificial lake lends itself to various water sports such as fishing (catfish, mojarra and carp) as well as boat tours to the islands of San Miguel Soyaltepec and Isabel María. The lakesides abound with birds, small mammals and reptiles. The second was started in 1972 and built in fits and starts over a 16 year period. The long-delayed Cerro de Oro Dam provided multiple opportunities for organisations opposed to the construction of the dam to mobilise sympathy, create road blocks, encourage noisy demonstrations and deliver a continuous barrage of press releases and media events. More than 25,000 indigenous Chinantec people were moved twice because of the dam. First, in 1975, to a resettlement site some 200 kilometres distant in virgin rainforest. Their kin who remained behind were moved between 1986 and 1988 to over 30 new villages spread over a wide area in south central Veracruz. The Chinantec were victims of dam-induced ethnocide.


RIO PAPALOAPAN

Resourceful River Mazateca The Mazatec Indians have lived in a relatively isolated area in northernmost Oaxaca, wedged in between the states of Puebla and Veracruz, since well before the arrival of the Spanish in the sixteenth century. In these rugged highland areas the Mazatecans have developed a unique whistle language. With this, they can carry on a conversation with whistle sounds only, like the yodeling of the Alpine shepherds, and communicate from one peak to another using a vocabulary of sounds. The Mazatec conserve many of their traditional values and mythical beliefs. The use of curanderos (healers) is a common practice and there are many sacred places throughout the region. In 1954 a gigantic development project was begun in the area, which brought about momentous changes for the Mazatec. Hydroelectric dams were built, which, besides helping to control the great cyclical floods of the Rio Papaloapan, provided the basic infrastructure for the area's economic development. This scheme focused on the lowlands and favored the development of cattle raising and commercial agriculture for export. Large tracts of the jungle were cut down, the monoculture of sugarcane was promoted, and private banks supported the development of pasture for cattle. In the process, the territorial and cultural unity of the Mazatec was severed: approximately 22,000 villagers who inhabited the basin of the Miguel Aleman dam were moved and relocated to five areas in the states of Oaxaca and Veracruz, some 250 kilometres away from their traditional habitat. With the construction of the dam, the lowland Mazatec lost 500 square kilometres, equivalent to 50% of their cultivable land. In the highlands, on the other hand, where the emphasis was on coffee production, the infrastructure and services were left relatively undeveloped. Oaxaca has 53% of the whole indigenous population in Mexico and half of its population lives close to the poverty line and a third of them still speak a native language. When the Miguel Aleman dam was built in 1947 it created one of the largest artificial lakes in the whole of Mexico. Native groups were forced to move from the mainland to a new “island” and had to leave behind their long time agricultural way of life to start fishing. Everything changed as a result and a large percentage of the population left the region. Nowadays the community is made up of three-hundred families from Mazatecan background (an indigenous native group) who speak “mazateco” among themselves, and only speak Spanish with outsiders. Spanish conquistadores arriving in Mexico during the sixteenth century noted that the native people used vision-inducing plants such as peyote, mushrooms, morning glories, and others. When the New World came under the jurisdiction of the flourishing Spanish Inquisition, the Indian utilization of hallucinogenic plants was anathema to the clergy. The identities of the mushrooms and morning glories were forgotten for centuries until expeditions to remote areas of central Mexico during the 1930s found that isolated peoples, including the Mazatecs, had continued to use hallucinogenic plants in ritual healing, and these investigations were largely responsible for the introduction of Mazatec psychotropic plants to the outside world.


RIO PAPALOAPAN

Working River State of Veracruz

From pre-Columbian times until the nineteenth century, the Papaloapan has been an important transport artery and means of communication. But recently, largely due to deforestation and the effects of climate change, the depth of water in the river has reduced and it is now no longer navigable. Tlacotalpan originally became a destination as the farthest up the river that ships could navigate and Tlacotalpan became the principal town in the region, often more in touch with Cuba and Europe than the rest of Mexico. The port was established early and in competition with the port at nearby Veracruz. Tlacotalpan’s location on the banks of the Papaloapan meant that steamships from Europe could berth there when the Norte was blowing, a cold northerly wind that prevented them from docking at Veracruz. Important shipyards were moved from Cuba as a direct result of the English blockade of Havana in 1762. The port developed rapidly, receiving schooners and side-wheel steamships that imported European goods and exported tobacco, exotic woods, cotton and sugar cane. Ships from the port of Tlacotalpan took products from the states of Oaxaca and Puebla to Veracruz and on to New Orleans, Havana and Bordeaux. By 1855, its fleet had grown to 18 steam ships and one large sailing vessel used to transport

timber, tobacco, cotton, sugar, grain, brandy, leather, salt meat, crocodiles, heron feathers, furniture and soap. The State of Veracruz produces 76% of Mexico’s oil; it grows 64% of its pineapples; over half its crop of oranges and 60% of its sugar cane. There are huge sugar cane refineries on the Papaloapan by Cosamaloapan. Fishing is also a highly significant industry – particularly shrimps. For years fish have been very abundant and very diverse and the local population, many of whom are poor villagers, have relied on the river as a source of plentiful food. However, global warming and pollution are seriously threatening the local fish stock.


RIO PAPALOAPAN

Working River Chocolate According to one legend, the Aztecs associated chocolate with Xochiquetzal, the goddess of fertility. They ground the cocoa seeds into a paste that, when mixed with water and seasoned with chilli pepper and other ingredients, made a frothy, bitter, spicy drink called xocoatl. Another Aztec legend tells of the god Quetzalcoatl bringing heavenly cocoa to earth. Eventually, Quetzalcoatl was cast out of paradise for the blasphemous act of giving this scared drink to humans. The gods felt that only they should be able to drink chocolate. Priests often made offerings of cocoa seeds to Quetzalcoatl and other deities. The cocoa tree will not grow in the dry highlands of central Mexico, the seat of the Aztec empire. So the Aztecs traded with the Maya and other peoples in order to receive a steady supply of seeds for chocolate. Because cocoa was so valuable, conquered people in cocoa-growing areas paid a tax by supplying the Aztecs with cocoa seeds.

Chocolate was an important luxury good throughout pre-Colombian Mesoamerica, and cocoa beans were often used as currency. Cocoa beans served as money until the seventeenth century Christopher Colombus brought some cocoa beans back to show Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, but it was the Spanish friars who introduced it to Europe more broadly. The first recorded shipment to Europe for commercial purposes was in a shipment from Veracruz to Seville in 1585. It was still served as a beverage, but the Europeans added sugar and milk to counteract the natural bitterness and removed the chilli pepper, replacing it with another Mexican indigenous spice, vanilla. Changes to taste meant that by the seventeenth century it was a luxury item among the European nobility. It is believed that the Englishman Joseph Fry made the first chocolate for eating in 1847, followed in 1849 by the Cadbury brothers.


RIO PAPALOAPAN

River City Otatitlán

Otatitlán, a town of some 5,000 inhabitants, is mainly known for its annual festival: the Day of the Holy Cross. Held from 29 April to 3 May, thousands of indigenous Indians descend on the town to pay their respects and perform traditional dances to El Señor de Otatitlán. Otatitlán has always been little more than a minor river setlement. However, from pre-Hispanic times, locals worshipped Yiacatecuhtli, a commerce deity who was also traditionally depicted with black skin. When the Spanish Conquistadors arrived, they forced the locals to worship the image of St Andrew in his place. But local stories tell of a blackened image, representing the figure of Christ crucified, washed up on a raft, along the town's riverport dock a few years later, in 1597. It was embraced by the converts to Roman Catholicism as a replacement for local god Yiacatecuhtli. It was interpreted as a divine sign that the area had been blessed and locals began construction of a huge church and the town became a pilgrimage site. In 1931, during a period of unrest between government and Catholic rebels, the image was stolen and taken to the nearby village of San Antonio. There, anti-clerical forces under orders from Veracruz Governor Adalberto Tejada, tried to set fire to it, but it refused to catch and the desecrators had to be satisfied with decapitating it. After recuperating their profaned icon, the townsfolk carved a new head for it. Miraculously, in 1950, the original head was recovered and put back in place; the replacement was also put in a display case in a place of honour in the sanctuary.

The most important festivities take place on May 3, the Day of the Holy Cross. During these celebrations, thousands of pilgrims arrive eager to witness the venerated image of the black Christ. Before entering the church, pilgrims purchase bundles of basil, myrtle and rosemary which local healers use to cleanse the devotees after which they enter the church to take part in a remarkable act of worship with unbroken roots back into pre-Hispanic culture.


RIO PAPALOAPAN

River City Tlacotalpan

Known as “the pearl of the Papaloapan”, Tlacotalpan is one of Mexico’s most beautiful towns. Pronounced "Tah-lack-oh-tahl-pan", the name is of Nahuatl origin and means “the place in the middle of the earth”. The town is located on the left bank of the Papaloapan River, opposite the point at which the San Juan Michapan rivers the river. In pre-Hispanic times, Tlacotalpan was the site of a major indigenous settlement. The first contact with the conquistadors was in 1521 when Cortes sent an expedition up the Papaloapan in search of gold and, soon after, the Spaniards began to settle here. Most of the town was established during the second half of the eighteenth century when cotton and sugar plantations were developed. But it

wasn’t until the early nineteeth century that Tlacotalpan experienced an economic boom. It grew as a river port with access to the Gulf of Mexico via the Papaloapan. Tlacotalpan experienced a boom during the second half of the nineteenth century. At this time, the town became important because sea-going vessels could navigate up the Papaloapan to reach the port at Tlacotalpan. The town was visited by three-masted sailing ships and schooners with the foreign crews as well as the legendary two-floor steam ships equipped with side-wheels that docked there to embark passengers, exotic timber, tobacco and large amounts of cotton and other tropical produce. After a series of disastrous fires, Tlacotalpan was rebuilt and its distinctive architectural style comes from rules imposed by the town planners at that time. Tlacotalpan is exceptional for the layout of the town, with tree-lined, wide streets and colourful and highly ornamented houses built in the Caribbean style rather than in Spanish colonial. The one and two story neoclassic buildings are painted intense shades – emerald and lime green, pale pink, rosa mexicana, lavender, purple, violet, blue, turquoise, yellow and melon. During the golden years, Tlacotalpan built a theatre with chandeliers and marble flooring, a customs house, a tram service and invested in street lighting. Mexico’s first naval academy was built here. However, the construction of the Isthmus Railway took business from the Papaloapan and Tlacotalpan became isolated. A drop in cotton production accelerated the town’s decline. Paradoxically, the same isolation that caused its decline has helped preserve this picturesque town. There has been a chapel dedicated to La Virgen de la Candelaria in Tlacotalpan since 1550, when the Spaniards were attempting to eliminate the indigenous religions. Tlacotalpan is now famous for the festival for its patron saint. The most famous image of the fiesta is a statue of the Virgin Mary drifting down the river, followed by a flotilla of little boats. The procession of the idol and accompanying parade of boats originated as a means to induce the Virgin to protect the community against the annual floods.


RIO PAPALOAPAN

River City Alvarado

Alvarado is strategically located at the mouth of the Papaloapan. The town is sheltered from the sea by a stretch of sand dunes which form a huge lagoon. Since the earliest settlement, when it was known as Atlizintla (‘the place between abundant waters’), Alvarado has been a port and a centre for fishing. The settlement was named San Cristobel de Alvarado in 1600 after Hernan Cortes’ notoriously violent and volatile fellow conquistador Pedro de Alvarado. Today, the town has a military naval academy and a technology institute for marine studies. The most significant industry in Alvarado is fishing, with shrimp and the local fish Tilapia particularly abundant. Some of the first Spaniards settled on these lower reaches of the Papaloapan. Amongst the many crops they experimented with was sugar cane, which grew exceptionally well in this climate. Plantations soon followed and the early settlers were followed by a steady flow of black slaves who were sent to work the sugar plantations. Inter-marriage between Africans, Spaniards and indigenous groups led to a large mixed-race population and, by the eighteenth century, a distinctive local culture, called Jarocho, had emerged. Indeed, the local music, called Son Jarocho, is a fusion of African, European and Mesoamerican rhythms. Son Jarocho, played traditionally on harp and guitars, is undergoing a popular revival and every year the town of Tlacotalpan hosts a great encounter of these musicians.


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River Culture La Candelaria From 31 January until 2 February Tlacotalpan explodes into a religious and secular frenzy, its streets stuffed with true believers and joyful revelers. In the whirl of activity there are three events that stand out: el Encuentro de Jareneros, el Corrido de Torros, and el Paseo de la Virgin. The afternoon of January 31 kicks off with a parade of equestrians, dressed in the traditional costume of the Jarochos. The men dress in white with a red bandana and the typical hat with indentations. The women wear flowing white dresses, black aprons, shawls with ribbons and flowers in their hair. During the next three days there will be other parades including the “Mojiganga” (a procession of giant figures). There will be regattas on the river, bailes, masses, various presentations in the town squares and lots of drinking of Toritos de Cacahuates (a highly alcoholic drink made from peanuts). Starting on the night of January 31st in la Plaza de Doña Marta, jareneros (musicians who play the traditional music from southern Veracruz, called Son Jarocho) gather for the largest Encuentro and Fandango of the year. Along with the musicians, the Decimistas come to present their work. Decimas are poems of ten-line stanzas that are dramatically spoken with the accompaniment of Son Jarocho music. Decimas often proclaim the greatness of Veracruz and the beauty of its women, but the majority are picaresque comments on everyday life. At about 11pm a Fandango (dance done to Son Jarocho) starts up. Here one can watch

the most talented dancers from the region until 10 am the next morning. The Encuentro and Fandangos span all three nights. El Corrido de Torros is a Running of the Bulls. The bulls are free to run more or less where they will, controlled only by cowboys. As a result, they are likely to run down any street, jump up on the pavements and have even been known to enter houses. Every year, some people are seriously hurt and sometimes killed. The bulls too are seriously injured and they are always killed at the end of the festivities. In 2006 due to an international campaign and meetings with Mexican animal rights activists, the governor of the state of Veracruz banned the use of the bulls but the mayor of Tlacoltalpan overruled his decision and the fiesta went ahead as usual.

El Paseo de la Virgen de la Candelaria is a supplication for protection against flooding. On February 2nd, a mass is held starting at dawn. At around 6am a mariachi and the jaraneros (who have been playing at the Fandango all night) enter the church for the playing of the traditional Mexican birthday song and The Crying Woman. A little later the Virgen is carried in procession through the centre of town and down to the walkway beside the river where a barge awaits her. Many people rent boats from local fishermen, even bringing musicians along to serenade the Virgen on her voyage up and down the river. Those who do not manage to acquire a boat, line the shore to watch the procession.


RIO PAPALOAPAN

River Culture Voladores

The dance of the Voladores (“the flyers”) has remained almost unchanged since pre-Hispanic times. Dressed in fanlike headdresses with red and blue tunics, the five participants in this daring event climb up a 15m high pole. Perched at the very top of the pole, the chief faces east and invokes the gods, opening his arms and using a whistle to imitate an eagle. Poignantly (and to his considerable personal danger) he stands on the top and dances to each of the four cardinal points. East first, where the sun rises, then south, west and finally north. The ‘flight’ then begins. Four voladores are attached by coiled ropes to the platfform at the top of the pole. They allow themselves to fall backwards and slowly descend to the ground, forming a great spiral as their ropes gradually unwind. The most difficult task facing the voladores is to grasp the rope between their toes, so they hang upside down with their arms open, like gliding birds that trace great circles in the sky. Much significance is read into the iconography of the dance. For instance, the descent of each of the four voladores should be accomplished in thirteen turns; 4 x 13 = 52, the number of years in the pre-Hispanic century. In addition, the voladores must purify themselves before every flight by abstaining from alcohol and sexual intercourse for seven days prior to a flight. The dance was originally made to the god of agriculture Xipe-Totec to

appeal for sun and rain and to make a plentiful harvest. These days, the voladores make an appearance at most significant local festivals in the area between the River Tuxpan in the north and the Papaloapan in the south. Many towns, including Tlacotalpan, have installed permanent poles for the voladores in the heart of their communities.


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River Culture Day of the Dead

Celebrations vary from region to region, as does the timing of the events. But in most places, the

souls of dead children (“Angelitos”) arrive at midday on 31st October and depart on 1st November, their place is then taken by the souls of dead adults. They in turn depart at midday on 2nd November (“El Dia de las Muertos”). Mexicans believe that a person dies three deaths. The first is when the body ceases to function; the second is when the body is interred or returned to mother earth and the third and most definitive death is when there is no-one left alive to remember the

life of the departed. Everywhere the dead are welcomed with ceremony and respect. House altars are adorned with flowers, leaves and fruit; sometimes a path of flower petals from street to altar guides the returning souls. Elegant candlesticks and incense burners are set out with offerings of food and

drink. Care is taken to ensure that the aroma is strong, for it is the fragrance that leads the spirit home. On the morning of the 2nd November, families gather in the graveyard with more offerings. Some bring picnic baskets, bottles of tequila for toasting the departed or even a mariachi band to serenade the dead with songs and music. Often there are stalls outside cemetery gates selling food and drinks and the noise of firecrackers fills the air. From mid-October, markets and shops all over Mexico start to sell the paraphanalia for the Day of the Dead. There are skeletons (“calaveras”) and all sorts of macabre toys; intricate tissue paper-cuts (“papel picado”); elaborate wreaths and crosses; candles and votive lights; fresh seasonal flowers, particularly marigolds and cockscomb. There are loads of edible goodies too like sugar skulls, chocolate coffins and specially baked and shaped breads The origins of the Day of the Dead date back thousands of years to rituals celebrating the death of ancestors and, more recently, to Aztec times and a festival dedicated to a goddess called Mictecacihuatl (“The Lady of the Dead”). The 1st and 2nd November are also All Souls’ Day and All Saints’ Day, respectively, whose roots go back to Celtic times. With its mix of pre-Hispanic and Roman Catholic rituals the Day of the Dead is a perfect illustration of the synthesis that has been achieved between ancient and modern beliefs. Jose Posada’s striking image of a costumed woman with a skeleton face that he called “Catarina” as a parody of a Mexican upper classes, and now also Catarina figures, often feature prominently in the Day of the Dead.

rio papaloapan

Documents

mariposas river

elixir of life

large dams

group of natives

king ferdinand of spain

gulf of mexico

southeastern mexico

surrounding area