NOTES CONCERNING THE USE AND RE-USE OF
LITHIC MATERIALS AMONG THE HUICHOLES
OF JALISCO
PHIL C. WEIGAND
rHE SETTING
fhere are two major groups of Huicholés. Those
of Jalisco are subsistence farmers and small-scale cattle
herders. They live in dispersed rancherias, the larger and
older of which have /túki/, or /kalihúef, ceremonial com-
pounds. Thase /túki/ districts are organized into gober-
nancias having the classic Mesoamerican civil-religious
hierarchy: gobernador, juez, capitán, alguacil, mayordomo,
topil, etc. The gobernancias, in turn, are organized into
comunidades indz'genas which are now managed from
Presidencias within each comunidad. The civil-religious
and comunidad hierarchies form the essence of the cultur-
al and sociallife of the Huicholes of Jalisco (cf. Lumholtz
1902; Weigand 1978; Zin~ 1938).
The Huicholes of Nayarit live in small "pueblitos"
in the Paso de Alica area, literally the outskirts of the
city of Tepic. These pueblecitos serve as reservoirs for
urban day-wage labor. The civil-religious hierarchy is not
present, nor are there /túki/ compounds. These Huicholes
are highly acculturated, and many of their number have
specialized as "professional Indians", as tourist-oriented
craft producers. The bright and beautiful yarn paintings,
along with the quaint tales, come from the craftsmen and
artists residing in the composite, urban-oriented, prole-
tarian environment (Weigand 1978, 1980, 1981).
The following notes concern only the comunidad
Huicholes, and for the most part are based upon field work
within the comunidad of San Sebastian Teponahuastlán.
USE OF STONE
The Huicholes make extensive use of many types
of stones, especially for building houses, compound walls,
terraces, and field walls. They only quarry and mine two
types, however: (1) soft cantera limestones for construction
purposes, and (2) weathered rhyolites which are used for
red and green paints. Cantera is quarried and shaped with
metal tools in fashions visible in the rural setting all over
Mexico. Levers, adzes, and heavy machetes form most of
the tool kit. The weathered rhyolite is míned from placer
deposits in the arroyo bottoms-metal shovels, picks, and
buckets are used to mine it. The deposit mined near the
San Sebastian Casa· Real is associated with a /túki/ cere-
monial center. The soft rock is ground up to a powder,
mixed with tzia-chía oils, and used as fresco paints on
scraped gourds. No one owns the deposit nor is permission
needed to mine within it. Most mining occurs during the
dry season, which is also the season that most of the
traditional handicrafts, including gourd decoration, are
made.
In the past, Huicholes used to make manos and
metates from the local limestones, and sometimes these
are still in use, or at least stored. Nowadays, however,
mass-produced lava manos and metates are purchased.
Judging from the distribution of projectile points within
and nearby the comunidades, it seems certain that these,
too, were once made in the area. But modern arrows
have tire hardened foreshafts of brasil wood instead of
stone points. Rhyolite and basaltic hammerstones and
axes are occasionally found in the area as well. Stones,
usually rhyolites or basalts, are still bein.& used as hammers,
but they are not hafted or shaped in any fashion. Such
cobbles are chosen tor their natural shapes from among
the unsorted materials of the arroyo deposits. They are
used to stra~ghten nails, cold hammer nicks out of mache-
tes, metal coas., axes, etc., or to break up bottles for glass.
Since most stones of the area are sedimentary, igneous
cobbles are often saved-very frequently by placing them
in a rock wall ( either house or compound) where they can
be removed easily when needed.
Bottle glass is a commodity that has obviously replaced
obsidian, chert, and fme rhyolites within the comunidades.
It is in use today, along with metal knives, to smooth
gourds; to smooth locally made coa, shove~ and axe handles;
to scrape and cut hides; and to cut fabrics. It is not chipped
in preparation for a task, nor systematically saved once the
task is over. But since bottles are still at a premium in the
areas without roads, glass scrapers sometimes are placed
in 'rack walls for future use. Glass scrapers, along with
their metal counterparts, also are used for fine woodwork
such as, for example, shaving bows, arrows, bastones, and
465
so on. Tne use of glass, though, appears to be opportunistic
for the most part, and the metal counterparts are much
preferred when there is a choice.
RE-USE OF STONE ARTIFACTS
There is not now, nor within the memory of the
oldest HuichoL any fine lapidary work or stone chi¡:>ping,
such as chert or obsidian knapping. This do es not mean, how-
ever, that Huicholes do not gather used lithic artifacts.
In general, archaeological materials, whether from within
the comunidades or the neighboring barrancas, have high
cultural value for the Huicholes. Huicholes opportunistically
gather up projectile points {of any medium), obsidian chips
and flakes, figurines, jars, bowls, quartz crystals, scrapers. _
axes, etc. whenever the chance presents itself. They do
not pot-hunt- or search for archaeological materials, but
well-known ruins, such as jtséwij where the "Great
Ones" once lived, have been picked clean. Deliberate
looting, however, would be antlthetical to their deeply
felt respect for their ancestors. Huicholes are very
knowledgeable about the ruins in their areas for these
localities are where their ancestors once lived. Since
important aspects of contemporary Huichol religious
life are oriented toward ancestors, who control their
health and the character. of much of their emotional,
social, and natural environment, ancient habitation and
ceremonial areas, and the artifacts thereupon, have power.
Anything that once belonged to or wás made by an ancestor
has power.
Lumbholtz (1902), Zingg (1938), and almost all
other f1e1d worke.rs who worked withm the comunidades
have noted ceremonial re-use of archaeological materials-
in one case even a fluted point fragment {Weigand 1970).
Quartz crystals have special power, for through them
come the voices of the ancestors. These crystals are still
very valuable, but the treks to especially acquire them
from the Etzatlán area are a thing of the past. All old
things, including coins {especially silver, Colonial _coins),
have the power of the ancestors, and hence high value.
Archaeological pieces are often found in the small
pouches used by the jmaraakámej, the singer-curer, who
for the most part depends upon his ancestors for his powers
to cure and to speak with their voices. Obsidian objects
and chips, quartz crystals, pie ces of turquoise, and malacates
are favorite items. The pouches are highly valued and are
stored in the (Sfríkij, the ancest~or-god house of each
rancho, where jurukámej lives. jurukámej is the dead
singer-curer who has returned to live in the jStríki/ of
his descendents.
Be cause of their power · archaeological objects are
occasionally used as offerings in severa! types of ceremonies,
all of which require the participation of the ancestors.
While old coins are the favorite offerings, I hav~ also seen
offerings of ceramic bowls, obsidian and chert projectile
466
points, and. of course, crystals. Coins and pomts are pla d
at the base of decorated jicaras and attached by wasp wce
These .ar~ placed in the holy caves of the comunid~
zone-1t 1s írom these caves that the ancestors once cam
althou~ they. carne from other places as well. Eac~
rancnerza has 1ts own holy cave, with an active spring ·
which offerings are made for curing and general~ed heal~n
for planting' and harvesting ceremonies, etc. In returh'
Huicholes . can takP. water from the spring for baptism'S
an d blessmg. Pan-Hmchol shrines also exist, tne mosr
famous being Teakáta. Offerings here, however, usually
do ,not include valuable, old objects for two reasons:
{1) the fear .:hat others will rob or deface the offering,
hence rendenng it useless, and (2) the fact that these
shrines are more oriented toward the goas lhan the
ancestors.
Valuable offerings are made also on the tluicholes'
various ceremonial treks. Examples in elude (1) the trip to
the Pacific Coast near San Bias where the sea is placated
and where the cycle of baptisms and marriagesare ceremo-
nially consummated; and {2) the pilgrimage to the
deserts of Zacatecas and San Luis Potosí, on the way
to the peyote grounds, following the exact steps of
jtamátzij, the ancestor deer. The latter ro u te cannot be
varied for if it is the peyote loses its ritual value. Offerings
must be left at all of the may shrines along the way.
CONCLUSIONS
These examples of the re-use of archaeological
materials, or situations sympathetic to re-use, even though
thev are oportunistic, are systematized. Archaeologists
probably deal with many more of these patterns of re-use
than they suspect. I am positive that this phenomenon
is not just a contemporary Huichol practice but could be
very generalized and ancient in tradition. Systematic re-
use of archaeological materials appears to be restricted
to shrine sites, at least among the Huicnoles. But this
means that many rack shelters and caves are the most
likely places for such offerings, especially if there are
traces of a live water source. In addition, spring sites as
such are important places for offerings. Other areas,
arnong the Huicholes, where archaeological materials can
turn up ·are: the rock walls of structures and compounds,
the /sfríki/ thatch roofs and altars, and kitchens {in the
case of usable metates, for example ).
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The fleld work among the Huicholes has been
sponsored by the National Science Foundation, Wenner-
Gren Foundation for Antropological Research, the Southern
Illinois University Museum Co-operative Research Fund,
and the State University of New York Research Founda-
tion. Without the active aid of Celia García de Weigand, the
work would have been imposslble.
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