IMAGES OF CHRIST

Good Friday is almost past, but not without the procession of images of Christ. Two things struck me on observing this event once again. The first is to be reminded of how easily those in the secular West dismiss Christianity (and perhaps all religions). Second, and related, is the importance of this event.

Let’s begin with a brief description. The procession is scheduled to begin at 7:00PM but everyone knows it won’t begin until dusk. Nevertheless, the center of town is virtually shut down from about 6:300 – about 10 square blocks of this pueblo. As vehicles have been removed, people take to the streets, some taking up their positions along the curbs, others just walking perhaps looking for a better viewing place. By the time the procession begins there must be 1,000 (or perhaps 2,000) on the streets. One has the feeling the entire town has turned out for this annual event. The procession begins with the mandatory truck with four police officers with machine guns at the ready and then the Bishop protected by a canopy held by four men (and perhaps the guns) and then a lovely image of Mary (revealing again her importance as the mother of Christ). The main procession consists of a Christ image from every church in town, some very large images taking 8 men to carry and others no more than 15 inches high. One or two images are of Christ in his glass tomb (which fascinates the young children) and others carried on a mat or in a supine position on the cross. Many of the walkers carry candles to suggest that the life of Christ will live on after his death earlier in the day. The procession takes about 30 minutes to pass: There is no band (which is very unusual) and the entire crowd is silent.

Why do people come? Clearly they do not come to see the latest image as little has changed over the years. It is not novelty that brings them out, but the predictable. If we rely on Brandes (1988) analysis we note that there are no masks, suggesting that the main participants are not playing a social role in which individual identity is lost. On this occasion people are truly playing themselves, as are the crowd. We are all participating in collective ritual in which we must see and be seen. We all remind ourselves of our membership (the writer and probably many other westerners present can be excluded from this claim) and this reminder binds members together and provides a collective identity. In a Catholic country this identity is reinforced several times throughout the year, but the events of these few days restate the importance of that membership and provides emotional attachment and feeling of importance. The events of these days make public the very foundations of the group – a belief in Christ, in the story of his crucifixion and resurrection.

By coincidence I read a story in Canada’s national newspaper reporting the dismay of professors of English literature at the growing unawareness of the story of Christianity among their students. This unawareness prevents them from understanding the metaphors, phrases and persons from the Bible that have shaped much of the literature of the West. Some students fail to understand why their professor is frequently talking about Christianity and perhaps see this as bias. However, this story, which has been around for 2000 years (perhaps the only longer surviving story is that of the Jews) has penetrated much of our language and story telling. Perhaps this is part of my dismay at the ease with which the secular west dismisses Christianity. If this same story were encountered while traveling in the darkest (if any such place still exists) of the Amazon, we would marvel and go out of our way to learn more. Now students would rather take a course in the history of rock music than read the Bible or listen to analysis of this old story.

RITUAL PERFORMANCE IN TZINTZUNTZAN

I arrived in Tzintzuntzan around 9:00 AM on Holy Thursday in order to see the spies (espias) on their horses. I really did not know what to expect as I had not heard anyone speak of this event. I positioned myself at an intersection behind the church and waited. I soon saw a large number of men on horses go through an intersection three blocks away, so knew they were approaching. These riders begin around 9:00am and go systematically through every street in the pueblo, repeating the journey three times. When they approached me I was astounded by the spectacle. There were at least 60 riders on attractive horses and dressed in coordinated colours. They wore red satin hats which covered their face with the exception of a slit, outlined in green, for the eyes. The hat was some what like a bag tied at the top with a yellow or green ribbon. They all wore a tunic which came part way down the legs. The tunics were made of a silk like fabric in colours of gold, red or purple. Some of the tunics were decorated with small white, black or red bows (similar to what is worn in Canada for Aids awareness days or various women’s causes). Some of the men also had a gold breast plate. The pants were white cotton although mostly covered by long red stockings, and their feet were covered with sandals, some with laces going part way up the leg. They then had a coordinated cape that flowed over the back of the horse. They all rode bareback. What a sight.

They entered the olive tree filled atrium of the church and spread out the width of the yard. They stopped every 50 feet and some of the riders appeared to whistle with their hands or using a small clay whistle. As one man’s sound faded the next would repeat the sound, and so on. It was a sight right out of a movie or from a previous life.

So, what was this about? Foster (1945) and Brandes (1988) tell us that this event has been going on for as long as anyone can remember. People claimed the spies were originally to watch for people working on Holy Wednesday or Holy Thursday. They had the right to impound the tools of the worker who must pay a fine to have them returned. It was clearly no longer about this as many people were working – a group of people were sweeping the entire church yard and others were building the stage for the performance of the passion play. So it appears to be entirely performance with the entire pueblo as the set. Brandes suggests that the performance continues because it brings prestige to the community and it was clear that the community was expecting large crowds on Good Friday. I was not aware of tourists but many people had cameras.

The performance has become more elaborate with the passing of time. Foster describes the riders in 1945 wearing silk dresses borrowed from their mothers and having a red felt hat covering the face. Brandes describes the event from 1981 and saw the same hats but the dresses had been replaced with white cotton shirts and pants. In 2009, I saw the beautiful performance described briefly above. What was at one time a functional ritual has evolved into an entirely ritual performance.

To complicate this story there is another dimension. Before going to this event a friend reported that the riders were Jews looking for Jesus (since he was a Jew I hoped he was joking since this would stir-up the controversy between Christians and Jews). Later another friend reported that a tour guide told him the riders were looking for Jesus. Since the costumes do seem to have changed quite dramatically from those described by Foster and Brandes could it be that the community has created a new role for the riders and made the costumes look much more like Roman riders in order to fit the story?

As a small aside: On one street a family erected an alter with a manequin dressed as a spy along with a photo of the dead family member. The riders stopped to this alter and blew their whistles. Of note is that the dead rider was shown in the clothing of a slightly earlier time period. While much of the costume was familiar it was not identical to those on the street today.

HOW NAMES CHANGE

Over the past two decades or more we have seen indigenous names of towns, lakes, physical features and so on, replace previous English (or Spanish, etc.) names. Presumably this was undertaken as a sign of respect. Bombay is now Mumbai and in Canada the names of First Nations groupings have been changed to reflect indigenous languages.

One day a friend wondered aloud when the term P’urepecha (also spelled as Purepecha) became common in reference to the local indigenous peoples of Michoacan and the Spanish term, Tarascan, (perhaps derived from a mishearing of a native word) became less common. Both terms can be used to refer to the people and to the language group. It is clear, however, as you look around the state and listen to news that the term P’urepecha is now the preferred term.

One way to begin to track this change would be to look at the terms used in classic anthropological ethnographies. Ethnographers (mainly English speaking by birth) have been in the region for almost 70 years so there is a solid database. I reviewed a few of these.

Ralph Beals was in the region from about 1941 and published an ethnography on the pueblo of Cheran in 1946. He uses only the term “Tarascan”. The 1998 edition contains a forward by the other grandfather of ethnographies in the area, George Foster, and he only uses the term “Tarascan”. (I expect Foster’s ethnography of Tzintzuntzan, published in 1948, also uses this term, but I cannot confirm this). George West (1948) describing the cultural geography of the area known as “once pueblos” only uses the term “Tarascan”. Donald Brand, writing in 1951 about the pueblo of Quiroga, only uses the term “Tarascan” (pp. 1-3, 9) and at times refers to “Indians” (p. 11). Michael Belshaw (1967), describing the pueblo of Huecorio, avoids the problem by only referring to the people of Huecorio or Huecorians. Stanley Brandes (1988), a student of Foster and also studying Tzintzuntzan since 1967, uses the term P’urepecha in his index where it says “see Tarascan”. The first mention of Tarascan says “..known in their own language as P’urepecha”. Cynthia Nelson, also a student of George Foster and arriving in Erongaricuaro in 1960 does say in her 1971 book on this pueblo “.. a Tarascan people or culture (properly known as Purepecha). (p. 10) This does seem to indicate the beginnings of a shift in thinking or at least an awareness of appropriateness. However, if we jump forward to the 2006 book on Day of the Dead in Mexico by Stanley Brandes we find he uses only the term “Tarascan” and no longer gives the indigenous equivalent. Another recent authors, Martha Works and Keith Hadley (2000), review the 1948 work by West (see above) and make use of his photography. But they say in the first footnote: “.. Tarasca and Tarascan are now considered to be Spanish colonial constructs” and they always use the term Purepecha. This line suggests the use of Tarascan has a moral implication but a local anthropologist says that this is not so. Perhaps as some confirmation of this when we picked up two village people needing a ride we heard them chatting for some time. They then apologized and said they were speaking Tarascan.

This post may not have clarified anything but it has narrowed the search somewhat. This type of investigation could also be considered for tourist guides to the area, folk art histories, historical reports of the area and so on. Or it might be interesting to compare English speaking authors and Spanish speaking authors.

WHAT WAS THAT EVENT? A WEDDING?

This post is very speculative and I would appreciate any comments.

We were walking around the town of Paracho (the guitar town) when we heard a rather alarming noise behind us – much shouting and horn honking. We turned to find two or three trucks loaded with young men and women and the men with blackened faces. Was this the coming revolution! Upon asking we were told it was a wedding and the large group was going to pick up the bride. The trucks stopped on a side street and a young man in the traditional dress (white cotton shirt with embroidery and white cotton pants) appeared to be dancing to accompaniment of shouting and clapping. What was going on?

In search of an answer I turned to the ethnography by Ralph Beals (1946) on the town of Cheran which lies about 10 km to the north. Beals describes a traditional Tarascan wedding but his information comes from the 1930s and early 1940s and is an ideal portrait of weddings as he never witnessed one that fit this description. Let me summarize his description by identifying the main events in a sequence of activities.

1. The groom “steals” the bride. This is usually by consent and according to plan.
a. Parents of groom visit the bride’s house to ask for “pardon” and entice the father to consent with gifts.
b. If the father accepts, the neighbors and family are called together and much drinking occurs.
2. A few days later both families assemble and exchange bread and tomales. Much drinking occurs.
3. The couple makes application for a civil wedding. They almost always marry prior to the religious wedding.
4. Religious marriage.
a. Very early in the morning the bride’s parents hire a band and go to the groom’s house to take him clothing. He must dance once dressed.
b. Parents and godparents of groom go the house of the bride and take her clothing.
c. Parents, relatives and band take the couple to the church (still very early).
d. Bride and family go to her house.
e. Remainder of the group goes to the groom’s house.
f. All then go to the bride’s house and then back to the groom’s house for breakfast.
g. Bride returns to her house.
h. Band plays in the groom’s house and more and more friends drop in for food.
i. Meanwhile the sibling, cousins and grandparents of groom hire a band and go through the streets, ending up at the groom’s uncle for something to eat. They then proceed to the godparents of the bride where they sing outside the house and then enter to seek permission to take the bride.
j. The group then goes to the house of the bride and immediately asks for permission to take the bride. If the bride’s parents consent they take the bride back to the groom’s house along with gifts of clothing.
k. At the groom’s house there is the traditional distribution of bread.
l. All begin to drink and the gift clothing is distributed.

Now perhaps we can make some sense of what I saw on the street. The event observed appears to relate to 4(i) above. We observed the event in question around 1:00 so if the wedding occurred early in the morning and people have had time for breakfast and then some further food it seems reasonable that the picking up of the bride would be around this time. The groom was dressed very differently than others and his cloths may have been the gift from the bride’s parents and the cloths he was married in. The event on the street may have been the serenading of the godparents of the bide and obtaining their consent. Many of those in the trucks were drinking heavily and as this was the last major event of the day prior to the exchange of gifts and more drinking, it seems right. However, Beals makes no mention of the blackened faces. So perhaps my speculation is off course or this is a new addition to the tradition in the last 60 years. Any suggestions?