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Visualizing the Miraculous,
Visualizing the Sacred

Copyright © 2014. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. All rights reserved.
Jackson, Robert H.. Visualizing the Miraculous, Visualizing the Sacred. Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars
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Visualizing the Miraculous,
Visualizing the Sacred:
Evangelization and the “Cultural War”
in Sixteenth Century Mexico
By
Robert H. Jackson
Visualizing the Miraculous, Visualizing the Sacred:
Evangelization and the “Cultural War” in Sixteenth Century Mexico,
by Robert H. Jackson
This book first published 2014
Cambridge Scholars Publishing
12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Copyright © 2014 by Robert H. Jackson

All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system,
or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or
otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner.
ISBN (10): 1-4438-6402-1, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-6402-2
I would like to dedicate this study to the memory of Dr. Eleanor Wake
(1949-2013). She was a friend and colleague who inspired me to look
at things differently. She will be greatly missed.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
List of Tables .............................................................................................. ix
List of Figures............................................................................................. xi
Acknowledgements ................................................................................. xvii
Introduction ................................................................................................. 1
Chapter One ............................................................................................... 11

Visualizing the Miraculous: The Virgin of the Rosary Mural
at Tetela del Volcán (Morelos)
Chapter Two .............................................................................................. 33

Organizing Missions in Sixteenth Century Central Mexico
Chapter Three ............................................................................................ 67

Dateline Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan) 1542: “Idolatry” and an Inquisition

Investigation
Chapter Four .............................................................................................. 83

Visualizing the Sacred: Embedded Stones and Native Religious
Iconography
Chapter Five ............................................................................................ 125

Representations of Death and the Challenge of Evangelization
Chapter Six .............................................................................................. 149

Confraternities and the Ritual of Penitence: Catholic Practice
or Ritual Self-Sacrifice?
Conclusions ............................................................................................. 163
Selected Bibliography ............................................................................. 173
Index ........................................................................................................ 181
LIST OF TABLES
Table 1: Political organization of the Tributary Province of Huaxtepec

under Culhua-Mexica Rule
Table 2: Augustinian Missions in the Tributary Province of Huaxtepec, c.
1580/1590
Table 3: Visitas and Number of Tributaries of Yecapixtla in 1571
Table 4: Dominican Missions in Morelos
Table 5: Selected Dominican Missions in Oaxaca in the Late Sixteenth
Century
Table 6: Structure of the Jurisdiction of Tlaxiaco c. 1550
Table 7: Jesuit Missions in Sinaloa and Sonora in 1624
Table 8: The Number of Jesuit Missionaries Stationed on the Sinaloa-
Sonora Missions, 1604-1625
Table 9: Baptisms in the Sinaloa-Sonora Missions, 1591-1631
Table 10: Text of El Chuchumbé
LIST OF FIGURES
Fig. 1: The church and convent San Juan Bautista Tetela del Volcán
(Morelos)
Fig. 2: Illustration from the 1778 Crónica de Michoacán depicting the
process of catechism and baptism
Fig. 3: Panel from the Doctrina Cristiana regarding death and salvation
through conversion
Fig. 4: Santa María Magdalena Tepetlaóxtoc, built on top of a temple
platform
Fig. 5: Section of the surviving mural from San Juan Bautista Tetela del
Volcán
Fig. 6: Another section of the Tetela del Volcán mural program
Fig. 7: A mural in the lower cloister of Nuestra Señora de la Natividad
Tepoztlán (Morelos) that depicts a group of Dominicans
Fig. 8: Mural in the portería of Santo Domingo de Guzmán
Tlaquiltenango that depicts a Dominican blessing a native
Fig. 9: Ruins of the Augustinian convent at Ocuila (Estado de México)
Fig. 10: The mural of red Tláloc from the Tepantitla palace complex at
Teotihuacan (Estado de México)
Fig. 11: An embedded stone with the face of Tláloc found at the rear of the
Franciscan church Santiago Tlatelolco
Fig. 12: The Franciscan convent San Miguel Arcángel Maní, site of the
1562 auto de fé
Fig 13: Tributary Province of Coaxtlahuacan from the Matricula de
Tributos
Fig. 14: The Augustinian convent San Guillermo Totolapan
Fig. 15: The 1581 map of Huaxtepec from the relación geográfica of that
year
Fig. 16: The Dominican church at Oaxtepec
Fig. 17: The barrio chapel of the Barrio de los Reyes, Atlatlahucan
(Morelos)
Fig. 18: Santo Domingo de Guzmán, Antequera (Oaxaca) City)
Fig. 19: The open chapel and church of San Pedro y San Pablo
Teposcolula
Fig. 20: A reconstruction of Yucundáa shortly before the relocation of the
Dominican mission to the valley floor
Fig. 21: The Open Chapel at Yucundáa (Teposcolula)
xii List of Figures
Fig. 22: The open chapel at San Juan Bautista Yodzocoo (Coixtlahuaca)
Fig 23: The Dominican church and convent built on the pre-Hispanic
temple platform in Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan)
Fig. 24: The restored Aniñe or Casa de la Cacica at Yucundáa
(Teposcolula)
Fig 25: The Aniñe at Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan) from the Codex Yanhuitlan
Fig 26: Chapel and Hospital de Indios at Yucundáa (Teposcolula)
Fig. 27: The Dominican mission Santo Domingo Yanhuitlan
Fig. 28: Lamina 14 of the Lienzo de Tlaxcala showing the execution of
native leaders for idolatry
Fig. 29: Santo Domingo de Guzmán Hueyapan (Morelos)
Fig. 30: Tláloc from the Codex Borgia
Fig. 31: A mural identified in 1942 by Antonio Caso as being Talocan,
“the paradise of Tláloc”
Fig. 32: Xipe Tótec from the Codex Borgia
Fig. 33: The rain deity Dzahui
Fig. 34: The sacred valley of Yutatnuhu (Apoala)
Fig. 35: Embedded stones on a wall of the pre-Hispanic Templo Mayor at
Tlatelolco (Distrito Federal)
Fig. 36: Embedded stones on the exterior wall of the Augustinian convent
church at Acolman
Fig. 37: Illustration from Diego Duran, O.P., showing the Templo Mayor
in the sacred precinct at Tenochtitlan

Fig. 38: An embedded stone with the image of Tláloc on the exterior wall
of the Franciscan church San Martin de Tours Huaquechula (Puebla)
Fig. 39: The convent at Tzintzuntzan, showing embedded stones
Fig. 40: The open chapel at San Juan Bautista Yodzocoo (Coixtlahuaca,
Oaxaca)
Fig. 41: Embedded stones found in the walls of the open chapel at
Yodzocoo (Coixtlahuaca, Oaxaca)
Fig. 42: San Luis Obispo Tlalmanalco (Edo de Mexico)
Fig. 43: Three embedded stones in the bell tower of the church at
Tlalmanalco
Fig. 44: An embedded stone (a chalchihuitl or symbol of water) on the
lateral wall of the church at Tlalmanalco
Fig. 45: Embedded stone on the exterior façade of the cloister at
Amecameca
Fig. 46: Detail of column in the cloister at Amecameca depicting a flower
associated with the cult of Tláloc
Visualizing the Miraculous, Visualizing the Sacred xiii
Fig. 47: Embedded stone that is a representation of Xipe Tótec on the

exterior wall of the visita chapel San Agustin Zapotlan (Estado de
Mexico)
Fig. 48: The exterior wall of the visita chapel San Agustin Zapotlan
showing the location of three embedded stones on two buttresses
Fig. 49: A section of the vault mural in the lower cloister at Malinalco
Fig. 50: Page from the Codex Borbonicus
Fig. 51: Detail of the speech and song glyphs
Fig. 52: Detail of the Malinalco vault mural showing a speech and song
glyph
Fig. 53: Detail of the Jaguar Warrior mural at Ixmiquilpan, showing
speech glyphs
Fig. 54: A speech glyph from a section of the vault mural program, lower
cloister, Malinalco
Fig. 55: Speech glyph in the lateral wall mural program, lower cloister,
Malinalco
Fig. 56: A speech glyph from above the main entrance of the church
Fig. 57: Mural in the Tecpan at Metztitlán (Hidalgo)
Fig 58: The Tecpan in Tlayacapan (Morelos)
Fig. 59: Embedded stones along the upper façade of the tecpan at
Tlayacapan (Morelos)
Fig. 60: Embedded stone, a chalchihuitl, along the upper façade of the
tecpan at Tlayacapan (Morelos)

Fig. 61: Petroglyphs located near Huichapan, Valle de Mezquital
(Hidalgo)
Fig. 62: Jesuit ruins at Pueblo Viejo (El Nio, Sinaloa)
Fig. 63: Ruins of Cucurpe Mission
Fig. 64: Design element on the lateral wall of Nuestra Señora de los
Dolores Xaltocan, Xochimilco (Distrito Federal, Mexico)
Fig. 65: The Opodepe church façade design element
Fig. 66: Petroglyph showing Kokopelli, the hunchback flute player
Fig. 67: Panels depicting a pair of lizards and a human and a Kokopelli
Fig. 68: Panels depicting the sun and a second Kokopelli playing its flute
Fig. 69: The Dance of Death from St. Mary’s church, Beram, Croatia
Fig. 70: Mural depicting the Triumph of Death and the Dance of Death on
an exterior wall of the Oratorio di Disciplini in Clusone, Italy
Fig. 71: Detail of the Triumph of Death depicting Death’s skeletal
minions shooting victims with arrows and a primitive firearm
Fig. 72: Depiction of the Dance of Death from the Franciscan convent San
Francisco de Morelia (Morelia, Valencia, Spain)
Fig. 73: Different members of society dance around death
xiv List of Figures
Fig. 74: Death shoots an arrow at a Tree of Life

Fig.75: Death depicted as the grim reaper and an Augustinian missionary
at Malinalco (Estado de México)
Fig. 76: Mural at Los Reyes Magos Huatlatlauca (Puebla) depicting the
triumph of death
Fig. 77: Mural depicting death in the portería of the Franciscan convent
San Gabriel Cholula (Puebla
Fig. 78: Death riding in a chariot runs over his victims. Mural from the
Casa del Dean (Puebla City)
Fig. 79: Detail of the mural showing death holding a scythe
Fig. 80: Mictlantecuhtli the God of death and the underworld. Statue in the
Museo del Templo Mayor
Fig. 81: Detail of depiction of a tzompantli from the Templo Mayor of
Tenochtitlán
Fig. 82: Skull embedded in the nave wall of convent church San
Bernardino de Siena Xochimilco
Fig. 83: Section of a panel from Coixtlahuaca depicting death holding a
scythe
Fig. 84: A painting from the Hospital de la Santa Caridad (Sevilla, Spain)
depicting death with a scythe
Fig. 86: Side altar at San Luis Obispo Huamantla
Fig. 87: Figure of the King of Death from Santo Domingo Yanhuitlan
Fig. 88: Primitive church at San Miguel Achiutla (Nundecu)
Fig. 89: The second church built at San Miguel Achiutla (Nundecu)
Fig. 90: Penitential procession from a mural at the Franciscan convent San
Martín de Tours Huaquechula (Puebla)
Fig. 91: Mural depicting a penitential santo entierro procession during
Holy Week and beneath it the santo entierro casket with the body of
Jesus, from the church at San Miguel Arcángel Huexozingo (Puebla)
Fig. 92: North wall mural that adjoins the Porciuncula door
Fig. 93: Detail of an eighteenth century painting on cloth showing a
penitential santo entierro procession (Church of the ex-convent of
Singuilucan, Hidalgo)
Fig. 94: The church and portería of the Dominican doctrina San Juan
Bautista Teitipac (Oaxaca)
Fig. 95: Mural program in the portería at Teitipac
Fig. 96: A group of Dominican Missionaries lower Christ’s body from the
cross. Mural from San Juan Bautista Teitipac
Fig. 97: The santo entierro carried by a group of missionaries followed in
the procession by hooded penitents who carry arma Christi
Visualizing the Miraculous, Visualizing the Sacred xv
Fig. 98: Detail of mural showing the santo entierro

Fig. 99: Detail of mural showing hooded penitents carrying the arma
Christi
Fig. 100: Bare-footed penitents participating in a “Silent Procession” in
Queretaro on Good Friday (2014) carry a santo entierro casket
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
It is difficult to document the elusive, such as what people believed,

felt, and thought in the past. This is particularly difficult when considering
religious beliefs, and how the native populations of central Mexico
responded to the evangelization campaign launched by Franciscan,
Dominican, and Augustinian missionaries in the 1520s and 1530s. The
French historian Robert Ricard postulated that the religious conversion of
the native populations was rapid and facile, and the missionaries
themselves initially believed that the administration of the sacrament of
baptism indeed marked the acceptance of the new faith. However, it was a
more difficult proposition to eradicate a world view and religious beliefs
that had sustained native civilization for centuries. Growing evidence of
what the missionaries defined as idolatry, making sacrifices to idols, and
apostasy, straying from the teachings of the Catholic Church, showed that
the missionaries were wrong in their belief that the natives had embraced
the new faith.
Historians generally rely on written documents to illustrate the past,
but there is also physical and visual evidence that provides clues as to
what has transpired in the past. The type of physical or visual evidence
discussed in this study often escapes the attention of conventional
historians who are not conversant with other academic disciplines such as
archaeology, architecture, and art history. This does not mean that the
types of information that scholars from these disciplines analyze have any
less utility for historians trained in the conventional use of documents as
their primary source. My own intellectual evolution has seen a shift from
an earlier and continuing interest in subjects that rely on quantitative
sources such as historical demography, to the construction of an
interpretation of the past that relies, in part, on visual evidence such as
murals, which normally would be a topic for art historians. This line of
research has combined my interest in history and photography, and my
wanderlust that has led me to visit hundreds of small towns across Mexico
in recent years. My monograph titled Conflict and Conversion in Sixteenth
Century Mexico: The Augustinian War on and Beyond the Chichimeca
Frontier is based, in part, on a discussion of what murals executed in the
sixteenth century can tell us about the ideology of the evangelization
campaign the missionaries launched along the Chichimeca frontier after
1550.
xviii Acknowledgements
In my approach to this research topic I benefited from intellectual

exchanges with Eleanor Wake, who shared her ideas and perspectives in a
series of communications that spanned several years, and during trips to
places such as Malinalco, Michoacán, and Morelos. My interactions with
Wake, who was a top flight art historian and innovative and stimulating
scholar, refined my thinking on how to interpret art for purposes of the
analysis of social history. She also introduced me to new forms of visual
evidence that can be used to document the difficult question of how the
natives living in central Mexico responded to the sixteenth century
evangelization campaign, and what their religious beliefs really were.
Wake introduced me to her creative research on embedded stones and how
the natives visualized a sacred landscape linked to sources of water in
sacred mountains, and the placement of temples to register the changes in
the seasons critical for the agricultural cycle that sustained Mesoamerican
civilization for centuries. I benefitted from her insights, but I alone am
responsible for the musings and interpretations presented in this volume.
In November of 2012, I organized a two-day conference in Mexico
City that brought together a talented group of scholars who presented
original research on the topic of evangelization in different parts of
colonial Mexico. I benefitted from interactions with the participants in the
conference, and particularly Francisco Manzano Delgado who also has
accompanied me on trips to historic sites in central Mexico, Arturo
Vergara Hernández, who has been a friend and fellow intellectual traveler
for a number of years, Maria de Fatima Wade and Susan Deeds who have
been friends for years, and Gerardo Lara Cisneros. Cambridge Scholars
Publishing recently released a volume of selected essays from the
conference titled Evangelization and Cultural Conflict in Colonial Mexico.
My greatest debt of gratitude is to my wife, Laura Díaz de Sollano
Montes de Oca. She has accompanied me on many of my outings across
central Mexico to visit sixteenth century convents, and in many ways has
put up with my wanderlust and my penchant for writing. This book would
not have been possible were it not for her constant support.
INTRODUCTION
The Dominican missionary Diego Durán, O.P., wrote about problems

in the evangelization of the native population in central Mexico in the late
sixteenth century. He noted that:
If you don’t believe the pot was broken, taste there the potsherds. And if
you forgive me for what we see every day and at times have found and
discovered, not only in the villages very remote from Mexico and which
would have some excuse, [because of a] lack of doctrine, that generally
does not reach them, but very close to Mexico [City] and in the same
Mexico there are many evils and superstitions as idolatrous Indians, as in
their old law, of physicians and conjurers, and imposters and old preachers
of their damn law, which does not lead to forgetting [the old beliefs],
teaching it to the young men and children, putting and pretending
superstition in things which in themselves are not bad; up to piercing the
ears and putting earrings on girls by women who have entered
superstition…I say it's fine idolatry in them, because other than being an
ancient rite, all idolatries are founded in eating and drinking, worse than it
1
epicureans and they put all their happiness in it.
Durán was one of a number of missionaries and Catholic Church officials

who towards the end of the sixteenth century recognized the persistence of
traditional conceptualizations of the sacred by natives who ostensibly had
converted to Catholicism. As Durán noted, the pre-Hispanic vision of the
sacred and its rituals pervaded all aspects of life, including eating and
drinking. The mere act of baptism that symbolized for the missionaries
incorporation into the Christian world did not erase loyalty to deities that
the natives had worshipped for centuries, and that had provided the basis
for their civilization.
There are several seminal studies that have framed the analysis of how
the native populations of central Mexico visualized the sacred, and the
effort by the missionaries to impose the new faith and their vision of the
miraculous. The French historian Robert Ricard was one of the first
1
Diego Durán, O.P., Historia de las Indias de Nueva España e islas de Tierra
Firme, 2 volumes (México, D.F.: Editorial Porrúa, 2006), I: 78.
2 Introduction
scholars to systematically describe the process of evangelization.2 Ricard

offered a strictly Eurocentric perspective that focused on the missionaries,
and presented the native populations almost as if they were backdrops to
the story of the triumph of the missionaries in the campaign to impose
their beliefs. Ricard posited a relatively easy and rapid conversion of the
native populations because of the effectiveness of the missionary
techniques. However, Ricard largely ignored native responses to the
missionary campaign.
Scholars have challenged the Ricardian view of evangelization, but one
of the more interesting and important was the study by the anthropologist
Louise Burkhart that analyzed how the Náhuas populations of central
Mexico responded to and more importantly interpreted the content of the
religion the missionaries sought to impose.3 The Náhuas had different
religious concepts and cultural norms to interpret religion. One example
Burkhart documents is the attempt to associate Jesus with the sun which
had important religious connotations for the Náhuas. The missionaries
assumed that the natives would understand this culturally embedded
religious symbolism in the same way that Europeans did. However, the
Náhuas interpreted this concept through the lens of their own culturally
embedded religious concepts, and understood Jesus to be a solar deity.4
Further evidence of this type of filtering of Catholic religious concepts
comes from a document that Burkhart translated and published, which was
the text of a sixteenth century religious play for performance on Holy

Wednesday during Easter week. A native scribe translated the play into
Náhuatl, and modified the play so that it could be understood by the target
Náhuas audience. As Burkhart notes, the text of the play can be viewed as
being either a colonial Spanish discourse or a Náhuas discourse, and the
editing by the Náhuas scribe indicates how the natives interpreted the
religious concepts the original text emphasized and attempted to teach.5
A second study offered a fresh and dynamic analysis of the incorporation
of native religious iconography into sixteenth century churches and
convents. Eleanor Wake identified indigenous iconography incorporated
2
Robert Ricard, The spiritual conquest of Mexico: An essay on the apostolate and
the evangelizing methods of the mendicant orders in New Spain, 1523-1572
(Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1974).
3
Louise M. Burkhart, The slippery earth: Náhua-Christian moral dialogue in
sixteenth-century Mexico (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1989).
4
Louise M. Burkhart, "The Solar Christ in Náhuatl Doctrinal Texts of Early
Colonial Mexico" Ethnohistory (1988): 234-256.
5
Louise M. Burkhart, Holy Wednesday: A Náhua Drama from Early Colonial
Mexico (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1996), 4-5.
Visualizing the Miraculous, Visualizing the Sacred 3
into what ostensibly were Christian visual themes, such as murals, atrial
crosses, and design elements.6 Additionally, Wake described a sacred
landscape defined by sight lines connected to sacred mountains that were
the source of life-giving water. The missionaries often directed the
construction of their sacred complexes on pre-Hispanic temples, and in
doing so preserved the orientation and sight lines to sacred mountains. The
natives also built temples to serve as solar calendars to mark changes in
the seasons. On key days the sun illuminated sections of temples, such as
the steps. Wake also documented the incorporation of pre-Hispanic stones
with ritually important images into churches and convents. She cogently
argued that the incorporation of embedded stones was not the mere
recycling of building material, but rather an example of agency on the part
of the natives who used the stones to continue practicing their traditional
beliefs, if covertly. Catholic Church leaders in Mexico recognized the
religious significance of the embedded stones, and the third Church
Council held in 1585 ordered their removal.
In the decades following the launch of the evangelization campaign the
newly introduced inquisition investigated cases of what the missionaries
defined as “idolatry” and “apostasy.” The most notorious inquisition case
was the 1539 trial and execution of don Carlos Ometochtzin, the tlatoani
or native ruler of Tezcoco, the site of one of the first four Franciscan
missions. The first bishop of Mexico, the Franciscan Juan de Zumárraga,
orchestrated the high profile trial, and had don Carlos Ometochtzin burned
at the state at Tlatelolco on December 1, 1539. Following the trial and
other inquisition proceedings, the Crown ordered the Church to suspend
investigations of native political leaders, who were important in the
construction of a colonial political system based on autonomous indirect
rule in the native communities. The trial of don Carlos Ometochtzin was a
key moment in the early evangelization campaign, because before his
execution he had been an important ally of the Franciscans and his baptism
was politically important. Moreover, the trial pointed to the failure of the
Franciscan approach to evangelization that consisted of baptisms of large
numbers of natives with minimal religious instruction. Their belief that
baptism marked the true conversion of the natives proved to be wrong, and
gave rise to a controversy with the other missionary orders, the
Dominicans and Augustinians, over the form of baptism.
A recent study of the trial of don Carlos Ometochtzin written by
Patricia Lopes Don offered interesting and important insights to the
6
Eleanor Wake, Framing the Sacred: The Indian Churches of Early Colonial
Mexico (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2010),
4 Introduction
context of the trial, including the Franciscan efforts to suppress traditional

religious practices in Tezcoco, such as conducting night raids on the
principal temples to frighten the natives away. Lopes Don also analyzes
the politics surrounding the problems between the Franciscans and don
Carlos Ometochtzin.7 The trial forced the missionary orders and
particularly the Franciscans to rethink their evangelization strategy, but
was not the first instance of the use of capital punishment to extirpate what
the missionaries defined as “idolatry” and “apostasy” in their effort to
impose a new religious orthodoxy.
Lopes Don’s study highlights how evangelization proved to be a
difficult endeavor, as have other studies such as the research on Oaxaca by
David Tavarez. Tavarez has shown, for example, that native religious
leaders created clandestine ritual texts written in indigenous languages. In
1635, Gonzalo de Balsalobre, the parish priest of San Miguel Sola located
in the southwestern part of the Oaxaca Central Valley, had a confrontation
with Diego Luis, a traditional religious leader who had a written text that
had been sent to him by another man. Diego Luis conducted rituals
associated with the corn harvest, birth, and burials. The parish priest
confiscated the text and had it burned in front of San Miguel church in
Sola, and had proceedings initiated by the inquisition. Balsalobre had
another confrontation with Diego Luis two decades later, in 1653.8 Literate
natives created ritual texts for their own use, shared them with ritual
practitioners from other communities, and translated them from one

indigenous language to another.
Written documents do not offer the only evidence for the continued
practice of pre-Hispanic religion. There is also visual evidence. As Wake
has shown, there not only was indigenous influence in what ostensibly was
Christian iconography, but also overt incorporation of religiously
significant symbolism that changed the meaning of the images from what
the missionaries had intended. There is also evidence in the embedded
stones that native artisans incorporated into the new sacred complexes that
the missionaries ordered built. This was not the recycling of building
materials or the random placement of stones from pre-Hispanic temples
that had ritually important images sculpted on them. Rather, as Wake first
suggested, the embedded stones served as sight lines that defined the
7
Patricia Lopes Don, Bonfires of Culture: Franciscans, Indigenous Leaders, and
Inquisition in Early Mexico, 1524-1540 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press,
2010).
8
David Eduardo Taravez, “La idolatría letrada: Un análisis comparativo de textos
clandestinos rituales y devociones en comunidades Nahuas y Zapotecas, 1613-
1654,” Historia Mexicana 49:2 (1999), 197-252.
sacred landscape. Moreover, the embedded stones allowed the natives to

continue practicing their old beliefs, and particularly the religion
associated water, earth, and the fertility of the soil. While the missionaries
were able to suppress the official state religion and the practice of human
sacrifice, it was more difficult to extirpate from the minds of the
commoners, particularly those who lived by agriculture, loyalty to the
gods that had brought the rains and guaranteed the fertility of the soil that
had provided the foundations of Mesoamerican civilization. The
missionaries and Church officials continued to uncover evidence of the
continued practice of traditional rites to ensure the rains and fertility of the
soil during much of the period of Spanish colonial domination.
These pages offer musings on the covert persistence of traditional
religious practices through a discussion of examples of the inclusion of
religious symbolism in Christian iconography, and embedded stones used
for ritual purposes and to mark site lines to sacred mountains. The first
chapter discusses a Catholic representation of the miraculous based on an
incident that allegedly occurred at a Dominican mission near Tezcoco
shortly following the trial and execution of don Carlos Ometochtzin. The
mural of the miracle of the Virgin of the Rosary is found in the upper
cloister of the Dominican mission at Tetela de Volcán in what today is
Morelos. A baptized native noble from Tepetlaóxtoc sought salvation
through confession before dying, and gained salvation. Unlike don Carlos
Ometochtzin, who turned his back on the Franciscans, the noble (tlatoani)
from Tepetlaóxtoc complied with the sacraments, and was an example of
the apparent success of the Dominican approach to evangelization. The
incident at Tepetlaóxtoc was also set against the backdrop of the baptismal
controversy, the criticism by the Dominicans and Augustinians of the early
Franciscan evangelization strategy characterized by mass baptisms of
natives with little or no religious instruction. The growing evidence of the
persistence of traditional religious practices was proof positive of the
failure of the Franciscan approach, while the Dominicans touted the divine
intervention of the Virgin of the Rosary as evidence of the efficacy of their
approach to evangelization. However, the Dominican triumphalism had to
be tempered by the reality of the persistence of idolatry in their own
missions, as shown by inquisition investigations at Coatlan and Yodzocahi
(Yanhuitlan), both in Oaxaca. These cases and others showed the
superficiality of the missionary evangelization campaigns, and the reality
that the natives did not visualize the sacred in the same way that the
missionaries did. The missionaries expected exclusivity, whereas the
natives did not abandon their beliefs. Rather they made room in their
belief system for the new faith, but on their own terms.
6 Introduction
The first group of missionaries from the Order of Preachers (Ordo

Praedicatorum or Dominicans) arrived in Mexico in 1526, two years
following the Franciscans. Although not all evidence of the persistence of
pre-Hispanic religious practices presented in this study involved the
Dominicans, their missions figure proximately in this study. The incident
that is commemorated in the mural of the miracle of the Virgin of the
Rosary occurred at a Dominican mission, and the mural itself is from a
second. The idolatry investigations in Oaxaca occurred at Dominican
missions. The Dominicans were perhaps the most vociferous critics of the
Franciscans and their practice of mass baptisms, and the incident at
Tepetlaóxtoc shortly following the execution of don Carlos Ometochtzin
touted their success, at least in their own minds. However, quite ironically,
the details of the inquisition investigations at Coatlan and Yodzocahi
(Yanhuitlan) revealed a pattern of systematic resistance to the imposition
of Catholicism as serious as, if not more so, than the trial of don Carlos
Ometochtzin.
The missionary enterprise was not strictly religious, but rather was part
of a larger colonial political system with its administrative structures and
agendas. The Spanish adapted the existing indigenous political-
administrative system in central Mexico as the basis to construct a system
of indirect rule that gave the native leaders a degree of internal autonomy,
as long as they complied with the mandates of the colonial regime. It
simplified and minimized the colonial bureaucratic structure. The

missionaries also used the existing indigenous administrative structure to
create their own jurisdictions. They generally established their doctrinas
(mission centers) in the head towns of the pre-Hispanic altépetl, and
categorized the subordinate communities as visitas that did not have
resident missionaries and that were visited periodically from the doctrina.
Chapter 2 examines this administrative organization in two regions in what
today are Morelos and Oaxaca, using examples of Dominican missions.
The Dominicans shared the missionary field in Morelos with the
Augustinians, but exclusively administered missions in Oaxaca. It first
examines the pre-conquest tributary province of Huaxtepec in Morelos,
and then the Dominican missions in Oaxaca. It relates the Culhua-Mexica
tributary system to the system the Spanish created following the conquest.
It also outlines the elements of the urban plan the missionaries introduced
with examples drawn from the Oaxaca missions in the region known today
as the Sierra Mixteca.
The sedentary civilizations of Mesoamerica had a foundation in
agriculture, and depended on the rains and the fertility of the soil. The rank
and file members of society were farmers, and their allegiance was to the
deities that ensured abundant crops. The new gods the missionaries
brought could not replace the deities that had provided for centuries.
Rather, the old deities were angered by the arrival of the new gods, as
evidenced by drought and famine and the epidemics that decimated the
native populations. The Spanish suppressed the state religion that focused
on deities such as Huitzilopochtli, but found it much more difficult to root
out the water-earth-fertility religion. Many instances of idolatry involved
sacrifices made to Tláloc and Xipe Tótec (Náhuas) and Dzahui (Ñudzahui).
One hypothesis suggested in these musings is that many embedded stones,
such as the one with the face of Tláloc found at the rear of Santiago
Tlatelolco church (Distrito Federal, were placed to maintain a duality of
sacred space shared by two deities. The templo mayor in the sacred
precinct of Tenochtitlan was an example of two deities that shared space,
in this case Tláloc and Huitzilopochtli. The placement of the embedded
stone in a visible location converted what ostensibly was a Catholic
structure into a temple shared by Jesus and Tláloc.
The rain and fertility deities were central to the pre-Hispanic religious
tradition, and several of the important early idolatry cases reported the
persistence of sacrifices to these gods. The Ocuila case appears to have
involved sacrifices to ensure the rains and the fertility of the soil, and the
Coatlan and Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan) investigations turned up evidence of
sacrifices made to Dzahui. Chapter 3 briefly examines the Coatlan and
Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan) cases that other scholars have examined in more

detail, and then summarizes the rituals associated with Tláloc, Xipe Tótec,
and Dzahui prior to the conquest and examples of the sacrifices made to
these deities following the beginning of the “spiritual conquest.”
At the core of this study is an analysis of iconographic evidence of the
persistence of pre-Hispanic religious beliefs, and particularly of the water-
earth-fertility religion. It also documents the incorporation of sight line
markers to sacred mountains in churches and convents. One example of
the evidence discussed in chapter 4 is the embedded stones found in the
churches and convents, and particularly stones placed in plain view with
representations of Tláloc and Xipe Tótec or symbols associated with the
two deities. I contend that the natives placed the embedded stones in order
to be able to worship the deities. This was the belief of the Third Church
Council held in 1585 that ordered the removal of the embedded stones.
The natives also incorporated embedded stones and religious iconography
in non-religious structures, such as the tecpan or municipal palace of the
native government, which was not under the control of the missionaries.
The enigmatic mural program in the lower cloister of the Augustinian
convent at Malinalco provides additional evidence. The native artists who
8 Introduction
painted the murals incorporated speech and song glyphs that converted a
representation of local plants into a flowery song with religious
significance. This chapter concludes with a discussion of a unique design
element on the façade of the Jesuit church at Opodepe, Sonora, built in the
early eighteenth century. The design element contains several representations
of the fertility deity Kokopelli. Its inclusion in the chapter suggests that
there is evidence of the persistence of traditional religious practices not
only in the core areas of Mexico, but also on the frontiers.
In a previous study I briefly examined the iconography of death as
related to representations of the last judgment in sixteenth century mission
centers.9 Chapter 5 discusses representations of death, and the later change
in the attitude of the missionaries regarding its use. In the sixteenth
century the missionaries placed less emphasis on death, and more on the
final judgment that was a concept useful for suppressing social-religious
practices such as pulque consumption that the missionaries found
objectionable. There was also a problem with parallel iconographic
representations of death as a skeleton in both European and Mesoamerican
cultures, and the missionaries suspected that the natives would associate
skeletal representations of death with their own deities. However, by the
seventeenth and eighteenth century new representations of death appeared
in Catholic iconography in Mexico, mostly in paintings related to the final
judgment. The discussion of death and related burial practices also touches
upon an incident of grave-robbing by a Dominican missionary.

The Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan) inquisition investigation alleged that the
native lord don Francisco had spilled his blood on the site of a demolished
temple, and that he had encouraged others to do so as well. The
missionaries introduced the concept of penitence as being an essential
element of salvation. Moreover, they promoted the organization of
confraternities, lay organizations that organized popular displays of
religiosity such as processions and particularly penitential processions
during Easter week. Confraternities also organized processions in response
to societal crises such as epidemics and drought, and natural disasters.
Penitents engaged in self-flagellation to extirpate their bodies of sin, and to
placate God’s anger, for surely God sent epidemics and other natural
disasters to punish humanity for sin. Penitents mortified the flesh to
placate God’s anger.
Chapter 6 briefly examines the evolution of penitential processions in
Europe in the early modern period, and the introduction of confraternities
9
Robert H. Jackson, Conflict and Conversion in Sixteenth Century Mexico: The
Augustinian War on and Beyond the Chichimeca Frontier (Leiden: Brill Academic
Publishers, 2013), 123-133.
and processions in sixteenth century Mexico. Murals and a painting survive

at several missions that depict penitential processions, as well as santo
entierro processions staged on Good Friday to recreate the lowering of
Jesus’ body from the cross and it’s being carried to the tomb. Some
penitents engaged in mortification of the flesh during santo entierro
processions to atone for the crucifixion. The Yodzocahi inquisition
investigation documented accusations that don Francisco had made
sacrifices to the Dzahui. Why did don Francisco spill his blood on the site
of the temple the Dominicans had demolished to make way for the
construction of a new sacred complex? Don Francisco may have believed
that Dzahui and the other gods were angry because the missionaries had
arrived to displace them, and the gods caused drought and sent epidemics
as punishment.
The natives embraced confraternities and ritual self-sacrifice. Did
penitential processions offer the natives cover for making self-sacrifices to
the old gods? Processions staged at Yodzocahi most likely would have
passed over the site of the demolished temple, located as it was within the
atrium of the Dominican convent complex. Processions generally
originated in the church, and then moved around the atrium. This would
have given the participants, particularly those engaging in self-flagellation,
an opportunity to spill their blood on the site of the temple. I suggest that
the natives used the confraternities as a way to continue ritual self-
sacrifices per their traditional beliefs. In a recent article I argued that the
description of a burial at one of the Chiquitos missions in eastern Bolivia
staged by an organization similar to a confraternity provided evidence of
the persistence of traditional religious rites, in this case of a burial.10
As is often the case, the process of elaborating a monograph evolves in
stages, and includes the publication of articles. Such is the case with this
study. I first discussed the story of the mural of the miracle of the Virgin
of the Rosary in an illustrated article that appeared in print in 2013.11 In
2012, I organized a conference in Mexico City dedicated to the theme of
evangelization and culture conflict in colonial Mexico. Cambridge
Scholars Publishers contacted me about publication of the papers
presented at the conference, and in June of 2014 a collection of articles
10
Robert H. Jackson, “Social and Cultural Change on the Jesuit Missions of
Paraguay and the Chiquitos Mission Frontier,” The Middle Ground 5 (Fall 2012),
1-39.
11
Robert H. Jackson, “The Virgin of the Rosary at Tetela del Volcán (Morelos),
Conversion, the Baptismal Controversy, a Dominican Critique of the Franciscans,
and the Culture Wars in Sixteenth Century Central Mexico,” Bulletin: Journal of
the California Missions Studies Association 29:1 (2013) 12-28.
10 Introduction
that I edited appeared in print.12 For this volume I recast the article on the
mural of the miracle of the Virgin of the Rosary, and included a discussion
of embedded stones as evidence of the persistence of pre-Hispanic religious
practices and as markers to locate sacred mountains.13 The introduction to
the same volume cites examples that now appear in Chapter 4 of this
study.14 In 2013, I published a study of Augustinian missions on the
Chichimeca frontier in the mid-sixteenth century.15 This study examined
issues that appear prominently in the present offering, such as the
baptismal controversy, representations of the final judgment, penitential
processions, and the iconography of death. These topics are pertinent to
this study, and I expand upon them and include new information and
analysis.
Finally I would like to make a disclaimer. The musings presented here
by no means pretend to be the final word on the subject of evangelization
and cultural conflict. Rather, I would hope that what I have written in
these pages would inspire other scholars to dig further, and to twist their
necks to look for elusive embedded stones on the walls of early colonial
structures or pre-Hispanic iconography in what ostensibly were Christian
murals. It is for a younger generation of scholars to continue this
intellectual odyssey.
12
Robert H. Jackson, editor, Evangelization and Cultural Conflict in Colonial
Mexico (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2014).
13
Robert H. Jackson, “The Virgin of the Rosary at Tetela del Volcán (Morelos),
Conversion, the Baptismal Controversy, a Dominican Critique of the Franciscans,
and the Culture Wars in Sixteenth Century Central Mexico,” in Robert H. Jackson,
editor, Evangelization and Culture Conflict in Colonial Mexico (Newcastle upon
Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2014), 1-29.
14
Ibid., xvii-xxvi.
15
Jackson, Conflict and Conversion.
CHAPTER ONE
VISUALIZING THE MIRACULOUS:

THE VIRGIN OF THE ROSARY MURAL
AT TETELA DEL VOLCÁN (MORELOS)
On the second floor of the cloister of the ex-Dominican convent San

Juan Bautista Tetela del Volcán (see Figure 1) is an enigmatic mural that
partially relates an incident that reportedly occurred in 1541. The incident
the mural memorializes symbolized how sixteenth century missionaries in
central Mexico conceptualized the process of evangelization. The missionaries
believed that the baptism of natives marked a transition in their spiritual
lives. The missionaries also believed that they were involved in an
ongoing war with Satan to win the hearts, minds, and souls of the natives.
Visual representations of the evangelization process depicted demons
attempting to reclaim the natives at the same time that the missionaries
indoctrinated them in the mysteries of the new faith. Once the missionaries
baptized the natives, however, the demons were no longer present, and
their absence marked victory in the war against Satan. The missionaries
also believed that Satan inspired pre-Hispanic religion, and that Satan
governed those parts of Mexico where the missionaries had yet to plant the
Christian cross. An example of a visual representation of this belief is an
illustration from the Augustinian Crónica de Michoacán that depicts
Augustinian missionaries catechizing natives. Demons surround the
natives receiving religious instruction, and demons also appear behind a
group of assembled natives with their lord, thus establishing the
connection between the native world before the conquest and Satanic
influence. In the final section of the illustration the missionary baptizes a
group of natives, and through this symbolic act vanquishes the demons
(see Fig. 2).
12 Chapter One
Fig. 1: The church and convent San Juan Bautista Tetela del Volcán (Morelos).
Baptism marked salvation through incorporation into the Christian

community. Sinners and those who died not having been baptized did not
receive God’s grace, and instead were consigned to hell, as shown in a
sixteenth century picture catechism (see Figure 3). The mural at Tetela del
Volcán conveyed the same doctrinal lesson. The mural memorialized an
incident that reportedly occurred in 1541 at another Dominican mission,
Santa María Magdalena Tepetlaóxtoc located near Tezcoco. The
Dominicans established a doctrina at Tepetlaóxtoc around 1527 or 1528,
and it was one of their first missions.1 The Dominican chronicler Fr.
Alonso Franco, O.P. narrated the incident that involved Fr. Domingo de la
Anunciación, O.P. According to the account, a native resident of
Tepetlaóxtoc died while Anunciación was away from the doctrina visiting
other communities. The native was unable to confess. Anunciación returned,
1
José Tinajero Morales, “La vicaria dominica de Tepetlaóxtoc, eremitismo y
evangelización ¿Contradicción o complemento?” Estudios de Historia
Novohispana 41 (julio-diciembre, 2009), 17-44.
Visualizing the Miraculous 13
Fig. 2: Illustration from the 1778 Crónica de Michoacán depicting the process of
catechism and baptism. Demons lurk behind the natives attempting to thwart the
missionaries, but baptism marks the triumph of the new faith over Satan. The title
of the illustration is: Aquí se demuestra el que habiendo venido noticia de la
entrega voluntaria y obediencia que dio el gran Caltzontzin... a Cortés, los reyes de
Tzirosco e Iguatzio pasaron a rendir obediencia y pedir bautismo, y se demuestra
los castigos que hacían a los que faltaban a las buenas costumbres. Archivo
General de la Nación, Mexico, D.F., Historia, 9:17, f. 148.
14 Chapter One
prayed for divine intervention and particularly for the intervention of the
Virgin of the Rosary, and the native reportedly revived long enough to
receive confession before finally dying. The account further noted that the
native told the missionary that: “When my soul left my body demons took
possession of it, and with abominable appearance and terrible bellowing
took it.”2 The reference to the Virgin of the Rosary was associated with
the confraternity of the rosary that the Dominicans first established in
Mexico City in 1538, and soon after at Tepetlaóxtoc. It continued to
function at Tepetlaóxtoc as late as 1853.3
Several scholars have interpreted the mural to be a depiction of the
1541 incident reported at Tepetlaóxtoc. In a study of the convent, Carlos
Martínez Marín identified the miracle of the Virgin of the Rosary as the
theme of the mural, and also noted its differences from the murals in the
lower cloister of the convent.4 Constantino Reyes-Valerio concurred in
Martínez Marín´s assessment of the theme of the mural and its difference
from other murals at the convent, and added the possibility that it was the
work of a native artist.5 Jaime Lara followed Martínez Marín´s analysis,
but also discussed the mural in the context of death. Lara concluded that
“The intercession of the saints and the sacraments of the Church (like the
rosary) are absolutely necessary if one is to avoid the hell mouth at the
lower right corner.”6
The Dominicans established a presence in what today is Morelos fairly
early. They founded their first mission at Oaxtepec shortly after their
arrival in Mexico in 1526. They expanded the number of their doctrinas in
the second half of the sixteenth century. The new missions included
Yautepec founded around 1552 not far from Oaxtepec, and Tepoztlán
established sometime before 1556. The convent at Tetela del Volcán dated
to about 1559, during the archbishopric of the Dominican Alonso de
Montúfar (1553-1559). In 1559, a doctrina dedicated to San Antonio de
Florencia existed at nearby Hueyapan. Juan de la Cruz, O.P., who arrived
2
Fr. Alonso Franco, O.P., Segunda parte de la Historia de la Provincia de
Santiago de Mexico Orden de Predicadores (México, D.F.: Museo Nacional,
1900), 35-36. The original quote reads “En saliendo mi alma del cuerpo se
apoderaron de ella los demonios, y con abominables figuras y terribles bramidos la
llevaron.
3
Tinajero Morales, “La vicaria dominica de Tepetlaóxtoc,” 33.
4
Carlos Martínez Marín, Tetela del Volcán, su historia, su convento (México,
D.F.: UNAM-Instituto de Historia, 1968), 106-107.
5
Constantino Reyes-Valerio, Arte Indocristiano (México, D.F.: INAH, 2000), 279.
6
Jaime Lara, Christian Texts for Aztecs (South Bend: University of Notre Dame
Press, 2008), 148, 316, note 403.
in 1562, initiated the construction of a new convent at Tetela del Volcán.

De la Cruz dedicated the mission to San Juan Bautista. Work on the new
complex concluded before 1578, the year in which De la Cruz was sent to
Chila.7 This would date the mural to about the last third of the sixteenth
century. The upper cloister mural program is distinct from that of the
lower cloister, which depicts saints, martyrs, and scenes from the life of
Christ, and is in color whereas that in the upper cloister is in black and
white.
Fig. 3: Panel from the Doctrina Cristiana regarding death and salvation through
conversion. Doctrina Cristiana, Edgerton Manuscript 2898. Courtesy of the
British Museum.
7
René Acuña, ed., Relaciones geográficas del siglo XVI: México Tomo Segundo
(México, D.F.: UNAM, 1986), 258-261, 271.
16 Chapter One
Fig. 4: Santa María Magdalena Tepetlaóxtoc, built on top of a temple platform.
The section of the upper cloister mural that is conventionally identified

as the miracle of the Virgin of the Rosary is only one part of a larger
mural program that originally covered an entire wall. A small fragment of

another section of the mural also survives at the opposite end of the wall,
and is unrelated to the specific theme of the miracle of the Virgin of the
Rosary. At the center of the mural is the body of the native on a table
wrapped in a shroud. Several women, perhaps his wives of a sinful
polygamous relationship, grieve by his side. His soul leaves his body, and
is lassoed by a demon. A necklace, perhaps of jade, hangs down from the
table, and other articles symbolize the high status of the deceased. One
looks to be a feather ceremonial object with a handle of the type that
would be used by a high status individual. The deceased man may have
been the tlatoani of Tepetlaóxtoc. To the left of the table is a figure that
appears to be Eve who carries an apple and serpent around her genitals,
which is a reference to the doctrine of the original sin. The mural depicts
Eve as a native woman (see Figure 5).8
8
Eleanor Wake, personal communication, March 3, 2012. Samuel Edgerton,
Theaters of Conversion Religious Architecture and Indian Artisans in Colonial
Mexico (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2001), 232. Edgerton
identifies the figure as Eve, but does not explain the horns.
In the lower register the blindfolded native is led away by a demon,

and is depicted in the type of clothes that would be worn by a high status
person. A second demon approaches one of the native women, which
perhaps made reference to the original sin. This reference would also
explain the presence of Eve just above the two women. On the lower right
hand side of the lower register a demon pulls the native towards the maws
of hell. Since he had not confessed before dying, the demon was taking his
soul to hell. The Virgin of the Rosary appears on the left side of the upper
register, and the Eternal Father God holding the orb and floating on a
cloud is on the right. At the center is Jesus on the cross. The native
holding the rosary takes Jesus by the hand, thus embracing the new faith.
The second fragment of the mural program is located on the lower left
hand side of the wall. This section of the mural programs is unrelated to
the 1541 incident at Tepetlaóxtoc. A man with European features and
wearing European-style clothes kneels with his hands bound before an
individual with a hood. The hooded man is standing in judgment of the
kneeling man. A demon takes the kneeling man by the shoulders, and is
ready to lead him away. One angel standing behind the man sitting in
judgment observes, while a second angel turns away from the condemned
man. The complete fragment shows that the incident takes place outside of
a church. This visual narrative shows that any sinner, European or native,
could be condemned for not following Church teachings.
When the two fragments are analyzed together, the overall theme of
the mural program is more than the simple relating of the 1541 incident
reported by Franco. It is possible that the original mural program was an
exemplum that related a story to make a doctrinal point. The mural
program perhaps emphasized that the faithful had to follow the teachings
of the Church and the sacraments in order to gain salvation. The native
noble of Tepetlaóxtoc gained salvation only after confessing. The second
fragment also fits the possible identification of the mural program as
having been an exemplum.
18 Chapter One
Fig. 5: Section of the surviving mural from San Juan Bautista Tetela del Volcán
that depicts the miracle of the Virgin of the Rosary.
Fig. 6: Another section of the Tetela del Volcán mural program that depicts a
demon claiming a condemned man.
Fig. 7: A mural in the lower cloister of Nuestra Señora de la Natividad Tepoztlán

(Morelos) that depicts a group of Dominicans. This may be a representation of the
first group of Dominicans to arrive in Mexico.
20 Chapter One
The exemplum mural program on the second floor of the cloister at

Tetela del Volcán was unique in terms of the iconography commonly
employed in sixteenth century central Mexican Dominican doctrinas. In
addition to the common themes such as the Passion of Christ, mural
programs also depicted Dominican saints and Dominican missionaries in
Mexico. Two examples of the depiction of Dominican missionaries come
from the lower cloister at Nuestra Señora de la Natividad Tepoztlán
(Morelos) and the portería or entrance of the cloister at Santo Domingo de
Guzmán Tlaquiltenango (Morelos). The murals at Tepoztlán depict a
Dominican heraldic device, and on the two side walls groups of
Dominicans who may have been the first missionaries from the order to
arrive in Mexico (see Figure 7). The mural at Tlaquiltenango depicts a
Dominican missionary blessing a native who, from the mode of dress,
appears to be from a noble lineage and perhaps was the tlatoani. This
representation showing a Dominican involved in the salvation of a high
status man from Tlaquiltenango was important, because the Franciscans
established the doctrina and later transferred it to the Dominicans. The
mural asserted in no uncertain terms a new historical reality that identified
the Dominicans as having been responsible for the evangelization of
Tlaquiltenango that their rivals the Franciscans actually initiated. It also
suggested that the Franciscan evangelization had not been as meaningful,
and that it was the Dominicans who brought the natives of Tlaquiltenango
into the Christian fold. The Dominicans also symbolically changed the
patron saint of the doctrina from San Francisco to Santo Domingo.
The baptism controversy and evidence of apostasy

and idolatry
Baptism symbolized incorporation of an individual into the Christian
community. The form of the baptism ceremony became the subject of
controversy between the three missionary orders. The Franciscans
baptized large numbers of natives in large groups using an abbreviated
ceremony, and with minimal or no religious instruction. The Franciscan
chronicler Fray Motolinía reported that the missionaries administered
some five million baptisms between 1524 when the Franciscans arrived
and 1536. In a letter dated June 27, 1529, Fray Pedro de Gante, O.F.M.,
one of the first twelve Franciscans to arrive in Mexico, made reference to
as many as 14,000 natives baptized per day.9 The Franciscans justified the
9
Robert Ricard, La conquista spiritual de México, first Spanish Edition. (México,
D.F.: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1986), 174-175.
mass baptisms on the grounds of the limited number of missionaries in

Mexico, and the large native populations. During this early period the
Franciscans limited the doctrinal elements they taught the natives to the
concept of one all powerful God, the trinity, the immaculate conception of
the Virgin Mary, the immortality of the soul, and the demonic threat.10
Fig. 8: Mural in the portería of Santo Domingo de Guzmán Tlaquiltenango that

depicts a Dominican blessing a native who, judging from his dress, most likely was
from a noble lineage and perhaps was a tlatoani.
10
Ibid., 166. Several sixteenth century visual catechisms with explanative text in
Náhuatl survive. One representative example introduced the concepts of the trinity,
an all powerful God, and the birth of Jesus as a man. See Miguel León-Portilla,
“Catecismo Náhuatl en imágenes,” Arqueología Mexicana, Edición Especial 42,
70-71.
22 Chapter One
The decision that individual natives made to receive or reject baptisms

was also related to politics in the period immediately following the
Spanish conquest. One important factor in conversion to Christianity was
the support or the lack thereof that the native lords gave the missionaries.
The attitude of Ixtlilxochitl, the tlatoani of Tezcoco, was a case in point.
Hernán Cortés took Ixtlilxochitl with him on his campaign to Guatemala
and Honduras (1524-1526), and when Ixtlilxochitl returned to Tezcoco he
found his political authority challenged by native factions favored by the
Spaniards who had remained in Mexico City during Cortés’s absence.
Ixtlilxochitl formed an alliance with the Franciscans to consolidate his
authority in Tezcoco. He granted the Franciscans space in the central
sacred precinct in the city to build their convent, and thousands of his
subjects accepted baptism and Christian marriage as a result of his
encouragement. This was a period during which the Franciscans
administered mass baptisms in Tezcoco. By 1528, however, Ixtlilxochitl
had consolidated his political authority, and assumed a more ambivalent
attitude towards the Franciscans. Over the next few years until
Ixtlilxochitl’s death in 1532, few Tezcocans requested baptism or
Christian marriage. Ixtlilxochitl’s ambivalence can also be seen in his
choice for the succession to his position as tlatoani, his brother don Jorge
Yoyotzin. Yoyotzin had supported the Culhua-Mexica during the Spanish
conquest, and did not embrace the Spaniards following the conquest.11
The Dominicans and Augustinians, on the other hand, did not perform
mass baptisms on the same scale as the Franciscans. Some Augustinians,
for example, argued that the baptismal ceremony should not be as
abbreviated as the ceremony the Franciscans performed, and that adults
should only be baptized on certain feast days such as Easter and Pentecost.
In 1534, the Augustinians in Mexico adopted a policy of baptizing adults
only at Christmas, Easter, Pentecost, and on the feast day of Saint
Augustine. The policy also mandated the use of the full baptismal
ceremony.12 A papal bull of January 1, 1537 stipulated that baptisms were
not to be administered in an abbreviated form, and were to be performed
individually and not in large groups. A Mexican church synod held on
April 27, 1539 established guidelines for urgent baptisms such as in the
case of imminent death, and the form of the baptism ceremony to be used.
11
Lopes Don, Bonfires of Culture, 34-38.
12
Diego Basalenque, O.S.A., Historia de la Provincia de San Nicolás Tolentino de
Michoacán del Orden de N.P.S. San Agustín, 2 volumes (México, D.F.: Tip.
Barbedillo y Cia, 1886), I: 176.
While implementing new rules for baptism, the papacy and synod did not
annul the early mass baptisms performed by the Franciscans.13
The minimal religious instruction prior to baptism meant that post-
baptism catechism was important. The missionaries generally organized
catechism in the convent atrium, the large enclosed space surrounding the
church and convent, and relied on native catechists who received special
training from the missionaries. The Doctrina (doctrinal guide) translated
by Fray Alonso de Molina, O.F.M., established the basic doctrinal
elements the Franciscans taught the natives. The natives were to comply
with the sacraments which included baptism, marriage, confession,
communion, and confirmation. Additionally, they were to learn the Credo,
the Padre Nuestro, the Ave María, Salve Regina, the 14 articles of faith
regarding the divinity and humanity of Jesus, the 10 commandments of
God and the five of the Church, and the venal, mortal, and capital sins.14
The Doctrina of the Dominican Pedro which was translated into Spanish
and Náhuatl in 1548 offered a more complete doctrine for religious
instruction.15 Although prohibited, the missionaries applied corporal
punishment to natives who did not attend catechism.16 Nevertheless, the
missionaries complained that many natives did not attend religious
instruction, and identified the dispersed settlement pattern as one factor for
the lack of attendance.17
What was the pace of baptism in the early years of the “spiritual
conquest?” A series of censuses prepared between 1535 and 1540 provide

clues to the extent of baptism. The censuses are for Tepoztlán, Huitzillan,
Molotlan, Tepetenchic, Panchimalco, and Quauchchichinollan located in
what today is Morelos. The location of the last five communities is not
known, although historian Sarah Cline suggests that they may have been
near Yautepec.18 The censuses reported the baptismal status of both adults
and children.
The number of natives baptized varied between the communities. In
Tepoztlán, for example, the rate of baptism among adults was high.
However, the figure on total baptisms is incomplete because the census did
not record the baptismal status of 521 children. If the 521 children for
13
Ricard, Conquista espiritual, 177-178.
14
Ibid., 189.
15
Ibid., 194.
16
Ibid., 182.
17
Wake, Framing the Sacred, 82.
18
Sarah Cline, “The Spiritual Conquest Reconsidered: Baptism and Christian
Marriage in Early Sixteenth-Century Mexico,” The Hispanic American Historical
Review 73:3 (1993), 453-480.
24 Chapter One
whom information on baptism is not given are not included in the

Tepoztlán census, then Tepoztlán would have had a 65 percent rate of
baptized.19 In the communities for which the data is complete, the
percentage of those baptized ranged from 84 percent at Tepetenchic, 79
percent at Panchimalco, 76 percent at Molotlan, nine percent at Huitzillan,
and a mere four percent at Quauchchichinollan.20
Several factors explain the difference in the percentage of natives
baptized in the six communities. One was personal choice. Some
individuals elected to not become Christians. A second factor may have
been related to the dynamic of the early evangelization campaign in
central Mexico. The censuses date to only a decade or so following the
arrival of the first missionaries in 1524. The orders had limited number of
personnel, and visited most communities as time permitted. The first
Dominican arrived at Tepoztlán in 1538, and began baptizing the native
population. The baptism of the population of Tepoztlán had progressed at
the time of the preparation of the census, as had that of Tepetenchic,
Panchimalco, and Molotlan. Missionaries most likely had only recently
visited Huitzillan and Quauchchichinollan, although the number of
baptized natives may have increased at a later date.
The missionaries’ perception of what conversion signified often
differed from that of the natives, who viewed the introduction of the new
faith on their own terms. Many baptized natives continued to covertly
practice their old beliefs alongside Catholicism, which was consistent with
the Mesoamerican religious tradition of flexibility in the incorporation of
new gods and practices. However, this Mesoamerican religious flexibility
conflicted with the chauvinistic and exclusivist belief of early modern
Iberian Catholicism. Moreover, many natives refused to accept baptism,
and continued to practice the old religion.
In the immediate aftermath of the conquest Cortés permitted the
natives to continue practicing their traditional religion, as long as they did
not engage in human sacrifice. Other types of sacrifices to their gods were
acceptable. However, in January 1525, the Franciscans stationed at
Tezcoco began a series of night raids on native temples to frighten and
chase the natives away. The Franciscans also discovered that the images of
Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary they had presented to the tlatoani of
Tezcoco, had instead been placed in the main temple of the city as a
replacement for the statue of Huitzilopochtli, the Culhua-Mexica god
disgraced by the Spanish conquest. This was a pragmatic incorporation of
19
Ibid., 461.
20
Ibid., 461.
the gods of the new conquerors into the round of pre-Hispanic rituals and
sacrifices, and was also a sign of loyalty to Hernán Cortés.21
As evidence mounted of the superficial baptism of natives and persistence
of traditional religious practice, Bishop Juan de Zumárraga, O.F.M.
instituted inquisition proceedings that followed an intensification of the
Franciscan morals campaign in the early years of the 1530s. Over four
years Zumárraga brought charges against 142 Spaniards and 16 natives.
Overall, this was a rate of 35 inquisition proceedings per year. Zumárraga
wanted to repress the continued practice of pre-Hispanic religion,
particularly by natives who had already been baptized. He also used the
inquisition proceedings to bring unruly Spaniards into line with the
Franciscan morals agenda.22 Several of those charged were native priests,
and the inquisition trials only served to drive practitioners of the
traditional religion underground and away from the urban centers in the
Valley of Mexico. Zumárraga initiated his anti-idolatry campaign with the
burning of pre-Hispanic religious texts.23
One of the last and perhaps the most important of Zumárraga`s
inquisition cases was the high profile trial of don Carlos Ometochtzin
Ometochtzin, the tlatoani of Tezcoco. The Holy Office charged him with
heretical dogmatism, or leading his subjects back to the old religion.
Following this trial there was a backlash among royal and church officials
in Spain, and Zumárraga was stripped of his inquisition authority in
1543.24 The baptism by the Franciscans of don Carlos Ometochtzin

occurred early during the first evangelization campaign, and was very
important because of his status as a member of the ruling lineage of
Tezcoco and as a political ally of the Spanish following the conquest. Don
Carlos Ometochtzin exercised political authority over native Tezcoco in
1539, when the inquisition brought him to trial. His own testimony and
that of a half-sister suggested that don Carlos Ometochtzin believed he had
been denounced by his enemies in Tezcoco who disputed the legitimacy of
his succession as tlatoani.25 The trial may also have been prompted by his
growing ambivalence towards the Franciscans, who had pressured him to
marry a noble woman from Huexotla, doña María, instead of the woman
he had chosen, his niece doña Ines.26 His relationship with his niece
21
Lopes Don, Bonfires of Culture, 34.
22
Ibid., 8.
23
Ibid., 4.
24
Ibid., 5.
25
Ibid., 147.
26
Ibid., 157.
26 Chapter One
resulted in his also being accused of concubinage. Don Carlos Ometochtzin

was burned at the stake at Tlatelolco on December 1, 1539.27
The hysteria of the Franciscan morals campaign and Zumárraga’s
inquisition cases focused the attention of the missionaries on the
persistence of traditional religious rituals. One case occurred at the
Augustinian convent at Ocuila (modern Ocuilan, Estado de México). The
Augustinian missionary Antonio de Aguilar, O.S.A., uncovered covert
sacrifices to pre-Hispanic gods including blood sacrifices in a cave close
to the convent. The idols and sacrifices in the cave were under the care of
a native named Acatonal, and Aguilar also found idols and other
paraphernalia in the houses of several natives. The incomplete record of
the Ocuila case does not indicate what punishment the missionaries
applied to those implicated in idolatry, but it showed that Christians
collaborated with pagans in the continued practice of the old faith.28
The location of the sacrifices in a cave indicates the persistence of the
water-earth-fertility religion that revolved around Tláloc, the central
Mexican rain deity. Tláloc brought life-giving rain that sustained
agriculture, and had given humans the gift of corn and other cultigens. The
Spanish suppressed the state religion of the Culhua-Mexica and their deity
Huitzilopochtli, but the worship of Tláloc persisted. Tláloc was the most
important deity for central Mexican farmers. Another manifestation of the
persistence of the water-earth-fertility religion was the incorporation into
churches of embedded stones with the face of Tláloc taken from pre-
Hispanic temples. An example of this is the embedded stone found at the
rear of the Franciscan church Santiago Tlatelolco (Distrito Federal). The
incorporation of the stone converted the church structure into a temple-
church shared by Jesus and Tláloc. The incorporation of pre-Hispanic
stones was not coincidental, and Church officials reported that the natives
paid too much attention to the embedded stones. The 1585 Third Church
Council in Mexico decreed the removal of embedded stones.29
27
Luis González Obregón, paleography and preliminary note, Proceso Inquisitorial del
Cacique de Tetzcoco, reprint Edition (México, D.F.: Congreso Internacional de
Americanistas, 2009), This text reproduces the entire trial record, including
witness testimony and the judgment leading to don Carlos Ometochtzin being
burned at the stake.
28
Ibid., 105-108.
29
Wake, Framing the Sacred, 97. The decrees from the 1585 provincial council
are analyzed and reproduced in Luis Martínez Ferrer, edición histórico y estudio
preliminar, Decretos del concilio tercero provincial mexicano (1585). 2 vols.
(Zamora: El Colegio de Michoacán, 2009). The text of the decree DE IMPEDIMENTIS
Fig. 9: Ruins of the Augustinian convent at Ocuila (Estado de México).

PROPRIAE SALUTIS AB INDIS REMOVENDIS appears in vol. II, 224-227. The

original text in Spanish reads:
Para que los indios se conseerven en la fee que se les ensena, y no buelvan al
vomito de la dolatrias que dexaron, grandamente conviene quitarles de delante
qualquer rastro de sus ritos ntiguos…Assi mismo encarga este santo concilio al
gobernador y justicias …como se quiten de las puertas o edificios los ydolos que
en ella estan puestos; o se deshagen las figuras que tienen; y los cues o
sacrificaderos se allenen y quiten, porque de todo se pierda la memoria de la
subjection del demonio…So that the Indians maintain the faith they are taught and
do not return to the vomit of the idolatries that they left, it is very convenient to
take from before them any trace of their ancient rites…As such this Holy Council
the governor and justices…that they take from the doors and buildings the idols
that are placed in them; and that they undo the figures that they have; and that they
fill and remove the temples (cues) and sacrificial sites, so that they lose all memory
of their subjugation to the demon[.]
28 Chapter One
Fig. 10: The mural of red Tláloc from the Tepantitla palace complex at
Teotihuacan (Estado de México). The open mouth represented an entrance into the
earth.
Other high profile anti-idolatry cases occurred over the following

decades in New Spain. One such case took place in 1562 at San Miguel
Arcángel Maní located in the Yucatán peninsula. Fray Diego de Landa,
O.F.M., headed the investigation in July 1562 that implicated the governor
of Maní Francisco de Montejo Xiú and other Maya caciques. An auto de fé
on July 12, 1562 publically punished the caciques: the Spanish deprived
them of their political positions and status, and destroyed a large quantity
of paraphernalia including pre-Hispanic codices. The Franciscans alleged
that the caciques did not support the missionaries, and instead actively
promoted idolatry.30 One of the documents that reported on the investigation
and punishment placed the blame for idolatry on the traditional native
political leaders “...because the said [native] lords and leaders [principales]
30
M. Isabel Campos Goenaga, “Consideraciones para el estudio de las idolatrías en
Yucatán,” in María Josefa Iglesias Ponce de León and Francesc Ligorred
Perramon, eds., Perspectivas antropológicas en el mundo Maya (Madrid: Sociedad
Española de Estudios Mayas, 1993), 414-415.
not only have not understood to help the said missionaries [religiosos] and
the salvation of the natives [naturales], but many have been perverters of
the poor people and dogmatizers...making them adore idols [idolatrar].”31
Fig. 11: An embedded stone with the face of Tláloc found at the rear of the
Franciscan church Santiago Tlatelolco.
The general response to idolatry and apostasy was harsh retaliation,

and at times, as in the case of don Carlos Ometochtzin, capital punishment.
Several illustrations in a manuscript written in the 1580s by Diego de
Camargo showed different forms of punishment of natives accused of
idolatry and apostasy. The manuscript is titled “Relación de la muy noble
y real ciudad de Tlaxcala…,” and is also known as the Codex Tlaxcala or
the Glasgow Manuscript. The images graphically depict the burning of
paraphernalia related to pre-Hispanic religious practices, and the execution
31
Quoted in ibid., 414. The quote reads in Spanish: “…porque los dichos señores y
principales no solo no han entendido en ayudar a los dichos religiosos y a la
salvación de los naturales, pero han sido muchos de ellos pervertidores de la gente
pobre y dogmatizadores…haciendoles idolatrar.”
30 Chapter One
Fig. 12: The Franciscan convent San Miguel Arcángel Maní, site of the 1562 auto
de fé.
of native priests and practitioners of the old beliefs.32 The mounting

evidence of idolatry was not a simple problem of religious orthodoxy,
particularly given that some individuals implicated had not converted to
Christianity, but of power and maintenance of the new colonial order.
Diego de Landa, O.F.M. put it succinctly when he advocated harsh
punishment for the Maní caciques he blamed for idolatry: “Without [harsh
punishments] there could occur larger and greater damage, as well as [the
natives] completely losing their Christianity, causing those who have made
them leave God to lose fear of the King our lord and his ministers, and
[once] lost they would come to rise up and rebel.”33 Caciques drawn from
32
René Acuña, ed., Relaciones Geográficas del Siglo XVl: Tlaxcala, 2 volumes
(México, D.F.: UNAM, 1986), vol. 1, cuadros 11, 12, 13, 14.
33
Quoted in Campos Goenaga, “Consideraciones,” 415. The quote reads in
Spanish: “…sin el cual podria suceder grandes y mayores daños, asi como perder
del todo sus cristiandades teniendo ocasión a quien los ha hecho dejar a Dios le
haga perder el temor al Rey nuestro señor y sus ministros, y perdido vengan en
estado de alzarse y rebelarse.”
the ruling native lineages played an important role in covert idolatry, and
their leadership in rejecting the new faith was threatening to missionary
and civil official alike. Religious inconformity could easily escalate to
more serious acts of resistance such as rebellion.
Conclusions
The Miracle of the Virgin of the Rosary mural at Tetela del Volcán was
a statement of Dominican triumphalism, and a critique of the Franciscan
method of minimal religious instruction for natives followed by mass
baptism. The 1541 incident at Tepetlaóxtoc, which was a community close
to Tezcoco, occurred only two years following the execution of don Carlos
Ometochtzin, the ruler of Tezcoco. Unlike don Carlos Ometochtzin, the
unidentified noble from Tepetlaóxtoc embraced the new faith on his
deathbed, and sought confession to save his soul from condemnation to
hell. The trial of don Carlos Ometochtzin was a significant blemish on the
record of the Franciscans and their methods of evangelization, and
signified the triumph of Satan in the war with the missionaries. The
Dominicans saved the soul of another native noble, and thus vanquished
Satan and showed the Franciscans that their methods gave better results
than did the Franciscan method. Don Carlos Ometochtzin betrayed the
Franciscans and the new faith, while at the same time the Tepetlaóxtoc
noble who had been under Dominican influence did not. The Franciscan
protégé and product of the Franciscan approach to evangelization retained
his loyalty to Satan, while God intervened at the bidding of the
Dominicans to save the soul of the noble from Tepetlaóxtoc. The mural
can also be understood within the context of the baptism controversy, and
was a way that the Dominicans could criticize the Franciscans and the
outcome of their approach of mass baptisms.
The larger message of the mural program was also an example of
Dominican triumphalism. If viewed as an exemplum, it re-enforced the
importance the missionaries placed on compliance with the sacraments,
and particularly baptism and confession as being essential elements of
salvation. This message was related to the larger thread of the baptism
controversy, and the series of events related to the trial and execution of
don Carlos Ometochtzin. The message of the mural program very clearly
communicated the content of the controversy, and the Dominican
approach to evangelization and their critique of the Franciscans. It was a
reminder to the Dominicans themselves of their mission in Mexico, and
the success of their approach over that of their rivals, the Franciscans.
CHAPTER TWO
ORGANIZING MISSIONS IN SIXTEENTH

CENTURY CENTRAL MEXICO
The previous chapter introduced the theme of evangelization and the

politics of the miraculous. The Dominicans touted the miracle they
reported at Tepetlaóxtoc. The story of the miracle occurred against the
backdrop of a high profile evangelization campaign supported by the
Crown, and competition between the three religious orders that came to
central Mexico to participate in that campaign. The first to arrive were the
Franciscans in 1524, and the first group of Dominicans came two years
later in 1526.
In the first decades following the Spanish conquest of central Mexico
relatively small numbers of Spaniards created a system of indirect colonial
rule on the existing matrix of political structures. The new colonial order
in central Mexico also had a basis in the construction of two corporate

societies, the República de Españoles and the República de Indios. The
Spanish imposed their rule on the native political structure of the altépetl,
and granted native rulers autonomy as long as they complied with tribute
and labor demands and remained loyal to the new colonial order. The
altépetl itself was a jurisdiction that consisted of a main town known to the
Spaniards as the cabecera and subject towns known as sujetos. The
political leaders of the altépetl collected tribute and labor services from the
subject communities, and in turn paid tribute to the dominant polity in the
region, be it the Culhua-Mexica or later the Spaniards.
The first generation of Spanish adventurers who subjugated central
Mexico divided the region into encomienda grants of jurisdiction over
tributaries that enabled them to accumulate wealth through tribute
collection and labor demands. At the same time the Crown attempted to
limit the political and economic power of the encomienda grant holders,
and when possible escheated private encomienda grants to Crown
34 Chapter Two
jurisdiction.1 The Culhua-Mexica had imposed their dominance over altépetl

in central Mexico, making tribute demands in a loosely knitted political
system that also lent itself to fragmentation and resistance as seen following
the arrival of the first Spaniards in 1519. The Spanish eliminated the Culhua-
Mexica, and adopted and modified the existing tribute and political system
as the basis for their system of indirect rule. The Culhua-Mexica had
subjugated the region known today as Oaxaca, and established centers
from which to control and direct tribute collection. One such site was
Inguiteria located near the modern town of Coixtlahuaca in the Sierra
Mixteca, which was also later the site of an important Dominican
mission.2
Early tribute reports provide perhaps the earliest information on
communities that figured prominently in the early Dominican evangelization
campaign and the culture war in central Mexico. The suma de visitas, a
summary of tribute reports prepared around 1550 provides details
regarding several communities, and particularly their tribute obligations.
The report on Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan) is particularly detailed. The report
noted that 16 other towns were subject to Yodzocahi, and the town with its
different barrios had a population of some 12,007 above the age of three.
The tribute obligation paid to the encomendero Gonzalo de las Cabras
included 782 gold pesos in gold dust, and planted wheat as a part of their
1
On the origins of the altépetl in central Mexico as related to the Culhua-Mexicas
see Federico Navarrete Linares, Los orígenes de los pueblos indígenas del valle de
México: Los altépetl y sus historias (México, D.F.: UNAM, 2011). The classic
studies of the construction of a colonial regime in central Mexico remain Charles
Gibson, The Aztecs Under Spanish Rule: A History of the Indians of the Valley of
Mexico 1519-1810 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1964); and James
Lockhart, The Náhuas After the Conquest; A Social and Cultural History of the
Indians of Central Mexico, Sixteenth Through Eighteenth Century (Stanford:
Stanford University Press, 1992).
2
Stephen Kowalewski, et al, “La presencia azteca en Oaxaca: la provincia de
Coixtlahuaca,” Anales de Antropología 44 (2010), 77-103. The 1581 relación
geográfica of Guaxilotitlan (Huitzo) noted that the Culhua-Mexica tribute
collectors had their seat in three towns that were Oaxaca (Oaxaca City),
Guaxilotitlan, and Cuestlauaca (Coixtlahuaca-Inguiteria. The original in the report
noted that: “…y tenia para recoger este tribute tres principales que los llamaban
‘calpizques.’ El uno estava en Guaxaca, e el otro en este pueblo, y otro en
Cuestlauaca, que es en la provincial de la Misteca, a donde el calpizque deste
pueblo enviaba el maiz y mantas, y lo demas llevaban a Mexico al propio
Motecsuma.” See Francisco Paz y Troncoso, ed., Papeles de Nueva España.
Segunda Series Geografia y Estadistica Tomo IV (Madrid: Tip. “Sucesores de
Rivadenyra,” 1905), 198.
Organizing Missions in Sixteenth Century Central Mexico 35
Fig 13: Tributary Province of Coaxtlahuacan from the Matrícula de Tributos. The
province consisted of the following head towns: Coaxtlahuacan (Coixtlahuaca),
Texopan (Tejupan), Tamacolapa (Tamazulapan de Progreso), Yancuttlan
(Yanhuitlan), Tepozcololan (Teposcolula), Nocheztlan (Nochistlan), Xaltepec
(Jaltepec), Tamazulla (Tamazola), Mictlan (Mitlatonga), Cuauacaxomulco
(Cuasimulco), and Cuicatlan (Cuicatlan).
36 Chapter Two
obligation. Moreover, they provided four birds from local species and two
from Europe (chickens?) daily, as well as a small jug of honey, wax, corn,
cacao, corn tortillas, eggs, salt, chile, tomato, firewood, and yerba
(herbs?). Additionally, ten natives had to provide labor services.3
Yucundáa (Teposcolula) had escheated to the Crown. The c. 1550 report
noted that the town had six barrios, and a population of 9,387 people
above the age of three. As a Crown jurisdiction the tribute obligation had
been set at an annual money payment of 832 pesos.4
Disinuu (Tlaxiaco) was held in encomienda to Francisco Vázquez. It
was an important polity that counted 31 subject communities identified by
the term estancia as well as other towns with independent ruling lineages:
Santa María with a church; Choquistepeque; Chilapa; Tepusutepeque; and
Comaltepeque. The population of Disinuu and its estancias was reported
as 1,851 men, 1,356 women, 433 boys between the age of 12 and 17, and
379 girls of the same age. The tribute payment totaled 45 gold pesos in
gold dust; corn supplied every 40 days, and other items. The ruling lineage
at Santa María had nine subject estancias and counted 380 tributaries, 507
boys between the age of 12 and 17, and 102 girls. The tributaries of Santa
María paid 13 gold pesos in gold dust every 60 days. Choquistepeque had
six subject estancias and a population of 455 male tributaries, 280 women,
and 233 boys above the age of seven. Its tribute was 11 gold pesos in gold
dust paid every 60 days. Chilapa had five subject estancias and a
population of 340 married men and 247 boys. The tribute obligation was
10 gold pesos in gold dust paid every 60 days. Tepusutepeque had 22
subject estancias, and a population of 1,322 married men 507 boys. The
tribute was 33 gold pesos in gold dust paid every 60 days. Finally,
Comaltepeque had six subject estancias and a population of 540 men, 280
women, 140 boys, and 130 girls. The tribute obligation was 20 gold pesos
paid in gold dust every 60 days.5 The importance of these jurisdictions
explains why the Dominicans selected them as sites for missions.
The Dominicans established their first convents in Mexico City,
Antequera (Oaxaca), and Puebla in that order, and then founded missions
in the Valley of Mexico and what today is Morelos. The first mission in a
native community was Tepetlaóxtoc discussed in the previous chapter.
This was followed by the establishment of missions at Oaxtepec and
3
Francisco del Paso y Troncoso, Papeles de Nueva España publicados de orden y
con fondos del gobierno mexicano. Segunda serie geografía y estadística: Tomo I
Suma de visitas de pueblos por orden alfabético (Madrid: Tip. “Sucesores de
Rivadeneyra, 1905), 131.
4
Ibid., 148.
5
Ibid., 282.
Coyoacán, which was still an independent native community that is now a

part of Mexico City.6 The Dominicans, as did the missionaries from the
other religious orders, organized their own internal political-administrative
structure based on the existing political structure inherited from the
Culhua-Mexica. This can be seen in the example of the tributary province
of Huaxtepec (modern spelling Oaxtepec) in the northern part of the
modern state of Morelos (see Table 1). The tributary province consisted of
seven cabeceras or head towns. They were Huaxtepec, Yacapichtlan
(modern spelling Yecapixtla), Totolapan, Tepoztlán, Yautepec, Atlatlauhca,
and Tlayacapa. Each of the seven head towns in turn administered other
communities as sujetos, which meant that the leaders of the subject towns
paid tribute and provided labor to the leaders of the head towns. Moreover,
there was a hierarchy of political authority within the region that defined
the relationship between the head towns. For example, the ruling lineages
of Atlatlauhca and Tlayacapa were subject to that of Totolapan, which was
one of the dominant polities within the region.7 The missionaries
administered the subject communities as visitas that did not have resident
missionaries, and that the missionaries stationed on the doctrinas visited
periodically.
Dominicans and Augustinians assumed responsibility for the evangelization
of the native populations of the tributary province of Huaxtepec. The
missionaries established doctrinas in the head towns which was a strategy
dictated by the small numbers of missionaries available and the large

native populations. Dominican leaders in Mexico recruited new personnel
in Spain, and many of the missionaries who came to Mexico spent most of
their adult lives in the missions. The career of Fray Cristóbal Jordán de
Santa Caterina, O.P., was typical of the experiences of sixteenth century
missionaries. He was born around 1526 in Vejar de Castañar, near
Valladolid. He took vows at the Dominican convent San Pablo in
Valladolid, and at age 24 came to the Mexican missions. He first went to
the Dominican convent in Mexico City where he was ordained in 1552,
and later to Santo Domingo de Guzmán convent in Antequera. He was
stationed twice at San Ildefonso de los Be’ena’as (Villa Alta, Oaxaca),
was the Master of Novitiates at Santo Domingo de Guzmán in Antequera,
6
Francisco de Burgoa, O.P., Geográfica descripción de la Parte Septentrional del
Polo Ártico de la América y, Nueva Iglesia de las Indias Occidentales, y Sitio
Astronómico de esta Provincia de Predicadores de Antequera Valle de Oaxaca, 2
vols. (México, D.F.: Editorial Porrúa, 1989), I: 45.
7
On the political structure of the Oaxtepec region see Susana Gómez Serafín,
Altepetl de Huaxtepec: Modificaciones territoriales desde el siglo XVI (México.
DF: INAH, 2011), 39-44.
38 Chapter Two
and later was the prior of the same convent. He died in Antequera on
February 6, 1592.8 By 1560, there reportedly were 212 Augustinians and
210 Dominicans in the central Mexican missions, and this was the number
available for all of the missions in native communities as well as the urban
convents.9 During the sixteenth century the Dominicans sent 489 missionaries
to the Spanish territories in America.10
The practice was to have several missionaries stationed on each
doctrina, and at least one of the missionaries periodically visited the
subject towns that did not have resident missionaries. In about 1580, for
example, the Dominican doctrina at Huaxtepec had four resident
missionaries, Tepoztlán three, and Tetela del Volcán and Hueyapan two
each (see Table 3). The Dominicans focused much of the attention of their
evangelization efforts on Oaxaca and Chiapas, and staffed missions in
other regions when missionary personnel became available. However, the
missionaries were also subject to outside pressures in making decisions to
establish and staff new missions. The chronicler Juan Bautista Méndez,
O.P., for example, reported a 1548 royal decree that called for the
establishment of new missions. Based on the decree Viceroy Antonio de
Mendoza requested that the Dominicans establish a mission at Disinuu
(Tlaxiaco) in the Sierra Mixteca.11
The arrival of the Spaniards led to processes of demographic change
that included shifts in settlement patterns as well as population decline.
Introduced disease such as smallpox and measles was an important cause

of demographic decline, and the late sixteenth century relaciones
geográficas reports referenced the lethal consequences of epidemics of the
newly introduced contagion.12 The report on Teitipac (Oaxaca) estimated
the degree of population decline:
This town of Teticpaque used to be a town with many natives
[naturales], and there was something like two thousand Indians [yndios],
8
Burgoa, Geográfica, I: 59-127.
9
Ricard, Conquista spiritual, 159.
10
Sara Morasch Taylor, “Art and Evangelization at the Sixteenth-Century Convent
of Santiago Apóstol at Cuilapan, Mexico, “ unpublished PhD dissertation, Bryn
Mawr College, 2006, 50.
11
Juan Bautista Méndez, O.P., Crónica de la Provincia de Santiago de México de
la Orden de Predicadores (1521-1564) (México, D.F.: Editorial Porrúa, 1993),
153-155.
12
The reports prepared around 1580 that are known today as the relaciones
geográficas to the effects of disease, and in some instances make estimates of
population loss. One example is the report for Tepoztlán, which describes the
newly introduced diseases. See René Acuña, ed., Relaciones geográficas del siglo
XVI: México tomo primero (México, D.F.: UNAM, 1984), 190-191.
and now a thousand; the cause for there being fewer now are the diseases
and pestilences they have had[.]13
Periodic epidemics killed thousands of natives. The report for
Coatzacualco, also located in Oaxaca, provides additional details on the
chronology and effects of contagions:
What they have reports on about the reduction [in number] of these
people was smallpox that broke out in the year one thousand, five hundred,
and thirty four, and measles that broke out in the year one thousand, five
hundred, and forty five. And it is clearly seen that they are becoming
fewer [in number] every day [.]14
Tepoztlán provides an example of population loss in the second half of
the sixteenth century, the period for which there is demographic information
available. The population dropped from around 7,500 in 1568 to some
4,890 in 1595 (see Table 3). Civil and religious officials instituted a policy
known as congregación to shift and resettle population because of population
decline. Some communities disappeared as a result of depopulation and/or
population shifts to new settlements. Population decline, however, was not
the only motive for congregación, and in some instances civil officials or
the missionaries relocated existing towns from hilltops to valley locations.
The Spanish relocated many of these communities to valley locations
that were easier to manage when trying to organize labor drafts, collect
tribute, or enforce attendance at catechism or mass. An example was
Yucundáa which was the Ñudzahui name and the Náhuatl name
Teposcolula, the site of a Dominican convent in the Sierra Mixteca of
Oaxaca. The Dominicans established a mission there around 1538, and
directed the construction of a primitive church and convent at the hilltop
site of Yucundáa. Archaeological excavations at the site uncovered the
primitive church and convent, as well as burials associated with epidemics
in the first half of the sixteenth century.15 The Dominicans had the
13
In Francisco del Paso y Troncoso, ed., Papeles de Nueva España. Segunda
Series Geografía y Estadística Tomo IV (Madrid: Tip. “Sucesores de Rivadenyra,”
1905), 110. The original quote reads: Este pueblo de Teticpaque solía ser pueblo
de muchos naturales e avía en el cómo dos mil indios, e a presente ay mil; la causa
de aver al presente menos son las enfermedades y pestilencias que an tenido... [.]”
14
In René Acuña, ed., Relaciones geográficas del siglo XVI: Antequera. Tomo
Primero (México. D.F.: UNAM, 1984), 151.
15
Christina Gertrude Warinner, “Life and Death at Teposcolula Yucundáa:
Mortuary, Archaeogenetic, and Isotopic Investigations of the Early Colonial Period
in Mexico,” unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard University, 2010, 194-196.
There may be as many as 2,000 burials in the great plaza most likely dating to the
1540s.
40 Chapter Two
population of Yucundáa relocated to the valley, and established the new

mission San Pedro y San Pablo Teposcolula at a new site in 1552.16 The
Dominicans directed the construction of a new complex that included an
open chapel, church, and cloister, as well as a hospital for the native
population. The ruling lineage had a complex know today as the Casa de
la Cacica built a short distance from the new religious complex. It was an
aniñe or residence of a Ñudzahui ruling couple. The complex was the
residence of doña Catalina de Peralta, who took up residence there in the
mid-1560s with her husband don Diego de Mendoza.17
Franciscans, Dominicans, and Augustinians in Morelos

The area of what today is the state of Morelos was an early and
important Spanish frontier in central Mexico. Hernán Cortes played an
important role in the development of the region. As the Marqués del Valle,
he received a grant of jurisdiction over three of the head towns and their
subject communities in the province of Huaxtepec.18 The task of
evangelizing the Náhuas who inhabited the region fell to two of the three
missionary orders. The Franciscans first arrived in Morelos in the mid-
1520s, followed by the Dominicans and Augustinians. The Franciscans
established their first mission in the region at Quauhnahuac (modern
Cuernavaca), which was also in the jurisdiction of the Marqués del Valle.
It was also the fifth Franciscan mission established in central Mexico.

They later branched out in the area surrounding and to the south of
Quauhnahuac, including Tlaquiltenango which they later ceded to the
16
On the early Dominican mission at Yucundáa and the resettlement of the
community see Ronald Spores, et al, “Avances de investigación de los entierros
humanos del sitio Pueblo Viejo de Teposcolula y su contexto arqueológico,”
Estudios de Antropologia Biológica 13 (2007), 285-305; James B. Kiracofe,
“Architectural Fusion and Indigenous Ideology in early colonial Teposcolula the
Casa de la Cacica: A Building at the Edge of Oblivion,” Anales del Instituto de
Investigaciones Estéticas vol. 17, No. 66 (Spring, 1995), 45-84.
17
Kevin Terraciano, “The Colonial Mixtec Community,” Hispanic American
Historical Review 80:1 (February 2000), 1-42; Kiracofe, “Architectural Fusion.”
18
Acuña, Relaciones geográficas del siglo XVI: Mexico tomo primer, 183, 196,
212; Gómez Serafín, Altepetl de Huaxtepec, 44; Elena Vázquez Vázquez,
“Distribución geográfica del Arzobispado de México Siglo XVI Acapistla
(Yecapixtla),” Estudios de Historia Novohispana 4 (1971), 1-25. The Matrícula de
Tributos, a pre-Hispanic reporting of tribute paid to the Culhua-Mexica, listed 24
towns in the Huaxtepec tribute province. See María Teresa Sepúlveda y Herrera,
La Matrícula de Tributos Arqueología Mexicana Edición Especial 14 (México.
D.F., 2010), Lamina 7, 34-35.
Dominicans.19 The Franciscans also administered the doctrina at Jiutepec,

located east of Quauhnahuac. The Augustinians entered Morelos in 1534
with the establishment of a mission at Ocuituco. The relación geográfica
report for Acapistla (Yecapixtla) noted the presence of the Augustinian
mission staffed by three or four missionaries. Yecapixtla was one of the
first Augustinian establishments in the region following the establishment
at Ocuituco, and according to one source the mission there dates to 1535.20
In the same year the Augustinians founded a mission at Totolapa, which
was also one of the head towns in the Province of Huaxtepec.21
As more missionaries became available the Augustinians expanded the
number of their missions in Morelos. The Spanish Crown supported the
recruitment of new missionaries by the three orders, both in Spain and as
the Spanish population grew in Mexico and other American territories.
Between 1533 and 1573, for example, some 125 Augustinians journeyed
from Spain to Mexico.22 In 1554, Tlayacapa became a mission and
Atlatlahucan in 1569 or 1570. Both had been within the mission
jurisdiction of Totolapa.23 The same report on Yecapixtla noted that the
Augustinians had also established new missions at Xantetelco (Jantetelco),
19
Writing in the 1580s, Antonio de Ciudad Real provided the following details
regarding Tlaquiltenango: “…there is another good and large one named
Tlaquiltenango, of the same Indians and in the same Archbishopric, in which a

convent is built that in the past when the faith was first planted in this area, was a
visita of our friars, later it was given to those of Santo Domingo, who staffed and
evangelized it along with other districts when the Father General Commissioner
(Fr. Alonso Ponce, O.F.M., visited it, but later when he was in Guatemala…a
Royal decree returned all to our friars,…and two friars presently reside there who
“…there is another good and large one named Tlaquiltenango, of the same Indians
and in the same Archbishopric, in which a convent is built that in the past when the
faith was first planted in this area, was a visita of our friars, later it was given to
those of Santo Domingo, who staffed and evangelized it along with other districts
when the Father General Commissioner (Fr. Alonso Ponce, O.F.M., visited it, but
later when he was in Guatemala…a Royal decree returned all to our friars,…and
two friars presently reside there who administer the doctrina.” Antonio de Ciudad
Real, Relación breve y verdadera de algunas cosas de las muchas que sucedieron
al padre Fray Alonso Ponce en las provincias de la Nueva España 2 vols.
(Madrid: Imprenta de la Viuda de Caero, 1875), vol. 1, 200.
20
Alipio Ruiz Zavala, O.S.A., Historia de la provincia agustina del Santísimo
Nombre de Jesús de México, 2 volumes (México, D.F.: Editorial Porrúa, 1984), II,
385.
21
Ibid., II, 377.
22
Ibid., II: 1-22.
23
Ibid., II: 279, 376.
42 Chapter Two
Xonacatepeque (Jonacatepec), and Tzagualpa (Zacualpan).24 The first two

had been within the jurisdiction of Totolapa, and became independent
missions in 1558 and 1566 respectively. The last named had been a visita
of Ocuituco.25 Altogether, the Augustinians established four missions in
the head towns of the former Huaxtepec tributary province (see Tables 1-
3). Reports from 1571 for Yecapixtla and Tlayacapan, for example, listed
the 13 estancias administered by the Augustinians stationed on the two
doctrinas.26
Fig. 14: The Augustinian convent San Guillermo Totolapan.
The Dominicans also established missions in the Huaxtepec tributary

province. Their first was at Oaxtepec established perhaps as early as 1526,
and it was also one of the earliest Dominican missions in central Mexico.
Oaxtepec was a populous jurisdiction. As late as 1568, it had a population
of some 17,900, and counted 17 subject towns (see Table 4). As already
24
Acuña, Relaciones geográficas del siglo XVI: Mexico tomo primer, 222.
25
Zavala, Historia de la provincia agustina, II, 322, 325, 389.
26
Luis García Pimentel, editor, Relación de los obispados de Tlaxcala, Oaxaca y
otros lugares en el siglo XVI (México, D.F.: Private Publication, 1904), 117-120.
noted, the Dominicans later established missions at Yautepec and

Tepoztlán. In 1585, after the Crown ordered the return of Tlaquiltenango
to the jurisdiction of the Franciscans, the Dominicans elevated Tlaltizapan,
a former visita of Yautepec, to the status of an independent mission (see
Table 4).
Fig. 15: The 1581 map of Huaxtepec from the relación geográfica of that year.
The church of the Dominican mission is at the center of the map, and below it is
the altépetl glyph of Huaxtepec. The Nettie Lee Benson Latin American
Collection, the University of Texas at Austin.
44 Chapter Two
Fig. 16: The Dominican church at Oaxtepec.
By the end of the sixteenth century the contours of the missionary

presence in Morelos had been established with doctrinas and visitas in
subject communities. Moreover, there was another level of organization
within the head towns, as it was not uncommon for the residents of the
individual barrios to build their own smaller chapels with different patron
saints from that of the main convent, where they would celebrate their own
feast days. Moreover, it was most likely that the activities of the cofradias
(confraternities) that became an important element of the spiritual life of
the native population developed around the barrio chapels. Barrio chapels
still exist in Atlatlahucan and Tlayacapan. Those in Atlatlahucan, such as
the one constructed in the Barrio de los Reyes, have the appearance of free
standing open chapels that the missionaries commonly had built in the
subject towns in the earliest period of evangelization. In some instances
the barrio leaders had more substantial structures built. The Tlayacapan
barrio chapels include simpler structures built in the sixteenth century that
may have also begun as free standing open chapels, and larger chapels
built at later dates in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
Fig. 17: The chapel of the Barrio de los Reyes, Atlatlahucan (Morelos).
The Dominicans in Oaxaca

The Dominicans first established an institutional presence in Oaxaca in
1535 with the establishment of Santo Domingo de Guzmán convent in
Antequera, which became the headquarters and training center for their
missions among the Ñudzahui and Be'ena'a (Be’ena’aas).27 An undated
27
The Culhua-Mexica subjugated what today is Oaxaca, and divided the Sierra
Mixteca into two tributary provinces. They were Coaxtlahuacan and Tlachquiavco
(Tlaxiaco). In the other areas of Oaxaca were the tribute provinces of Yohualtepec,
Tochtepec, and Coyolapan. The towns in Coaxtlahuacan included the head town
(Coixtlahuaca), Texopan (Tejupan), Tamacolapa (Tamazulapan de Progreso),
46 Chapter Two
report from the late sixteenth century noted that 35-40 missionaries resided
at Santo Domingo de Guzmán (see Table 5). They first focused their
missionary activity among the Ñudzahui in the Sierra Mixteca, but with
mixed results as seen below in the Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan) inquisition
case in 1544. The Dominicans established their first missions at Yucundáa
(Teposcolula) and Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan), both formally accepted in
1538 by the order, although missionaries arrived later. As discussed above.
The Dominicans originally established their mission at the original hilltop
site of Yucundáa, and directed the construction of a primitive church and
convent. They later relocated their mission and much of the population of
Yucundáa to a site in the valley below the original location of the town. At
Yodzocahi, on the other hand, the Dominicans chose the principal temple
as the site of their mission, which became a point of contention with the
Ñudzahui and a factor contributing to the 1544 inquisition case examined
in the next chapter. Domingo de la Cruz, O.P., founded the doctrina at
Yodzocahi in 1541.28 The Dominicans mobilized the resources of the
community, including native labor, to build the large church and convent
that took some 25 years to complete.29 Both were populous and politically
important jurisdictions. In 1568, Yodzocahi had a population of some
17,160, and Yucundáa some 11,418 (see Table 5).
Yancuttlan (Yanhuitlan), Tepozcololan (Teposcolula), Nocheztlan (Nochistlan),

Xaltepec (Jaltepec), Tamazulla (Tamazola), Mictlan (Mitlatonga), Cuauacaxomulco
(Cuasimulco), and Cuicatlan (Cuicatlan). The province of Tlachquiavco included
the head town, Achiotlan, and Capotlan. The province of Yohualtepec included the
town of the same name (Igualtepec), Ehuacalco (Calihuala), Tzilacayoapan
(Silacayoapan), Patlanallan (unknown), Ixicayan (Jicayan), and Ichcaatoyac
(Atoyac). The province of Coyolapan included the main town (Cuilapam), Etla
(San Pedro Etla), Cuauhxilottlan (Huaxolottlan), Huaxyacac (Antequera-Oaxaca),
Camotlan (Camotlan), Teocuitlatlan (unknown), Cuatzontlan (unknown), Octlan
(Ocotlan), Tetitpac (San Sebastian Teitipac), Tlalcuechahuayan (Tlacochahuaya),
and Macuilxochtli (Macuilzochil). Sepulveda y Herrera, La Matrícula de Tributos,
Laminas 20, 23, 24, 60-61, 66-69; Frances P. Berdan and Patricia Anawalt, editors,
The Codex Mendoza (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press,
1997), 111.
28
Francisco de Burgoa, Geográfica Descripción de la Parte Septentrional del Polo
Ártico de la América y, Nueva Iglesia de las Indias Occidentales, y Sitio
Astronómico de esta Provincia de Predicadores de Antequera Valle de Oaxaca,
two volumes (Mexico, D.F.: Editorial Porrúa, 1989), vol. 1, 286.
29
Ibid., vol. 1, 292.
Fig. 18: Santo Domingo de Guzmán, Antequera (Oaxaca) City).

Fig. 19: The open chapel and church of San Pedro y San Pablo Teposcolula, after
the Dominicans relocated their mission from Yucundáa.
48 Chapter Two
Fig. 20: A reconstruction of Yucundáa shortly before the relocation of the

Dominican mission to the valley floor, based on archaeological excavations.
Prior to 1550, the Dominicans focused their missionary program in the

Sierra Mixteca, and added only two more missions at Yodzocoo
(Coixtlahuaca, 1548) and Disinuu (Tlaxiaco, 1550). The Dominicans adopted

the Náhuatl names for the doctrinas established among the Ñudzahui. The
Dominican mission program in Oaxaca experienced its greatest expansion
between 1550 and 1558, when the order accepted 14 new establishments,
both among the Ñudzahui and Be'ena'a. One of the first new convents and
the first established outside of the Sierra Mixteca was Santiago Apóstol
Cuilapam, a community that formed a part of the Marqusado del Valle,
accepted in 1550 and established within two years with the arrival of four
Dominican missionaries. They were Domingo de Aguinaga, O.P.,
Domingo de Santo Domingo, O.P., Miguel Rodríguez, O.P., and Vicente
Gómez, O.P.30 Cuilapam was a Ñudzahui colony of settlers from Almoloyas
established after a marriage alliance between the ruling lineages of Yodzocahi
and Zaachila. The colonists named the new community Yuchaca or Sa’a
Yucu.31 The Dominicans congregated the residents of the pre-Hispanic
30
Morasch Taylor, “Art and Evangelization,” 58-59.
31
Details of the settlement of Cuilapam\Yuchaca come from the 1581 report on
Cuilapam. See Acuña, Relaciones geográficas del siglo XVI: Antequera. Tomo
Primero, 177-178.
settlement to a new site in 1555, where they also directed the construction
of the church and convent complex.32
Over the next several decades the Dominicans established new missions
among the Ñudzahui. They included Chila (1556), Ñundecu (Achiutla),
1558), Tecomaxtlahuaca (1564), Tejupa (1572), Jaltepec (1581), Atoco
(Nochixtlán, 1585), Huajuapan (1585), Ñunine (Tonalá, c. 1585), and
Yucundayy (Tequistepec, date unknown).33 The Dominicans established
the majority of new convents after 1550 among the Be'ena'a. They
established a handful of missions in the central valley of Oaxaca and
Tehuantepec, and then expanded the number of missions to surrounding
areas. San Juan Bautista Teitipac (Zetoba), accepted in 1555 along with
Santo Domingo Ocotlán, was one of the first Dominican missions. The
1580 report identified Teitipac as having been a subject community of
Zaachila which was the dominant Be'ena'a state in the region (the
Dominicans did not establish a mission at Zaachila until 1572). The
Dominicans stationed at Teitipac administered eight visitas subject to the
lord of the town, and other towns including Tlacochahuaya and Tlacolula,
which were held in the same encomienda grant.34 The Dominicans
stationed at Teitipac still had jurisdiction over Tlacolula, as noted in the
1580 report on its jurisdiction.35 However, at some point prior to 1580 the
Dominicans elevated Tlacochahuaya to the status of an independent
mission, and the Dominicans from there visited other towns including
Macuilsu’chil and Teotitlan [del Valle]. The 1580 report on Macuilsu’chil

noted the existence of the Dominican mission there.36
How did the population of the region change? The suma de visitas, for
example, provided information on the population distribution of Disinuu
(Tlaxiaco). The jurisdiction counted ten towns listed as cabeceras
including Disinuu, and 90 estancias or smaller settlements characteristic of
the spatial organization of the Ñudzahui population at the time of the
Spanish conquest. The reports on the cabeceras categorized the populations
in different ways. Categories reported included the number of tributaries,
the number of married men, the number of people of both genders above
32
Morasch Taylor, “Art and Evangelization,” 26.
33
Ibid., 59.
34
Del Paso y Troncoso, Papeles de Nueva España. Segunda Series Geografía y
Estadística Tomo IV, 109-111.
35
Ibid., 145.
36
Ibid., 104-105.
50 Chapter Two
the age of twelve, and the number of houses.37 Later sources noted the
total number of tributaries. The late sixteenth century “Descripción del
Obispado de Antequera, de la Nueva España hecho por el Obispo del
dicho Obispado, por mandado de S.M.” reported a tribute population for
the larger jurisdiction of Disinuu (Tlaxiaco) of 4,500 tributaries, that
would suggest a population of around 20,250. A figure taken from a
second report titled “Relación de la gente que hay en todo este Obispado
de la Ciudad de Antequera del Valle de Guaxaca, desta Nueva España así
de Españoles como Mextizos e Indios, para enviar al Consejo de Indias de
S.M,” noted a total of 4,200 tributaries that suggests a population of
around 19,000.38 The more detailed populations given in the suma de
visitas report for Disinuu (Tlaxiaco) also provides evidence of the
demographic consequences of the lethal epidemic of the mid-1540s. The
gender ratio for the population above the age of 12 of Disinuu proper was
1.3 males to every female, based on a reported population of 2,230 males
and 1,789 females.39 The imbalance most likely resulted from higher
mortality among women during the epidemic caused by the different
immunological response of girls and women that caused higher mortality.
The report dated to only a short period following the lethal epidemic of the
mid 1540s, and the population had not recovered or rebounded at that
point.
The Mission Settlement Plan and Urban Development

The 1579 relación geográfica for the jurisdiction of Nexapa in what
today is Oaxaca included details regarding the urban development of the
community under the direction of the Dominican missionaries. Nexapa
was a jurisdiction with a population of Be'ena'a, Mixes, and Chontales
located in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec.40 The Dominicans established a
doctrina there in 1556. The report noted that: “…there is nothing more
than a monastery, and there is no other town in the province that can suffer
more, because they are poor, there is no hospital in the entire district if not
37
Del Paso y Troncoso, Papeles de Nueva España publicados de orden y con
fondos del gobierno mexicano. Segunda serie geografía y estadística: Tomo I
Suma de visitas de pueblos por orden alfabético, 282-283.
38
García Pimentel, Relación de los obispados de Tlaxcala, Oaxaca y otros lugares
en el siglo XVI, 64, 75.
39
Del Paso y Troncoso, Papeles de Nueva España publicados de orden y con
fondos del gobierno mexicano. Segunda serie geografía y estadística: Tomo I
Suma de visitas de pueblos por orden alfabético, 282.
40
Ibid., 30.
one in this Villa [Nexapa] that his Excellent Lord don Martín Enriquez,
viceroy and Captain General of this kingdom, ordered built.”41 The fact
that Nexapa did not have a hospital was important enough to note in the
1579 report, and points to the practice of including hospitals in the urban
plan of mission communities.
In some instances, such as that of Yucundáa (Teposcolula) discussed
above, the missionaries directed the construction of new communities
from whole cloth at sites different from pre-Hispanic population centers.
The new or existing communities modified under the Spanish-missionary
urban plan incorporated different types of buildings. At the center of the
community was the new sacred complex built under the direction of the
missionaries in different stages. In many cases the first structures built
were a primitive convent with residences for the missionaries and an open
chapel that functioned as the church until the completion of a permanent
church. Open chapels exist at several Dominican missions in Oaxaca
including Yucundáa (Teposcolula) and Yodzocoo (Coixtlahuaca) (see
Figures 21-22). At other sites such as Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan) the
Dominicans directed the construction of the new sacred complex on a
temple platform, and had the pre-Hispanic temple demolished. This was
the temple that figured in the Yodzocahi inquisition case in the 1540s (see
Figure 23).
The Dominicans directed the construction of other elements in the new
sacred complexes. They included the cloister which served as the

headquarters of the missionaries, their habitations, communal dining hall,
and store rooms; and the permanent church generally built on a
monumental scale. A large open space enclosed by walls known as the
atrium fronted the sacred complex, and within the atrium there generally
were small chapels known as capillas de posa located at the four corners
or four cardinal points. The missionaries used the capillas as stopping
points to explain points of Catholic doctrine during the processions that
were an important element in ritual life, particularly during Easter week.42
41
Ibid., 43-44. The original quote reads: “…ya esta como en esta jurisdicion no
hay mas de un monestario in hay pueblo en la provincia que pueda sufrir mas,
porque son pobres, no hay hospital ninguno en todo este distrito si no es uno en
esta Villa que mando hacer el muy Excelente Senor Don Martin Enriquez virrey y
capitán general deste reino.”
42
On the architectural elements of the sixteenth century mission complexes see
George Kubler, Mexican Architecture of the Sixteenth Century (New Have: Yale
University Press, 1948); Robert J. Mullen, Dominican Architecture in Sixteenth-
Century Oaxaca (Tempe: Arizona State University Press, 1975); Roberto Meli,
52 Chapter Two
The urban plan also contained structures for the native populations.
Examples of these non-religious structures still exist at the site of Yucundáa
(Teposcolula). One is the so-called casa de la cacica, mentioned above. The
second was the hospital built to isolate sick natives. The practice in the
sixteenth-century was to quarantine or isolate those infected with
contagious diseases from the general population, and also those who had
been exposed to the infected. The treatment of those infected was
rudimentary, and death rates in the hospitals were high.
Fig. 21: The Open Chapel at Yucundáa (Teposcolula).
Los conventos mexicanos del siglo XVI: Construcción, ingenieria structural y

conservation (México, D.F.: Editorial Miguel Angel Porrúa, 2011).
Fig. 22: The open chapel at San Juan Bautista Yodzocoo (Coixtlahuaca).
Fig 23: The Dominican church and convent built on the pre-Hispanic temple
platform in Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan).
54 Chapter Two
Fig. 24: The restored Aniñe or Casa de la Cacica at Yucundáa (Teposcolula).

Fig 25: The Aniñe at Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan) from the Codex Yanhuitlan. Note the
roofline design element similar to that on the Casa de la Cacica at Yucundáa
(Teposcolula) that identified the structure as being the residence of the ruling
lineage. This may have been a design element introduced by the Culhua-Mexica
when they subjugated the region. The CodexTlatelolco shows the same design
element on the roofline of the Tecpan (native municipal palace) of that town.
56 Chapter Two
Fig 26: Chapel and Hospital de Indios at Yucundáa (Teposcolula).

Conclusions
The Spanish adopted and modified the existing political-economic
structure in central Mexico to create a system of indirect rule based on the
altépetl. The Dominican missionaries did the same, erecting their mission
centers in the head towns or cabeceras. The subject towns within the
altépetl became visitas that the missionaries visited periodically. In some
instances the missionaries modified exiting communities by having the
churches and convents built on the sites of pre-Hispanic temples, and by
adding new structures to the urban plan such as the Hospital de Indios. In
other instances, such as at Yucundáa (Teposcolula), the missionaries
directed the relocation of native populations to new sites, and developed
new urban plans from whole cloth.
Table 1: Political organization of the Tributary Province of Huaxtepec

under Culhua-Mexica Rule
Tepoztlán Yautepec Huaxtepec Yacapichtlan

Tepetlapan Ticomán Cocoyoque Epazulco
Amatlan Tlaltizapan Ayagualco Atlahuymulco
Xocotitlan Atluelic Chinameca Ecatepeqie
Tepecuitlapilco Amatepec Ixcatepeque Cacatepeque
Cacatepetlac Huitzillan Zacapalco Calapa
Acaueyecan Ixtoluca Tetzuaque Tetlicuyhucan
Quauhchichinola Tetelcingo Tecocuzpan
Ocopetlatla Tecaxque
Oacalco Ylucan
Cahuatlan
Suchitlan
Atlitec
Texcalan
Cequiapan
Achichipico
Apango
Totolapan Tlayacapa Atlatlahucan

Aguacatlan Huizquitepeque Texcalpan
Nepopohualco Cuitlapila Tepetliaxpan

Quauhmama cacinga Atocpa Tonala
Metepeque Tezontitlán
Atongo Nonopala
Quilotepeque Cacatiliucan
Teuhizco
Tolapa
Chalchiutepeque
Source: Susana Gómez Serafín, Altépetl de Huaxtepec: Modificaciones
territoriales desde el siglo XVI (México. DF: INAH, 2011), 40.
58 Chapter Two
Table 2: Augustinian Missions in the Tributary Province of

Huaxtepec, c. 1580/1590
Date of Number of
Number of Number of
Mission Foundation Tributaries
Pueblos c. Resident
1580/1590 Missionaries
Totolapa 1535 4,000 9/10 4
Yecapixtla 1535 3,300 17/15 3-4
Tlayacapa 1554 1,500 7/13 3
Atlatlahucan 1569/1570 4/?
Source: Fray Juan Adriano, O.S.A., “Relación de los Pueblos de yndios que los
religiosos de la Orden de N(ues)tro Padre San Agustín tienen a su cargo en esta
Nueva España,” in Fray Alipio Ruiz Zavala, O.S.A: Historia de la Provincia
Agustíniana del Santísimo Nombre de Jesús de Mexico, 2 vols (Mexico, D.F.:
Editorial Porrúa, 1984), II, 254-262; Relaciónes Geográficas del Siglo XVI:
Mexico Tomo Primero, edición de René Acuña (Mexico, D.F.: UNAM, 1985), 74,
80, 83, 88, 222; René Acuña, ed., Relaciónes Geográficas del Siglo XVI: Mexico
Tomo Segundo (Mexico, D.F.: UNAM, 1986), 33-34, 74-75; René Acuña, ed.,
Relaciónes Geográficas del Siglo XVI: Mexico Tomo Tercero (Mexico, D.F.:
UNAM, 1986), 159-160.
Table 3: Visitas and Number of Tributaries of Yecapixtla in 1571

Pueblo Number Pueblo Number

Tributaries Tributaries
Yecapixtla 1,052 Tecaxic 264
Epatzulco 411 Quatotolco 21
Atlamilulco 89 Zauatlan 151
Ecatepec 136 Suchitan 260
Zacatepec 48 Texcala 270
Calapa 180 Ayapango 70
Tetlecuilucan 142
Source: “Memoria de Acapistla, a la parte de mediodia-Arzobispado, in Luis
Garcia Pimentel, editor, Relación de los obispados de Tlaxcala, Oaxaca y otros
lugares en el siglo XVI (México, D.F.: Private Publication, 1904), 117-119.
Table 4: Dominican Missions in Morelos
Doctrina Year Founded # Priests Est. Pop. In Est. Pop. Pop. 1646 Sujetos
1568 1595
Oaxtepec Before 1535- c. 4 17,870 5,700 333

1526 Cocoyoque

Ayagualco
Chinameca
Ichcatepeque
Zacapalco
Tetzhuaque

Tetelzingo
Quauhatlixco
Quauhtla
Olintepeque
Anenecuilco
Ahuehuepa
Suchimillcatzingo
Tzumpango
Tecpanecapan
Amilltzingo
Ayotinchan
Yautepec 1548 13,352 6,585 1,632
60 Chapter Two
Tepoztlán 1555 3 7,498 4,890 Tepetlapan

Amatlan
Xocotitlan
Tepecuitapilco
Zacatepetlac
Acacueyecan
Tetela del Volcán 1559 2 Three estancias
Santo Domingo

Hueyapan 1559 2 San Miguel
Santo Tomas
San Bartolomé
Santo Tomas

San Bartolomé
Tlaltizapan 1585
Source: Robert J. Mullen, Dominican Architecture in Sixteenth-Century Oaxaca (Tempe: Arizona State University Press, 1975), 234-
237; René Acuña, ed., Relaciones geográficas del siglo XVI: Mexico tomo primero (México, D.F.: UNAM, 1984), 184-185, 197-200,
266; Sherburne F. Cook and Woodrow Borah, Ensayos sobre historia de la Población: Vol. Ill Mexico y California (Mexico, D.F.:
Siglo Veintiuno, 1980),37-39.
Table 5: Selected Dominican Missions in Oaxaca in the Late Sixteenth Century
Doctrina Year Number of Num.c. Visitas Est. Pop. Number of

established Missionaries@ 1580 1568 Tributaries @
Santo Domingo de
Guzmána

(Antequera) Pueblo
de Guaxaca 1535 35-40 40 Talistaca 3,010 1,200
Cuilapa 1550 5-6 20,246 5,000
Teozapotlan 1572 2-3 Cimatem 2,000
Cuyotepeque

Iztepec (Mixtepec)
1564 4 4 Tepecimatlan 1,800
Ayoquexo
Tlacolabacoya
Ocotlán 1555 2 Chichicapa 5,693 2,400
Titiquipaque
(Teitipac) 1555 4 Tlacolula 2,948 2,400
Macuilsuchil
Teutitlan
Tlacucchahuaya
Nexapa 1556 4 Maxaltepeque 1,742 3,200
Xilotepeque
Tizatepeque
Xolotepeque
Tonacayos
62 Chapter Two
Chimaltepeque
Tlazoltepeque
Comaltepeque
Necotepeque
Olintepeque
Xoquila
Ocotepeque
Zapotequillas

Tequecistlan 1585 2 Petlaltepeque 2,400
Tlapaltepeque
Xilotepeque
Topiltepeque

2 or 3 small towns
Xalapa 1558 2 Nanacatepeque 2,736 1,700
Quezalpa
Coatem
Totolapilla
Teguantepeque 1555 4 8,910 2,500
San Ildefonso de
Be’ena’aas (Villa
Alta) 1558 6 Chuapa 6,000
Comaltepeque
Tonaguia
Taguias
Tisaltepeque
Comatem
Guajacatepeque

La Hoya
Lalopaguas
Comaltepeque Abajo
Agabila
Tiltepeque
Laxila
Obegotapcia
Tontontepeque

Metepeque
Tiltepeque
Acoche
Tlaxitolepeque
Cacalotepeque

Maciguixi
Zapotequillas
Ayacastepeque
Noboa
Guiazona
Marinaltepeque
Ocotepeque
Yacoche
La Chixila
Yaguici y Avo
Teolotepeque
Izcuintepeque
Mixitlan
Cacalotepeque
64 Chapter Two
3 or 4 small towns
Etla 1550 2 4,696 1,600
Guaxololitlan
(Huitzo) 1556 2 3 Tenexpa 1,500
Teutila 1561 2 1,400
Nochistlan 1585 2 2 Etlantongo 1,400
Guautlilla
Xaltepeque 1581 2 1,500

Yanhuitlan 1538/1548 8 Chachuapa 17,160 7,000
Tiltepeque
Cuestlauaca
(Coixtlahuaca) 1548 4 Iztem 8,250 4,000

Tequequestepeque
Texupa (Tejupan) 1572 Tonaltepeque 3,063 1,500
2 2
Tamazulapan 1558 2 Tatla 4,472 1,700
Tepusculula 4,000
(Teposcolula) 1538 4 11,418
Tlaxiaco 1550 4 Chicahuastla 11,372 4,200
Cuicuila
Ocotepeque
Tecomastlauaca 1564 2 Xuistlauaca 1,600
Putla
Achiutla 1558 4 Tlatlaltepeque 3,238 2,200
Yucucuy
Marinaltepeque
Atoyatepeque

Santiago Tilantongo c. 1560 3 Nudito/ 2,845
Tlaxiatepque
Diyusi/
Xinytepeque
Teyuchi/
Yctziapa
Nuyagua/
Tamazola

Aqueya/
Aqueyatla
Chiyo/
Chayoltongo
Yucuuduchi/

Yeltepeque
Teyagui/
Ametla
@Figures from undated report “Relación de la gente que hay en todo este Obispado de la Ciudad de Antequera del Valle de
Guaxaca, desta Nueva España asi de Españoles como Mextizos e Indios, para enviar al Consejo de Indias de S.M.,” in Garcia
Pimentel.
Source: Luis Garcia Pimentel, editor, Relación de los obispados de Tlaxcala, Oaxaca y otros lugares en el siglo XVI (México,
D.F.: Private Publication, 1904), 69-76; Francisco del Paso y Troncoso, ed., Papeles de Nueva España. Segunda Series Geografia y
Estadistica Tomo IV (Madrid: Tip. “Sucesores de Rivadenyra,” 1905); Robert Mullen, Dominican Architecture in Sixteenth-Century
Oaxaca (Tempe: Arizona State University Press, 1975), 234-237, 242; René Acuña, ed., Relaciones geográficas del siglo XVI:
Antequera. Tomo Primero (Mexico, D.F.: UNAM, 1984.
66 Chapter Two
Table 6: Structure of the Jurisdiction of Tlaxiaco c. 1550
Cabecera Number of Estancias Reported Population

Tlaxiaco 31 913 houses, 4019 above age 12
Yglesia de Santa María 9 380 tributaries
Choquistepec 6 355 tributaries
Chilapa 5 340 married men

Tupulcultepec 22 1,122 tmarried men
Comaltepec 6 227 houses, 1,090 over age 12
Udecoyo 5 690 men
Pioltepec 4 295 married men
Tepomamastla 2 105 houses, 491 over age 12

Source: Franciso del Paso y Troncoso, Papeles de Nueva España publicados de orden y con fondos del gobierno mexicano. Segunda
serie geografía y estadística: Tomo I Suma de visitas de pueblos por orden alfabetico (Madrid: Tip. “Sucesores de Rivadeneyra,
1905), 282-283.
CHAPTER THREE
DATELINE YODZOCAHI (YANHUITLAN) 1542:

“IDOLATRY” AND AN INQUISITION
INVESTIGATION
Two high profile inquisition cases in the Ñudzahui (Mixteca Alta)

territory of Oaxaca seriously tested Dominican complacency in their belief
of the success of their evangelization campaign, and provided evidence of
a systematic campaign on the part of the native nobility and priests to
obstruct the Dominican evangelization campaign. The 1546 Coatlán
inquisition record noted that a priest had visited the community around
1538, and had demanded that all idols be given to him to be destroyed.
The nobles and priests assembled the least important idols that they gave
to the priest, and hid the more important ones so that they could continue
making sacrifices to them.1 The record also noted that leaders from a
number of communities met at Coatlán in 1543 to discuss strategies to
resist Christianity and the Dominican evangelization campaign. They
feasted and practiced their traditional rites, including self-sacrifice by
spilling their own blood. Witnesses also testified that the lords of Coatlán
continued to make sacrifices to the old gods and particularly the rain deity
Dzahui, including human sacrifices.2
The Coatlán inquisition record points to an organized pattern of
resistance to the new faith the Dominicans attempted to introduce. The
case at Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan) was more complicated, since native nobles
from other communities involved in disputes with the ruling lineage of
Yodzocahi made the allegations, and were important witnesses in the
investigation. Nevertheless, the details outlined in the inquisition
investigation also point to resistance to the Dominican evangelization
1
For a discussion of the Coatlán inquisition case see Kevin Terraciano, The
Mixtecs of Colonial Oaxaca: Ñudzahui History, Sixteenth Through Eighteenth
Centuries (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001), 263.
2
Ibid., 281.
68 Chapter Three
campaign.3 The primary target of the investigation was don Francisco, the
lord of Yodzocahi, who was accused of condoning human sacrifices, of
sacrificing his own blood to the old gods and encouraging others to do the
same, of trying to prevent the missionaries from destroying idols, and of
mocking natives who had become Christians.
Fig. 27: The Dominican mission Santo Domingo Yanhuitlan.
One point of conflict allegedly occurred when the Dominicans ordered

the destruction of a temple to make room for the construction of their
church and convent. The Dominicans chose the most important temple
platform in Yodzocahi as the site of their new sacred complex.4 They
mobilized the resources of the community, including native labor, to build
the large church and convent that took some 25 years to complete (see
Figure 27).5 It was during the first stages of the construction project that
several incidents allegedly occurred that indicated that don Francisco
embraced Catholicism superficially at best. Don Francisco reportedly tried
3
The most recent analyses of the Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan) inquisition case are
Terraciano, The Mixtecs of Colonial Mexico, 278-283; Byron E. Hamann,
“Inquisition and Social Conflicts in Sixteenth-Century Yanhuitlan and Valencia:
Catholic Colonization in the Early Modern Transatlantic World,” unpublished
Ph.D. dissertation, University of Chicago, 2011, particularly 89-109, 144-221.
4
Ibid., 461.
5
De Burgoa, Geográfica descripción, 1: 292.
Dateline Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan) 1542 69
to prevent the dismantling of the temple by native workers. Following the

removal of the temple, he allegedly made blood sacrifices from his tongue
and ear lobe on the site of the former temple, and encouraged others to do
so as well. The inquisition record noted that don Francisco encouraged his
subjects: “to worship in the place where the houses and temples of the
deities used to be, which is the southern side of the church patio.”6
Don Francisco and the lords of Yodzocahi denied the allegations
brought against them, and given that the charges arose in the midst of
inter-community conflicts the truth may never be known. However, the
allegations caught the attention of the inquisition, and the investigation
occurred at a time of increased questioning by the missionaries of the
efficacy of the initial approaches to evangelization. The inquisition record
is incomplete, so there is no information as to the outcome of the
investigation.
The details of pre-Hispanic religious practices, including self-sacrifice,
are corroborated by other sources, including the 1579 relación geográfica
report for Santiago Tilantongo. It should be noted, however, that the
details provided in the relaciones geográficas varied from report to report.
The report for Nochistlan, for example, merely reported that “...they
worshipped and had as God the demon with different forms of worship
and sacrifices that they made.”7 The report for Tilantongo, on the other
hand, noted that priests called taysaqui attended idols (qhyosayo) made of
stone or wood in a temple located on a hill. The priests made sacrifices to

the idols that included quail, doves, other fowl, dogs, deer, and finally two
or three people, whose hearts the priests removed from their bodies and
offered to the idols. People came to the temple, and under the supervision
of the priests, “they sacrificed and shed blood from their ears and tongue
using lancets or knives.”8 It was this self-sacrifice that don Francisco was
accused of making on the site of the temple the Dominicans had
demolished to make room for their church and convent.
Following the inquisition investigation a younger Ñudzahui leader
named don Gabriel de Guzmán, who may have been educated by the
Dominicans, assumed power in Yodzocahi. Don Gabriel recognized the
importance of cooperating with the missionaries. It was during his tenure
6
Quoted in Terraciano, The Mixtecs of Colonial Mexico, 280.
7
Francisco del Paso y Troncoso, ed., Papeles de Nueva España. Segunda Series
Geografía y Estadística Tomo IV (Madrid: Tip. “Sucesores de Rivadenyra,” 1905),
208.
8
Ibid., 73-74.
70 Chapter Three
(1558-1591) that work on the church and convent reached completion, and
he donated land to establish a chaplaincy.9
The investigation of idolatry at Yodzocahi paralleled other similar
allegations of the covert practice of pre-Hispanic beliefs in the decades
immediately following the Spanish conquest (see Chapter 1 above).
Several illustrations from the Lienzo de Tlaxcala documented the
persistence of sacrifices to pre-Hispanic gods, and the punishments the
Spanish administered for idolatry. Lamina 10 depicts Franciscans burning
temples, with demons fleeing. This reflected the belief held by the
sixteenth century missionaries that pre-Hispanic religion was inspired by
Satan. The caption to the illustration reads “Quema e incendido de los
templos idiatricos de la provin[ci]a de Tlaxcala por los frailes y españoles,
y [con] consentim[ient]o de los naturales” [Burning by the friars and
Spaniards of the idolatrous temples of the Province of Tlaxcala, with the
consent of the natives]. Lamina 12 shows a native making a blood
sacrifice of a bird in a cave. A Franciscan discovers the native, and at the
top of the illustration the native is executed by hanging. The caption reads
“Justicia que se hizo de un cacique de Tlaxcala porque habia reincidido en
ser idolatra; habiendo sido cr[ist]iano , se había ido a unas cuevas a
idolatrar” [Justice done to a cacique [tlatoani] of Tlaxcala because he
relapsed back to being an idolater; having been a Christian, he had gone to
some caves to idolatrize] Lamina 14 (see Figure 29) depicts the hanging of
five men and a woman, and the burning at the stake of two other men. A
Spaniard and two Franciscans observe the execution. The caption reads
“Justicia grande que se hizo de cinco caciques muy prin[cipa]les de
Tlaxcala, y una mujer, señora de aquella tierra, porque de c[rist]ianos,
tornaron a idolatrar, y dos demás destos, fueron quemados por pertinances,
por man[da]do de Cortes [y] por consentim[ien]to y beneplácito de los
c[uatr]o s[enor]es, y con esto, se arraigo la doctrina cr[ist]iana”[The great
justice done to five very important caciques of Tlaxcala, and a woman, a
lady from that land, because being Christians they returned to idolatrize,
and two others of these were burned for participating, by order of Cortes
and with the consent and blessing of the four lords [of Tlaxcala], and with
this they secured the Christian doctrine].10 Fr. Martín de Valencia, O.F.M.,
one of the first twelve Franciscans to arrive in Mexico, orchestrated the
Tlaxcalan executions in 1527.11
9
Terraciano, The Mixtecs of Colonial Mexico, 284.
10
René Acuña, ed., Relaciones geográficas del siglo XVI: Tlaxcala. Tomo primero
(México, D.F.: UNAM, 1984), cuadros 10, 12, 14.
11
Miguel León-Portilla, "Los franciscanos vistos por el hombre náhuatl.
Testimonios indígenas del siglo XVI." Estudios de cultura Náhuatl 17 (1984), 270-
The missionaries blamed native leaders for the continued practice of

pre-Hispanic rituals and sacrifices. This, in turn, reflected the method the
missionaries used in their evangelization campaign. They first attempted to
baptize native leaders, and then used the leaders to convince their subjects
to embrace the new faith. This was a strategy that Christian missionaries
had employed centuries earlier when attempting to extirpate paganism in
Central and Eastern Europe. Not all native leaders in central Mexico
supported the missionaries and their agenda, and in some instances the
missionaries alienated leaders who had initially supported them. This was
a factor in the case of don Carlos Ometochtzin, who used an alliance with
the Franciscans in Tezcoco to consolidate his authority, but later distanced
himself from the missionaries when they pressured him to marry a woman
other than his niece with whom he had had children.12 The missionaries
expected native leaders to collaborate with their agenda, and had problems
with those leaders such as don Francisco and don Carlos Ometochtzin who
did not.
Tláloc and Xipe Tótec

In his book titled Historia de las Indias de Nueva España e islas de
Tierra Firme, the Dominican missionary Diego Durán, O.P. (1537-1588)
described the pre-conquest rituals associated with Tláloc and Xipe Tótec at
the start of the agricultural cycle in the spring.13 Durán, a native of Sevilla,
came to Mexico between 1542 and 1544 with his family, and first lived in
Tezcoco. He became a Dominican in 1554 and took his vows on March 8,
1556. He spent time in Oaxaca, and later at Chimalhuacan Atenco south of
Tezcoco. In 1581, he became vicar of Santo Domingo de Guzmán
Hueyapan in what today is Morelos, and served there until his death in
1587 or 1588.14 Durán arrived at Hueyapan several years after De la Cruz
left Tetela del Volcán, and most likely was familiar with the mural of the
miracle of the Virgin of the Rosary.
271, identifies Martin de Valencia as the Franciscan in the laminas. On the

Tlaxcala executions also see Roberto Moreno, "La inquisición para Indios en la
Nueva España, siglos XVI al XIX." Chicomózoc: Boletín del Seminario de
Estudios Prehispánicos para la Descolonización de Mexico (1989): 7-20.
12
For a detailed analysis of the politics of the events leading to the trial of don
Carlos Ometochtzin in 1539 see Patricia Lopes Don, Bonfires of Culture:
Franciscans, Indigenous Leaders, and Inquisition in Early Mexico, 1524-1540.
(Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2010).
13
I use the two volume edition published by Editorial Porrúa (México, D.F., 2006).
14
Ibid., I: XII.
72 Chapter Three
Fig. 28: Lamina 14 of the Lienzo de Tlaxcala showing the execution of native
leaders for idolatry including a woman. Two Franciscans are present at the
execution, including Martín de Valencia, O.F.M., who orchestrated the executions.
From René Acuña, ed., Relaciones geográficas del siglo XVI: Tlaxcala. Tomo
primero (México, D.F.: UNAM, 1984).
Fig. 29: Santo Domingo de Guzmán Hueyapan (Morelos).
Durán described the rituals associated with the water-earth-fertility

religion that guaranteed life-giving rain at the start of the agricultural cycle
in the spring. The importance of Tláloc in the Mesoamerican religious

tradition can be seen in the space the Culhua-Mexica afforded the deity in
the sacred precinct of Tenochtitlan. The rain deity shared the same temple
with Huitzilopochtli, the principal Culhua-Mexica deity. The statue of
Tláloc in the templo mayor was of worked stone, and Durán described it
as being ugly and as having large teeth. The statue was painted red and
was decorated with green plumes, presumably quetzal feathers. Moreover,
the statue had a collar of green stones (jade). It carried a leather bag in its
right hand that contained ritual items.15 The large teeth were characteristic
of the representations of Tláloc, as seen, for example, in the mural of red
Tláloc at the Tepantitla palace complex at Teotihuacan (see Fig. 10), in
the Codex Borgia (see Fig. 30), and in other representations.
15
Ibid., I:81.
74 Chapter Three
Fig. 30: Tláloc from the Codex Borgia.
The Cerro de Tlálocan (modern Cerro de Tláloc), located in the

mountains that border the Valley of Mexico on the east and close to
Coathinchan south of Tezcoco, was the site of the principal temple
dedicated to Tláloc. Durán described the temple and the ritual held there
every year to initiate the agricultural cycle. The ritual sacrifice took place
in the temple complex near the top of the mountain (ruins of the temple
still exist). There was a walled patio and a stone structure with a wooden
roof. Inside the structure known as tetzacualco was a large statue of Tláloc
surrounded by smaller idols that represented the surrounding mountains

and canyons. Political leaders from central Mexico assembled at the
temple on April 29 to sacrifice a young boy of about six or seven years of
age whose blood was placed on the statue, and to adorn the statue with
robes and a crown of feathers. In the period immediately prior to the
Spanish conquest, the Culhua-Mexica tlatoani Moctezuma was the first
leader to adorn and feed the statue, and was followed in order by the
tlatoque of Tezcoco, Tlacopan (Tacuba), and Xochimilco. Following the
sacrifice and adornment of the statue, the tlatoque came down from the
mountain to make sacrifices in bodies of water such as rivers, lakes, and
fountains. Following the ceremony guards protected the temple to prevent
theft, and the robes and crown of feathers remained on the statue until they
rotted.16
A second sacrifice was made outside of Tenochtitlan, after the tlatoque
had completed the sacrifices on the Cerro de Tlálocan. The ceremony
began with singing and dancing before a tree brought from the Cerro de
Culhuacán (Cerro de la Estrella) to the temple in the sacred precinct of
16
Ibid., I: 82-85.
Tenochtitlan. The tree was given the name tota (our father), and was
surrounded by four smaller trees that represented its children. After the
tlatoque arrived, the priests sacrificed a girl of about six or seven years of
age, who was dressed in blue to represent the water of the lake and other
water sources. The girl was beheaded, and her blood drained into a
whirlpool in the lake at a site known as Pantitlan. The tlatoque also made
sacrifices of gold and precious stones thrown into the whirlpool. The tree
tota was left in the sacred precinct until it rotted.17
Fig. 31: A mural identified in 1942 by Antonio Caso as being Talocan, “the
paradise of Tláloc.” From the Tepantitla palace complex, Teotihuacan (Edo. de
Mexico).
A mural in the Tepantitla palace complex at Teotihuacan, illustrates

another element of the beliefs regarding Tláloc. It was that Tláloc gave
humans corn from the cave of origin inside of a sacred mountain. Scholars
now believe that the pyramid of the sun at Teotihuacan and the cave
underneath the pyramid was a representation of the cave of origin. The
cave originates below the main stairway that leads to the top of the
pyramid, and extends to the center of the structure.18 Mountains were
sacred, because they were sources of life-giving water that flowed out as
17
Ibid., I: 86-89.
18
See Karl A. Taube, “The Teotihuacán cave of origin: The iconography and
architecture of emergence mythology in Mesoamerica and the American
Southwest,” RES Anthropology and Aesthetics 12 (1986), 52-81.
76 Chapter Three
rivers.19 In the mural water flows from the mountain, and makes corn and
other plants grow. Scholars specializing in pre-Hispanic Mesoamerican
religious beliefs and iconography may debate the exact identity of the
Tepantitla mural series, but for the analysis here the key point is the
association of mountains and caves as the source of water, and cases of
idolatry following the initiation of the “spiritual conquest” that involved
blood sacrifices made in caves.
Durán also described the ritual cycle associated with tlacaxipeualiztli,
or the flaying of men, held in March towards the end of the dry season.
The Dominican translated the name Xipe Tótec as the “flayed and
mistreated man” and the “frightening lord.” Xipe Tótec was also known as
Tlatlauhqui Tezcatl, or the “luminous mirror.” The statue of the god was
also of stone, and was a representation of an open mouthed man dressed in
a flayed skin. Durán wrote that more men were sacrificed during this ritual
cycle than at any other time. The ritual cycle began 40 days before the
actual feast day. A man, usually a slave, dressed to be the living
representative of the god, walked in public. Durán also noted that a man
was dressed as Xipe Tótec in each barrio (neighborhood-calpulli). Priests
sacrificed the men by removing their hearts, and then flayed their bodies.
A new group of men then dressed in the flayed skins and wore the same
clothing and emblems.20
On the feast day priests took 30 to 40 of the living representatives of
the god to the temple known as Cuauxicalco, where there were two
sacrificial stones. The stones were known as Temalcatl (“stone wheel”)
and Cuauhxicalli (“trough” for collecting the blood of sacrificial victims),
and the ritual was known as Tlauaunalitzli (“to wound with a sword”). The
first stage of the ritual was to tie the sacrificial victim to Temalcatl to
engage in ritual combat with two eagle and two jaguar warriors. The
priests tied the victim to the stone by the foot, and gave the man a shield
and sword of plumes. When wounded in the ritual combat, the priests took
the sacrificial victim to Cuauhxicalli, and removed his heart as an offering
to the sun.21 Durán reported that workers uncovered the Cuauhxicalli stone
at the Cathedral construction site in what had been the sacred precinct of
Tenochtitlan.22
19
Doris Heyden, "Pintura mural y mitología en Teotihuacán," Anales del Instituto
de Investigaciones Estéticas 12:48 (1978), 19-33.
20
Durán, Historia, I: 97-98.
21
Ibid., I: 98-99.
22
Ibid., I: 100.
Fig. 32: Xipe Tótec from the Codex Borgia.
For 20 days following the ritual of Tlauaunalitzli a new group of men

dressed in the flayed skins that the previously sacrificed men had worn,
and went from door to door to ask for alms. The Xipes also blessed the
women and children that they encountered. At the end of the 20 day cycle
the priests collected the flayed skins, and buried them in an underground
room under the main stairs of the temple.23 The end of this ritual cycle set
the stage for the sacrifices to Tláloc and the start of the rains and the
planting season.
23
Ibid., I: 101-102.
78 Chapter Three
Dzahui
The Dominican missionary Francisco de Burgoa, O.P. narrated an
incident that involved the Dominican missionary Gerónimo de Abrego,
O.P., stationed at Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan). De Abrego discussed pre-
Hispanic beliefs and practices with one of the lords of Yodzocahi. The
discussion one day was on the subject of the rains, and the native told the
Dominican that they continued to make sacrifices to Dzahui (“dios de las
lluvias”) in a temple in a cave to guarantee the rains and bountiful crops. A
priest maintained the cave-temple, and the lord and other lords still went to
make sacrifices there. The Dominican went to the cave, which was spacious,
and found evidence of sacrifices of animals. Moreover there was a
pyramidal column (“columna piramidal”) of ice as clear as crystal next to
where the sacrifices had been made, that the natives believed to be a
representation of Dzahui. The Dominican preached to the natives he found
in the cave that the ice column was a natural and not a divine
phenomenon, and broke-up the ice column. He took pieces of ice that he
melted in his hand to drink to show that Dzahui was powerless.24
In 1652, officials accused Diego de Palomares, the alcalde of
Malinaltepec in Oaxaca, of making sacrifices to a bundled idol in a cave to
bring rain (Dzahui), and that he had invited others to make sacrifices.
Palomares denied the charges, and instead claimed that he had found the
the sacrifices in the cave. The sacrifices included burned copal, candles,
feathers, and animals.25 The case at Malinaltepec occurred a century
following the inquisition investigation at Yodzocahi, and showed that
natives continued to rely on Dzahui to produce rains. This case and the one
narrated by Francisco de Burgoa also showed that the continued worship
of Dzahui had been driven underground by the persecution of the
missionaries and civil officials. Caves now became the temples, and
priests made covert sacrifices whereas in the past these sacrifices had been
made publically in temples.
The Ñudzahui had different deities in addition to Dzahui. The relación
geográfica report for Puctla named different gods. One deity represented
by a jade idol was named Quacusiqhi. Another was Toyna Yoco, who was
the deity of merchants. Qhuau was the deity of hunters. Warriors
worshipped the sun, and they sacrificed the hearts of sacrificial victims.
According to the report, Dzahui was the deity of farmers.26 The report for
24
Francisco de Burgoa, O.P., Palestra Historial de virtudes y ejemplares
apostólicos (Mexico, D.F.: Editorial Porrúa, 1989), 478-482.
25
26
Acuña, ed., Relaciones geográficas del siglo XVI: Antequera, 312-313.
Tejupa identified two other deities. One was Yaguinzi, which meant “air,”
and a second was Yanacuu which meant “lizard.” Sacrifices to these two
deities included dogs, quail, green feathers, and humans.27
Fig. 33: The rain deity Dzahui.
The Yodzocahi and Coatlán inquisition investigations provide details

of the practice of the religion dedicated to Dzahui before and immediately
following the Spanish conquest. Priests and native lords made sacrifices
during droughts and at times of stress such as epidemics. Caxan (1-Eagle),
who was an unbaptized priest originally from Molcaxtepec, testified that
he made sacrifices to Dzahui at different times of the year, and cared for
the idol. During periods of drought Caxan promised to make sacrifices to
27
Del Paso y Troncoso, Geografía y Estadística Tomo IV, 55.
80 Chapter Three
Dzahui that included doves, quail, dogs, parrots, and a child provided by
the lords of Yodzocahi, and sprinkled water on the offerings. Caxan also
bounced a rubber ball before the idol of Dzahui, and then burned the ball
and smeared the idol with the resin. The priest took the idol to the top of a
high hill, and there scarified the child by removing the heart and placing it
at the base of the statue. He then burned the heart and used the ashes as an
offering.28 A second priest named Xaco (7-Rain) admitted when
interrogated during the Yanhuitlan investigation that he had made child
sacrifices on a hill called Yucumano. A slave named Juan testified that
two nobles from Yodzocahi don Domingo and don Francisco, had ordered
child sacrifices made as late as 1540 or 1541, after the arrival of the first
Dominican missionaries.29 Don Francisco allegedly played a leading role
in the continued worship of Dzahui, charges he denied at the time of the
investigation. Witnesses reported that he painted his body black, and drew
blood from his tongue and ear lobe as sacrifices to bring rain. He
reportedly encouraged others to also make sacrifices and drink pulque.30
There were also other rituals associated with the rain deity. For
example, Juanes de Angulo, O.P., stationed at the Dominican mission at
Yutatnuhu (Santiago Apoala), reported having found evidence of
voladores (yosicoyahandi-“fly like an eagle”) on a hill called Quiavi
located near Chacchuapa. The Dominican found the poles used in the
ritual, in which the flyers descend to earth from the top of the pole.31 The
persistence of the ritual of the voladores may also have been associated
with the importance of the sacred valley of Yutatnuhu, where the
Ñudzahui culture began with the creation of the Great Mother Pochote
Tree that gave birth to the founders of the different dynasties, and of the
first Primordial Couple at Kaua Kaandiui (“Place Where the Heaven
Was”).32
28
29
Ibid., 266.
30
Ibid., 265.
31
Ibid., 267. The best known voladores today come from Papantla in northern
Veracruz.
32
Maarten Jansen and Gabina Perez Jimenez, “Renaming the Mexican Codices,”
Ancient Mesoamerica 15 (2004), 267-271; Terraciano, The Mixtecs of Colonial
Mexico, 256-260. The Codex Vindobonensis Mexicanus I depicts the tree birth at
Yutatnuhu. Terraciano reproduces the image on p, 258.
Fig. 34: The sacred valley of Yutatnuhu (Apoala).

Conclusions
The rituals and sacrifices made to Tláloc, Xipe Tótec, and Dzahui were
similar, and included sacrifices of young children, the most precious gift
that could be given to the gods. The rain and fertility deities had provided
for the natives for centuries. The arrival of the Spaniards initiated a
spiritual conflict and crisis in the world view and lives of the native
populations in central Mexico. The Náhuas and Ñudzahui must have
thought that their gods were angered by the introduction of the new deities
(Jesus and the saints), that could not provide rain and ensure bountiful
crops. The old gods punished the natives by denying them life-giving
water. In response to the imposition of Catholicism and in order to restore
the cosmic balance that existed prior to the conquest and arrival of the
missionaries, the natives made sacrifices to placate their gods despite the
risk of punishment imposed by the missionaries and Spanish justice. The
Spaniards and their gods only brought lethal epidemics of smallpox,
measles, and other maladies, and recurring epidemics decimated the native
82 Chapter Three
populations.33 The missionaries preached that God sent drought and

disease as a punishment for idolatry and apostasy, and that Satan had
inspired pre-Hispanic religious beliefs and practices, including the human
sacrifices that had maintained the cosmic balance for centuries.
An escalating conflict or “culture” war developed as the natives took
steps to placate their gods, but faced the risk of being exposed by the
missionaries who attempted but failed to create a new cosmic balance. The
occurrence of drought and the new lethal maladies the Spaniards brought
were evidence of this failure. The forms of punishment for idolatry and
apostasy, including capital punishment, exposed the failure of the
evangelization campaign and the efforts of the missionaries to vanquish
Satan in the “cultural war.” The Coatlán and Yodzocahi inquisition
investigations demonstrated the superficiality of the conversion of the
natives, and the urgency they felt to make continued sacrifices to Dzahui
to bring life-giving rains and to restore the cosmic balance. The Ñudzahui
were not going to abandon their old gods, and the Coatlán “war council”
shows the extent to which the natives were willing to go to resist the
imposition of the new faith.
33
The relaciones geográficas contained references to epidemics. The reports on
Cuahuitlan, Pinotecpa, Potutla, and Icpatepque recorded the chronology of the first
epidemics, and the high mortality resulting from the contagion. There was a
smallpox outbreak in 1535 and measles in 1544. Acuña, Relaciones geográficas
del siglo XVI: Antequera 130-131.
CHAPTER FOUR
VISUALIZING THE SACRED:

EMBEDDED STONES AND NATIVE
RELIGIOUS ICONOGRAPHY
Native laborers incorporated stones from pre-Hispanic temples and

other religious structures into the churches and convents constructed in
central Mexico in the sixteenth century. Pre-Hispanic temples commonly
incorporated embedded stones with representations of deities, geometric
designs, or flowers that had religious significance. The templo mayor at
Tlatelolco conserves different types of embedded stones including flowers
and chalchihuitl that was a symbol of life giving water associated with
Tláloc.1 The missionaries used temples and other pre-Hispanic structures
as sources of worked stone to build their sacred complexes. The
Augustinians, for example, had stones taken from Teotihuacan to build

their convent at Acolman.2 Many of the stones used in the building of
churches and convents contained images of pre-Hispanic gods and
symbols important in the continued covert practice of the old faith. The
natives consciously placed embedded stones in strategic locations as a
means to practice their old beliefs. This is the interpretation presented by
British scholar Eleanor Wake.3
1
2
Some missionaries wrote during the early stages of the so-called “spiritual
conquest” that the practice was to employ building materials from demolished pre-
Hispanic temples. See Margarita Loera Chávez y Peniche, “Memoria indígena en
|Templos Católicos. Siglo XVI. Estado de México,” Convergencia. Revista de
Ciencias Sociales 10 No. 31 (enero-abril 2003), 253-281.
3
Wake, Framing the Sacred.
84 Chapter Four
Fig. 35: Embedded stones on a wall of the pre-Hispanic Templo Mayor at

Tlatelolco (Distrito Federal).
In the last decades of the sixteenth century clerics wrote that natives
were paying too much attention to the stones that had been incorporated
into the churches and convents, and were concerned that the natives might
use the embedded stones to continue practicing their old faith. Given the
high profile cases of what the missionaries defined as idolatry and
apostasy earlier in the century such as the trial of don Carlos Ometochtzin
and the auto de fé at Maní in the Yucatán in 1562, the missionaries
became increasingly concerned that embedded stones contributed to the
persistence of traditional religious practices. The Third Church Council
held in Mexico City in 1585 decreed the removal of embedded stones from
religious structures.4 The 1585 decree stated the intent of church leaders to
remove the stones. However, embedded stones remained in many churches
and convents. Their inclusion converted the Catholic churches into temple-
churches with dual meaning, one pre-Hispanic and the other Catholic.
Wake also suggests that the embedded stones served to mark sight lines in
4
For the history and text of the decrees from the council see Martínez Ferrer,
Decretos del concilio tercero provincial mexicano.
Visualizing the Sacred 85
a complex sacred landscape that linked temples to sacred mountains, and

also functioned as horizon or orientation calendars. Embedded stones on
post-conquest church walls could have served to mark specific dates
illuminated by the first light of the morning sun or the last light in the
evening.5
Fig. 36: Embedded stones on the exterior wall of the Augustinian convent church
at Acolman that formed sight lines to sacred mountains.
There are examples of embedded stones incorporated into churches and

convents that are related to the rain god Tláloc and the fertility of the earth
associated with Xipe Tótec. Tláloc and Xipe Tótec were perhaps the most
important deities for the majority of the native population in central
Mexico who depended on life-giving rain for agriculture. Moreover,
Tláloc had given humans the gift of corn and other cultigens. The
incorporation of the stone with the face of Tláloc at the rear of Santiago
Tlaltelolco church, for example, gave the temple-church a dual meaning,
which was not unusual in pre-Hispanic temples where several gods might
share the same sacred space. Huitzilopochtli and Tláloc shared the Templo
5
Wake, Framing the Sacred, 161-167.
86 Chapter Four
Mayor at Tenochtitlan. The natives worshipped the Christian god and

saints at Santiago church, but in their conceptualization the incorporation
of the stone in the body of the church Jesus converted the structure into
sacred space shared with Tláloc (see Figure 11).
Fig. 37: Illustration from Diego Durán, O.P., showing the Templo Mayor in the
sacred precinct at Tenochtitlan shared by Tláloc and Huitzilopochtli.
Architectural historian George Kubler summarized the details of the

construction of the church and convent complex at Tlatelolco. Two
Franciscans resided at the convent in 1535, although the formal establishment
of the doctrina did not occur until seven years later in 1543. The first
church was a three nave structure located in the center of a larger complex
that included the Colegio Real de Santa Cruz and the hospital for the
native population. The church reportedly was in a deteriorated condition
by the first years of the seventeenth century. Between 1604 and 1609, the
Franciscans directed the construction of a new church, the structure
currently at the site, and work began on a large cloister in 1653.6 The
rebuilding of the church in the early seventeenth century may have utilized
stone from the original structure, and the embedded stone with the face of
Tláloc may have been incorporated into the first structure. If this were the
case, the stone would have been placed in the Tlatelolco church as early as
the 1530s.
Fig. 38: An embedded stone with the image of Tláloc on the exterior wall of the
Franciscan church San Martín de Tours Huaquechula (Puebla).
The embedded stone at the rear of the church at Tlatelolco is not the
only example of stones with depictions of Tláloc incorporated into the new
Christian sacred complexes. One such stone is located at the base of the
exterior wall of the church at the Franciscan convent San Martín de Tours
Huaquechula (Puebla) (see Figure 38), and is one of several embedded
stones incorporated into the church. The placement of the stone with the
image of Tláloc was not coincidental. Its location at the base of the
exterior church wall also converted the structure into a temple with dual
meaning. The first Franciscans resided at Huaquechula in the mid-1530s.
Work on the church was completed around 1560, and the embedded stone
6
George Kubler, Arquitectura Mexicana del siglo XVI (México, D.F.: Fondo de
Cultura Económica, 1983), 587-588.
88 Chapter Four
with the face of Tláloc would have been placed in the structure at that
time. Work on the cloister was completed around the end of the sixteenth
century.7
A third example of an embedded stone with the image of Tláloc exists
at the Augustinian church-convent complex at Mixquic (Distrito Federal).
The stone is located in the bell tower, and there are several other
embedded stones in the same structure. The Augustinians directed the
construction of the church and convent on a pre-Hispanic temple platform,
and excavations beneath the cloister uncovered pre-Hispanic stones
including stones used in the juego de pelota (ritual ball game). The
Augustinians established a presence at Mixquic in the late 1530s, and
construction of the church reportedly had been completed by the 1560s,
although the façade was later modified.8 The stone with the face of Tláloc
most likely was placed in the bell tower at that time.
The incorporation of embedded stones in the new temple-churches and
convents also reflected the continuation of the pre-Hispanic practice of
decorating temples with religious symbols. The Franciscan convent at
Tzintzuntzan is an example. The P’urépecha workers who built the
convent incorporated stones from the nearby city into the church, hospital
open chapel, and convent buildings. The number and variety of embedded
stones suggests native agency. This was not the recycling of building
materials, but rather the incorporation of native iconography in the new
temple-churches.9
Embedded stones and other native religious iconography incorporated
into ostensibly Catholic sacred complexes offer evidence of the persistence
of pre-Hispanic religious practices at a time that the missionaries believed
that their evangelization campaign had been successful. Many embedded
stones were visible, which re-enforced their spiritual value. Others,
however, were placed within walls out of sight, but the natives who had
placed them there knew of their existence and in placing them in the
Catholic structures they also gave these structures a dual meaning. The
open chapel at the Dominican convent at Yodzocoo (Coixtlahuaca) in the
Sierra Mixteca provides an example of this type of embedded stones.
Recent restoration work on the open chapel resulted in the discovery of
embedded stones found inside the walls. The open chapel was the first
7
Ibid., 563.
8
Ibid., 623.
9
For a study of the embedded stones in the Franciscan church at convent at
Tzintzuntzan see Veronica Hernández Dias, Imagines en piedra de Tzintzuntzan,
Michoacán: Un arte prehispanico y virreinal (México, D.F.: UNAM, 2011). This
study offers a more limited interpretation of the embedded stones.
Fig. 39: The convent at Tzintzuntzan, showing embedded stones.

Fig. 40: The open chapel at San Juan Bautista Yodzocoo (Coixtlahuaca, Oaxaca).
90 Chapter Four
temple-church built at Yodzocoo (Coixtlahuaca). The stones appear to be

representations of water spirits related to Dzahui, and their incorporation
into the structure of the open chapel had a similar function as did the
embedded stones with the face of Tláloc. The stones converted what
ostensibly was a Catholic structure into a temple-church with space shared
by Jesus and Dzahui. It afforded the natives a way to continue to worship
the source of life-giving rain.
Fig. 41: Embedded stones found in the walls of the open chapel at Yodzocoo
(Coixtlahuaca, Oaxaca).
In the Shadow of the Volcanoes: Embedded Stones

at Tlalmanalco and Amecameca
Two cases from a region in what today is the Estado de Mexico
provide further insights to the persistence of native religion following the
Spanish conquest. The two cases are from the Franciscan convent San Luis
Obispo Tlalmanalco and the Dominican convent Nuestra Señora de la
Asunción Amecameca, both located in the hills that border the
southeastern corner of the Valley of Mexico close to the two volcanoes
Popocatépetl and Iztaccihuatl, and south of the Cerro de Tláloc and the
temple dedicated to the rain god. Both cases had connections to the
continued practice of the cult of Tláloc and of fertility, and that of
Tlalmanalco is an example of embedded stones aligned to sacred hills and
mountains.
Fig. 42: San Luis Obispo Tlalmanalco (Edo de Mexico).
Antonio de Ciudad Real described the Franciscan convent at

Tlalmanalco in the mid-1580s. The chronicler noted that construction
continued on the cloister: “…it has three rooms, and they were making the
corridors of the cloisters, along with the rest: four missionaries [religiosos]
lived there [.]”10 Ciudad Real further described the town:
The town of Tlalmanalco is large and with a numerous population
[mucha vecindad], the houses are of stone and mud and some of adobe, the
first friars founded there a house or monastery for nuns or pious [native]
women, but later seeing that it was not convenient because of the lack of
interest [flaco sujeto] that there was among them, they didn’t move
forward with the work; the walls of the house are still there [.]11
10
Antonio De Ciudad Real, Relación breve y verdadera, 1: 170. The original
reads: “…tenia hechos tres cuartos y estanse haciendo los corredores de los
claustros con lo demás: moraban allí cuatro religiosos[.]”
11
Ibid., I: 170. The original reads: “El pueblo de Tlalmanalco es grande y de
mucha vecindad, las casas son de piedra y barro y algunas de adobe, los primeros
92 Chapter Four
The cloister and church were built between 1582 and 1591.12 One
architectural feature that Tlalmanalco is known for is the open chapel.
Ciudad Real did not describe this structure, but it most likely existed at the
time of his visit.
Fig. 43: Three embedded stones in the bell tower of the church at Tlalmanalco that
constitute a sight line to a nearby extinct volcano known locally as the “Hill of the
Stone.”
There are a number of embedded pre-Hispanic stones in the exterior

walls of the church and the bell tower at Tlalmanalco. As already noted,
Eleanor Wake interprets the embedded stones to have been in some
instances markers to indicate sight lines to sacred mountains as elements
of the sacred landscape. Wake suggests that the three embedded stones in
the Tlalmanalco bell tower sighted to a mountain in Morelos known as the
Cerro de Tepozteco.13 However, equally plausible is that the sight line was
frailes hicieron allí una casa o monasterio para monjas o beatas india, pero viendo
después que no convenía por el flaco sujeto que en ellas hay, pasaron adelante con
la obra: allí permanecen los paredones de la casa [.]”
12
Kubler, Arquitectura Mexicana del siglo XVI, 586.
13
to a local extinct volcano known today as the “Hill of the Stone” (see
Figure 43).
Fig. 44: An embedded stone (a chalchihuitl or symbol of water) on the lateral wall
of the church at Tlalmanalco. An adjoining stone has a series of what appears to be
man-made indentations.
There are embedded stones at the Dominican convent at Amecameca,

just south of Tlalmanalco. The Franciscans first administered Amecameca
as a visita of Tlalmanalco in 1534, but the Dominicans established a
mission at the site in 1537. Construction of the current church began in
1547, and the Dominicans celebrated the first mass seven years later in
1554. The work of the decoration of the church had been completed by
1562. Construction of the cloister began in the 1550s. The bell tower was
completed in 1680.14
There is an embedded stone in the bell tower at Amecameca, but the
more important element is found on the exterior cloister façade that aligns
with a nearby hill that is the site of the church of the Sacramonte. It
consists of four different stones. At the center is Xipe Tótec. On each side
14
Kubler, Arquitectura Mexicana del siglo XVI, 634.
94 Chapter Four
there are stones with eagles, and above the stone of Xipe Tótec is the sign
of the Virgin Mary that has been inverted.15 The two eagles may represent
the Atl tlachninolli, or fire over water which represented a ritual duality
important in the region.16
Fig. 45: Embedded stone on the exterior façade of the cloister at Amecameca.
The embedded stones at Tlalmanalco and Amecameca constituted part

of a larger sacred landscape in a zone important to the religion dedicated
to Tláloc, rain and the fertility of the earth, sacred mountains, and
particularly the two volcanoes. We can think of this sacred landscape as
having the same significance in pre-Hispanic religious beliefs as the sites
in Palestine have for Christians. The volcanoes functioned as solar
markers for important points in the year, such as the solstices that
delineates the changes in the seasons and especially the start of the
planting season ushered in by the important ceremony in the temples
dedicated to Tláloc and to Xipe Tótec. There was a stone located at an
elevation of 2,600 meters on Iztaccihuatl that was an astronomical
15
Loera Chávez y Peniche, “Memoria indígena,” 262.
16
Ibid., 262.
observatory with calendar dates that marked dates important in the

celebration of earth fertility. The month of Tlacaxipehualitzli (March) was
and continues to be important in the round of sacrifices made to Xipe
Tótec in caves in the mountains to initiate the agricultural cycle.17 The
cloister of the convent at Amecameca contains one additional piece of
evidence that points to the persistence of the water-earth-fertility religion.
The arches in the cloister contain depictions of a plant associated with rain
and fertility. Again, as in the case of the embedded stone, they served as a
marker for Tláloc and Xipe Tótec.
Fig. 46: Detail of column in the cloister at Amecameca depicting a flower

associated with the cult of Tláloc.
There is another example of an embedded stone that is a representation

of Xipe Tótec, seated and with the characteristic open mouth used in
depictions of the deity. It is on a buttress on the southern exterior wall of
the visita chapel San Agustin Zapotlan, located north of Tlalmanalco and
Amecameca in the region of the Estado de Mexico that borders Hidalgo. It
is located close to the Franciscan mission at Zempoala. The stone of Xipe
17
Ibid., 265.
96 Chapter Four
Tótec is one of three embedded stones on the exterior wall of the chapel.
The second is located below the representation of Xipe Tótec on the same
buttress, and has a hole where the heart would be. The third stone is
located on another buttress, and appears to be a frog or a lizard. The stones
most likely also marked sight lines, and, as in the other cases discussed
above, converted the chapel into a sacred structure with dual meaning.
Fig. 47: Embedded stone that is a representation of Xipe Tótec on the exterior wall
of the visita chapel San Agustin Zapotlan (Estado de Mexico).
There are numerous other embedded stones in sixteenth century

temple-church and convent structures that had the same function. However,
embedded stones were not the only way that natives were able to incorporate
their own religious iconography into Catholic representations. There are, for
example, murals in the churches and convents that incorporate pre-
Hispanic iconography painted by native artists, such as the so-called
“Garden Paradise” mural program at the Augustinian convent at Malinalco
(Estado de Mexico). The following section presents evidence that the
native artists converted the mural program found in the lower cloister at
the convent into a flowery song.
Fig. 48: The exterior wall of the visita chapel San Agustin Zapotlan showing the
location of three embedded stones on two buttresses.
Talking and Singing Flowers: The Mural Program

of the Lower Cloister at Malinalco

The “Garden Paradise” murals at Malinalco are an example of the
incorporation of iconography associated with the traditional beliefs of the
native population. The mural program depicts plants and animals from the
region, and on the vaults a matrix of different plants also found in central
Mexico. The meaning of the mural program has been the subject of
considerable debate among scholars in recent years. Jeanette Peterson first
analyzed the Malinalco mural program in a book-length study, and argued
that it was a representation of a “garden paradise” inspired by European
tapestries. She also identified the song glyphs in the vault murals, and the
pre-Hispanic example from the Codex Borbonicus. Moreover, Peterson
discussed the importance of pre-Hispanic painters (tlacuiloque), and cited
the song glyph as an example of the incorporation of pre-Hispanic
symbols. However, Peterson did not give greater importance to the
inclusion of the song glyphs or other symbols.18
18
Jeanette Favrot Peterson, The Paradise Garden Murals of Malinalco: Utopia
and Empire in Sixteenth-Century Mexico (Austin: University of Texas Press,
1993), 47-51 and passim.
98 Chapter Four
Samuel Edgerton offered an alternative analysis of the symbolism of

the mural program. Edgerton argued that the murals served as a backdrop
to a religious procession to commemorate Cortés’s arrival in Mexico in
1519, and the end of the Náhuatl 52-year calendar cycle that began with
that event. Moreover, based on a Spanish document from 1571 that
reported that work on the convent at Malinalco was nearly completed,
Edgerton asserted that “…it would appear from the documents that the
Malinalco cloister was being rushed to completion by the earlier Aztec
year’s end, perhaps so that the murals would be painted in time for a
special event related to the calendar-round anniversary of Cortés’s coming
in the next year One Reed.”19 According to Edgerton, the “terrestrial
paradise murals represented the scenery for just such a native procession
and neixcuitilli [.]”20 Edgerton further argued that the missionaries used
cloisters for processions.21
Fig. 49: A section of the vault mural in the lower cloister at Malinalco.
19
Edgerton, Theaters of Conversion, 234.
20
Ibid., 235.
21
Ibid., 235.
Edgerton was not the first to suggest that the missionaries used lower
cloisters for processions. Susan Verdi Webster made the same point in her
analysis of the mural program in the church at San Miguel Arcángel
Huejotzingo (Puebla) that depicts a santo entierro procession.22 However,
organizing a procession involving more than a few select people would
have been a logistical problem, given the limited space within a cloister,
and particularly given the large size of the native populations in some
communities. In 1580, a decade following the completion of the cloister,
Malinalco reportedly counted 3,000 tributaries distributed in 12 towns,
which would indicate a total population in the range of 12,000-13,000.23
Even if a procession included only the residents of Malinalco itself, the
numbers would have been too great to accommodate in the restricted space
of the cloister, even considering Edgerton’s assertion that the entrance to
the cloister may have been larger than today and that any procession that
entered the cloister would have been small.24 In her analysis of the Holy
Week Santo Entierro processions organized by the confraternity of the
Santa Vera Cruz at Huejotzingo, Verdi Webster noted that the first stage,
the reenactment of the descent of Jesus’ body from the cross, was held
outside of the church in front of the open chapel, where the missionary
could present the sermon since there was plenty of space for the native
participants. The procession passed through the church, and then to the
atrium and the four posa chapels. The last stage would have been in the
cloister with the placing of the body in the tomb, as is suggested by the
procession mural at San Juan Bautista Teitipac (Oaxaca), but the cloister
would not have been the main venue for the procession.25 Staged religious
events such as processions and plays were more commonly held in the
more spacious atrium that could accommodate larger numbers of people.
In discussing the song glyphs in several panels of the vault murals,
Edgerton followed Peterson’s analysis of their similarity to a song glyph
that appears in one of the calendar pages of the Codex Borbonicus. A
speech glyph with flower at the top comes from the mouth of a drum
22
Susan Verdi Webster, “Art, Ritual and Confraternities in Sixteenth-Century New
Spain: Penitential Imagery at the Monastery of San Miguel, Huejotzingo,” Anales
del Instituto de Investigaciones Estéticas 70 (1997), 5-43.
23
Fray Juan Adriano, O.S.A., “Relación de los Pueblos de yndios que los
religiosos de la Orden de N(ues)tro Padre San Agustín tienen a su cargo en esta
Nueva España,” in Ruiz Zavala, OHistoria de la Provincia Agustíniana , II: 254-
262.
24
Edgerton, Theaters, 234.
25
Verdi Webster, “Art, Ritual and Confraternities in Sixteenth-Century New
Spain,” 33-38.
100 Chapter Four
playing musician, who performs before the god Huehuecoyotl, the patron
of music, song, and dancing (see Figures 50 and 51).26 The song glyphs in
the Malinalco vault mural sections have a similar form, and represent
singing flowers. The speech glyphs also have a similar form to the song
glyphs, but without the “flanges” that characterized the song glyphs at
Malinalco that Peterson first described (see Figure 52). The connection to
the Codex Borbonicus is particularly appropriate, because the plants and
flowers in the Malinalco mural program are both singing and talking.
In her recent study Eleanor Wake offered a different interpretation of
the incorporation of the song glyphs in the murals at Malinalco. She
interprets the murals as having been a flower song in motion. The song
glyphs, for example, are divided into eight sections that were similar to the
eight paired verse sequence of pre-Hispanic song poems. Wake concluded
that the presence of the song glyph was not a mere “signature” left by the
artist as Peterson argued, but rather was an indication that the mural
program represented a flower song. The vault sections number 16, which
Wake further argues could be indicative of the murals being the
“performance of two flowery songs or a repeated rendering of one.”27
The Malinalco mural program has inspired others areas of analysis,
beyond its symbolic meaning. A recent study focused on the number of
different species of plants depicted in the murals, and especially the
medicinal uses of the plants.28 The authors analyzed the murals and
colonial-era sources such as the Codex of Francisco Hernández and the

Codex de la Cruz Badiano, and identified 31 different species of plants,
and thus amplified Peterson’s list of identified plants. Moreover, the
authors noted that 28 of the different plants had pre-Hispanic medicinal
uses, and 24 have modern-day medicinal uses. An appendix summarized
the uses of the plants. However, the authors do not suggest that the
inclusion of plants used for medicinal purposes was a subtext to the
meaning of the murals.
26
Edgerton, Theaters, 220.
27
Wake, Framing the Sacred, 249-251. The quote is taken from 251.
28
Carmen Zepeda G. and Laura White O., “Herbolaria y pintura mural: Plantas
medicinales en los murales del convento del Divino Salvador de Malinalco, Estado
de México,” Polibotánica 25 (2008), 179-199.
Fig. 50: Page from the Codex Borbonicus showing a song glyph similar to the ones
in the vault murals at Malinalco.
102 Chapter Four
Fig. 51: Detail of the speech and song glyphs.
A re-examination of the murals on both the lateral walls and vaults of

the lower cloister at Malinalco provides evidence that the mural program
indeed may have been a representation of a flowery song that was in
movement, and that the flowers both talked and sang. There are flowery
songs in the corpus known as the Cantares Mexicanos, and flowers were
important in pre-Hispanic religious iconography.29 One section of one of
the vault mural panels has a song glyph and a speech glyph together (see
Figure 52). Speech glyphs also are found in other colonial-era murals, such
as the jaguar warrior from the convent church at Ixmiquilpan (Hidalgo) (see
Figure 53). Moreover, the evidence suggests that the original mural
program found in the lower cloister also extended to the church completed
in the late sixteenth century, and that the church murals may also have
been a representation of a flowery song.
Fig. 52: Detail of the Malinalco vault mural showing a speech and song glyph.
29
See Miguel León-Portilla, Cantares Mexicanos, 3 volumes. (México, D.F.:
UNAM, 2011). See, for example, “Xochicuicatl/Canto Florido,” vol. 1, 435-453.
104 Chapter Four
Fig. 53: Detail of the Jaguar Warrior mural at Ixmiquilpan, showing speech glyphs.
Fig. 54: A speech glyph from a section of the vault mural program, lower cloister,
Malinalco.
Reviewing the Evidence

Peterson identified the song glyphs in the vault murals at Malinalco,
but minimized their importance in explaining the symbolic meaning of the
mural program. The incorporation of song glyphs in different sections of
the vault murals indicates that the native artists envisioned the flowery
vault murals to have been a flowery song. Moreover, one section of one
vault panel contains a glyph without the flanges next to a song glyph,
which indicates that it would have been a speech glyph. The speech glyph
is similar in structure to the song glyph, yet is distinct in its own way. It is
also divided into segments as is the song glyph, and there is a square
within each segment (see Figure 54). There are also representations of
speech glyphs on the lateral wall murals, although they are also distinctive
in structure indicating that there were painted by different artists. The
106 Chapter Four
speech glyphs originate from a plant or fruit (grapes), are not divided into
segments, but do have rectangles in their body (see Figures 54 and 55).
They also have different forms, and one closely resembles the form of the
speech glyph of the Jaguar Warrior from Ixmiquilpan (see Figures 53).
There is a pair of speech glyphs that are a fragment of the mural program
in the church, located above the main entrance (see Figure 56).
Fig. 55: Speech glyph in the lateral wall mural program, lower cloister, Malinalco.
Fig. 56: A speech glyph from above the main entrance of the church.
Religious Symbolism in Indigenous Civil Buildings

Religious structures were not the only space that natives used for
iconography related to their old religious practices. Civil buildings such as
the tecpan or municipal palace of the native government also served to
reproduce religious iconography, and it was a space that was not under the
control of the missionaries. A mural fragment on one of the walls of the

tecpan in Metztitlán (Hidalgo) provides an example (see Figure 57). The
mural depicts an eagle grasping a scorpion in its beak. The symbolism in
the mural most likely was associated with pulque deities.30 Metztitlán and
neighboring parts of what today are Hidalgo were important pulque
producing regions, and the symbolism linked to pulque would have been a
direct challenge to the social policies of the missionaries, who attempted to
suppress pulque consumption because of its ritual significance. The
Augustinians who staffed the missions in the Barranca de Metztitlán and
in the Valle de Mezquital had murals created in public space that showed
that pulque consumption would open natives up to demonic influence.
Mural panels with this theme survive in the open chapel at San Nicolás
Tolentino Actopan and the visita chapel Santa María Xoxoteco, which was
a visita of Metztitlán.31 The tecpan mural was a form of validating the
ritual importance of pulque.
30
For a discussion of maguey and pulque deities in early colonial iconography see
Wake, Framing the Sacred, 206-214.
31
Jackson, Conflict and Conversion, 95-98.
108 Chapter Four
Fig. 57: Mural in the Tecpan at Metztitlán (Hidalgo) that depicts an eagle grasping
a scorpion.
Other religious related iconography was incorporated into tecpan

structures. James Kiracofe described a design element he called a “disk
frieze” found on the upper exterior façade of several tecpan structures,

including those of Tlatelolco, Mexico-Tenochtitlan, and the so-called casa
de la cacica in Yucundáa (Teposcolula), Oaxaca, which was an aniñe or
royal palace.32 There are also embedded stones on the exterior walls of the
tecpan structure at Tlayacapan (Morelos) that may have been similar to
Kiracofe’s “disk frieze”, and the design element may have originated in
central Mexico among the Náhuas and later was introduced to what today
is Oaxaca following the conquest of the region by the Culhua-Mexica (see
Figure 58). On closer examination the “disk frieze” design element and the
embedded stones on the tecpan structure at Tlayacapan are chalchihuitl,
symbols of water associated with Tláloc. The incorporation of chalchihuitl
into public structures associated with the indigenous government provides
further evidence for the survival of the importance of the water-earth-
fertility religion following the Spanish conquest.
32
Kiracofe, “Architectural Fusion.”
Fig 58: The Tecpan in Tlayacapan (Morelos). It now serves as the municipal
palace.
Fig. 59: Embedded stones along the upper façade of the tecpan at Tlayacapan
(Morelos).
110 Chapter Four
Fig. 60: Embedded stone, a chalchihuitl, along the upper façade of the tecpan at
Tlayacapan (Morelos).
The Opodepe (Sonora) Church Façade Design Element

The incorporation of religious iconography associated with pre-
Hispanic religious beliefs was not limited to the regions of central Mexico
evangelized in the sixteenth century. There is also evidence of the
persistence of pre-Hispanic religion among the sedentary agriculturalists
that lived on the missions the Jesuits established in central Sonora in the
seventeenth and eighteenth century. Many of the Jesuit and later
Franciscan churches built in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries have
experienced subsequent architectural changes that may have destroyed
evidence of the persistence of traditional religious practices. One
exception is the design element on the façade of Nuestra Señora de la
Asunción church at Opodepe, located on the San Miguel River in central
Sonora. An analysis of the images depicted in the design element
demonstrates that native artists used the church façade as a surface to
reproduce the same type of ritual themes found in pre-Hispanic
petroglyphs found in Sonora and other parts of Mexico, and what today is
the southwestern United States.
Fig. 61: Petroglyphs located near Huichapan, Valle de Mezquital (Hidalgo).

The origins of the Spanish colonization of Sonora and the neighboring

jurisdiction of Sinaloa and the Jesuit missions established there date to the
first decade following the fall of Tenochtitlan in 1521. In the 1520s, the
Spanish in Mexico divided into factions that competed for power and
access to native labor and tribute. The faction opposed to Hernán Cortés
governed Mexico between 1525 and 1529 through an audiencia (a type of
court) headed by Nuño Beltrán de Guzmán who was the president, and had
four oidores. Cortés returned to Spain to appeal to the Crown, and returned
to Mexico in 1529 with the title of Capitán General de la Nueva España
(Captain General of New Spain). This marked a political defeat for Nuño
Beltrán de Guzmán, who left Mexico City to organize the conquest of
western and northwestern Mexico. At that time Spanish control in western
Mexico extended to what today is Michoacán.
Nuño Beltrán de Guzmán organized an army of 500 Spaniards, 10,000
natives from the Valley of Mexico, and another 10,000 from Michoacán.
Beltrán de Guzmán created a new jurisdiction that he called Nueva Galicia
that incorporated the modern states of Jalisco, Colima, Aguascalientes,
Nayarit, Sinaloa, and parts of Zacatecas and San Luis Potosi. He subjugated
the native populations of this region in brutal military campaigns starting
112 Chapter Four
in 1530, and in the process enslaved thousands and provoking a major native
uprising known as the Mixtón War that broke out in the early 1540s.33 In the
wake of his expedition Spaniards began to establish settlements with
municipal governments in the newly conquered territory. They included
Compostela, Guadalajara, Purificación, and San Miguel Culiacan in what
today is Sinaloa.34 During the sixteenth century the number of Spaniards in
what today is Sinaloa and Sonora was very small, and in 1600, there were no
more than 500 or 600 Spaniards in the region.35 Although the Spanish had
established encomienda grants with rights to tribute and labor in the region
which also brought with it a theoretical obligation to evangelize the
natives, there was little systematic missionary activity until the Jesuits
arrived at the Villa de San Felipe y Santiago Sinaloa in 1591, and founded
a colegio there. After their arrival, the Black Robes had a virtual monopoly
on the evangelization of the native populations of Sinaloa and Sonora,
until their expulsion from the Spanish dominions in 1767.36
While Nuño Beltrán de Guzmán was busy subjugating and enslaving
natives in northwestern Mexico, another Spaniard named Álvar Núñez
Cabeza de Vaca participated in an odyssey that brought him to the Spanish
frontier in Sinaloa and inspired an expedition to New Mexico in 1540 that
passed through Sonora. Cabeza de Vaca joined an expedition organized in
1527 by Pánfilo de Narváez to conquer Florida that ended in disaster. The
expedition encountered considerable native resistance, and lost contact
with its ships. The Spaniards built rafts to try to navigate to Pánuco which
was a Spanish settlement located in what today is northern Veracruz, but
the majority of the expedition perished at sea in storms. The only survivors
from the expedition were Cabeza de Vaca, Alonso del Castillo Maldonado,
Andrés Dorantes de Carranza, and a Berber slave know as Esteban or
Estebanico. The Spaniards were stranded on the Texas Gulf Coast among
natives collectively known as Karankawas, but eventually walked from
Texas to northern Sinaloa where they encountered a group of Spaniards at
Bamoa on the Sinaloa River in 1536.37
33
On the Spanish conquest of western Mexico see Ida Altman, The War for
Mexico’s West. Indians and Spaniards in New Galicia, 1524-1550 (Albuquerque:
University of New Mexico Press, 2010).
34
Ibid., 57.
35
Peter Gerhard, La frontera norte de la Nueva España (Mexico, D.F., UNAM,
1996), 310.
36
Ibid., 308.
37
Cabeza de Vaca wrote a narrative of his odyssey. For a recent translation see
Rolena Adorno and Patrick Pautz, translators, The Narrative of Cabeza de Vaca
(Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2003).
Cabeza de Vaca and his companions became celebrities in Mexico

City, and the story of their trek from Texas to Sinaloa inspired the 1540-
1542 expedition to New Mexico organized by Francisco Vázquez de
Coronado. The expedition left Compostela (modern Nayarit), and passed
through Sonora on the way to New Mexico. Fray Marcos de Niza had
earlier passed through Sonora on an expedition to visit the New Mexico
pueblos. The accounts of Cabeza de Vaca and the Vázquez de Coronado
expedition were the first descriptions of the tribal polities in central and
northern Sonora. A 1533 expedition headed by Diego de Guzmán had
already visited the Yoémem (Yaqui) who lived in what today is southern
Sonora. Their accounts, for example, described the Tehuima (Opata)
settlement the Spaniards called pueblo de corazones because of the deer
hearts being cooked. This was Ures, later the site of a Jesuit mission
established in 1644 by Francisco Paris, S.J.
The Jesuits initiated their evangelization campaign on the Sinaloa
River in the mid-1590s, some 60 years following the Spanish subjugation
of the region. They established several missions for the local indigenous
population, but remains of these missions exist at only two sites. The first
was at El Nio Icesave, founded in 1595 south of the Villa de San Felipe y
Santiago de Sinaloa and Bamoa. The Jesuits designated the mission
Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe.38 The mission at El Nio occupied two sites,
and there are ruins at both. The older ruins are located at Pueblo Viejo,
which is about two kilometers south of the modern town of El Nio. They
are located in the town cemetery. The second site is in the small town of El
Nio. There was another Jesuit mission at Tamazula, also on the Sinaloa
River south of El Nio. The existing church dates to the period following
the Jesuit expulsion in the late eighteenth century. There was also a
mission at the site of modern Guasave, but nothing remains of this
establishment.
The natives of northern Sinaloa did not universally support the Jesuit
evangelization campaign, and the Black Robes adopted tactics to
undermine the status of their principal rivals, the shaman or traditional
religious leader. In 1594, for example, Gonzalo de Tapia, S.J., had a
shaman flogged. The traditionalist faction headed by the shaman
responded by killing the Jesuit.39 An epidemic that struck the native
population of the Sinaloa River Valley had given the traditional religious
leaders effective propaganda in the cultural war with the Jesuits. As
38
For a narrative history of the first Jesuit missions in northern Sinaloa and Sonora
see Peter Masten Dunne, S.J., Pioneer Black Robes on the West Coast (Berkeley
and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1940).
39
Ibid., 33-36.
114 Chapter Four
occurred on numerous occasions on different mission frontiers, the

traditional religious leaders blamed the missionaries for the epidemics that
killed many.40 However, the Jesuits were able to use Spanish colonial
authority and support from the military to overcome opposition to their
mission program. There were other instances of resistance to the Jesuit
mission program. The Upper Pimans, for example, revolted twice against
the Spanish and the Jesuit missions in 1695 and again in 1751, and in both
instances the natives killed missionaries.
Fig. 62: Jesuit ruins at Pueblo Viejo (El Nio, Sinaloa).
Over the next ninety years the Jesuits moved northward along the river
valleys, and into the mountains of the Sierra Madre Occidental, establishing
missions among native communities of sedentary or semi-sedentary
agriculturalists. In 1605, the Jesuits established missions among the Yoreme
(Mayo) living along the Río Fuerte in northern Sinaloa, and in 1614 in the
Yoreme communities of the Mayo River Valley in southern Sonora. This
was followed in 1617 with the first mission among the Yoémem founded
by Andrés Pérez de Rivas, S.J., and Tomás Basilio, S.J. Two years later, in
1619, Jesuits visited Sahuaripa, the residence of the Sisibutari or
paramount chief of the Tehuimas (Opata). The Black Robes established a
40
Ibid., 31-36.
mission at Sahuaripa in 1627. Over the next several decades the Jesuits
established new missions among the Tehuimas at sites such as Huepac and
Arizpe in the Sonora River Valley, and Bacadehuachi and Bavispe in the
mountains of eastern Sonora. The Jesuits established missions among the
Névome (Pimas Bajos) beginning in 1620, and expanded the number of
missions in later years to communities such as Yecora (1673).41 Around
1650, the Jesuits established a mission at the Tehuima community
Cucurpe, just south of the Upper Pima communities. Jesuits baptized some
160 Hymeris Pimas (modern Imuris), and the converts moved to a site
closer to Cucurpe.42 This group of Hymeris was the first Upper Pimas the
Jesuits baptized, and later formed the nucleus of the first mission that Kino
established that he named Dolores, located just north of Cucurpe.
The establishment of missions in northern Sinaloa and southern Sonora
also brought demographic consequences to the native populations. Epidemics
of highly contagious crowd diseases such as smallpox and measles
decimated the populations, killing thousands. The Black Robes, for
example, reported that by 1603 some 4,000 natives had died on the Sinaloa
River missions because of disease and warfare, and in 1617 the natives in
the same area fled their communities following the outbreak of an
epidemic.43 The Jesuits reported large numbers of baptisms in northern
Sinaloa and southern Sonora. Between 1591 and 1631, the number of
baptisms reached 151,240. However, disease and other factors reduced the
size of the native populations. In the mid-1620s, 27 Jesuits staffed

missions with a reported population of 67,375.44 These figures suggest a
rate of depopulation in excess of fifty percent over a period of some 40
years (see Tables 7-9).
The Jesuits had limited personnel, and adopted the same organizational
scheme used in the sixteenth century central Mexican missions. The Jesuit
missionaries staffed the cabecera or head town in a district, and then rode
the circuit to visit communities without resident missionaries designated
visitas. Although, at least on paper, the Jesuits administered communities
with thousands of natives who had been baptized, but the inhabitants of
many communities only saw the missionary periodically, and the level of
conversion was shallow at best. This was particularly the case on the
Pimeria Alta frontier, where there was a chronic shortage of missionaries.
41
Ibid., 80, 144. For a narrative history of the Jesuit missions of central Sonora
north of the Yaqui River Valley see John Bannon, S.J., The Mission Frontier in
Sonora, 1620-1687 (New York: Catholic Historical Society, 1955).
42
Ibid., 102.
43
Dunne, Pioneer Black Robes, 75.
44
Ibid., 217, 220.
116 Chapter Four
In the early 1750s, for example, the natives at San Francisco Xavier del
Bac were not well instructed in Catholicism and the Jesuits complained
that there were no catechists to instruct them in Christian doctrine.45 The
Jesuits had first visited Bac in the early 1690s, some sixty years earlier,
but visited the community only sporadically after that date.
Fig. 63: Ruins of Cucurpe Mission.
The Magdalena Parish Archive in Magdalena de Kino, Sonora

preserves two baptismal registers that date to the 1680s, and they are the
oldest such record for the region. The larger baptismal register recorded
the baptism of 448 natives, mostly Opata and Pima, five settler children,
12 Seri or Tepoca from the fringes of Spanish Sonora on the coast of the
Sea of Cortes (Gulf of California), two Yoémem (Yaqui) from southern
Sonora, and two non-Christians, most likely Pima, the missionaries
labeled as “gentiles.” The second smaller baptismal register is titled
“Hiaquis (Yoémem) and servants of the settlers.” The Yoémem came to
the frontier to work for the settlers living in the region. This register
45
Robert H. Jackson, Indian Population Decline: The Missions of Northwestern
New Spain, 1687-1840 (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1994), 23.
recorded the baptisms of 78 native children, five settler children, four

Tehuima, one Névome, five Seri, one Pima, and 14 Yoémem. The
missionaries had to co-exist with a growing settler population, and at times
there were conflicts between the missionaries and the settlers. Some
natives elected to leave the missions and work for the settlers. The Sonora
frontier was fluid, and there were movements of people.46
The Jesuits established a mission at Opodepe in 1649 among the
Tehuima (Ópata). The Opodepe mission district consisted of two and at
times three different staffed missions, and the staffing depended on the
availability of Jesuit missionary personnel. In 1716, for example, the Jesuit
stationed at Opodepe also had responsibility for Tuape and the Eudebe
community Cucurpe, both located north of Opodepe on the San Miguel
River.47 The Jesuits had established a mission at Cucurpe at about the
same time as that at Opodepe, and there were periods when there were
enough missionaries to staff Cucurpe as well. However, in 1716 Cucurpe
did not have a resident missionary.
The Opodepe church façade retains parts of a design element unique to
northern frontier mission structures. It is a technique that used small stones
embedded in plaster to create designs on walls. Examples of this design
technique survive on churches in central Mexico, such as on the lateral
wall of the barrio (neighborhood) chapel Nuestra Señora de los Dolores
Xaltocan, located in Xochimilco (Distrito Federal). The Xaltocan design
includes a cross flanked by two flowers in pots. A scalloped-like design

surrounds the cross (see Figure 64).
The design element on the Opodepe church façade consists of
individual panels with different themes in rows that originally flanked the
main church door, and a window above the door. Later modifications to
the façade have destroyed parts of the design element. The segment on the
right hand side of the main church door extends lower than that on the left,
which indicates that the design element originally was more extensive.
The addition of new design elements above the door and the addition of
new layers of plaster around the window have also damaged and destroyed
individual panels. However, enough remains of the design element to
identify an overall theme, and the different elements represent elements
found in petroglyphs. In other words, the native artists who created the
46
Robert H. Jackson, “Demographic Change in Northwestern New Spain,” The
Americas 41:4 (April, 1985), 464.
47
José Luis Mirafuentes Galván, “Las tendencias individuales de los indios y los
excesos del patrimonialismo misional en Sonora, 1687-1825,” Estudios de Historia
Novohispana 33 (julio-diciembre 2005), 25.
118 Chapter Four
design element used the church façade to place a series if petroglyphs with
symbolism linked to pre-Hispanic religious beliefs.
Fig. 64: Design element on the lateral wall of Nuestra Señora de los Dolores
Xaltocan, Xochimilco (Distrito Federal, Mexico).
Fig. 65: The Opodepe church façade design element.

There are several enigmatic panels on the left and right side of the
design element that depict the pre-Hispanic fertility deity Kokopelli, the
hunchbacked flute player. A panel on the left side depicts a pair of lizards,
and in the adjoining one two figures. The figure on the left is a human and
the figure on the right is Kokopelli. The figure is holding a flute, and has
the characteristic feathers or antenna-like protrusions coming out of the
back of its head. Kokopelli was often depicted as a hunchback, and the
figure in the panel shares those characteristics and has physical
characteristics different from that of the human figure. A panel on the
right-hand side depicts a second Kokopelli, also identified by the
protrusions at the back of its head, playing the flute, and in the adjoining
panel the sun, which was a common theme in pre-Hispanic petroglyphs
(see Figures 67 and 68). At least one other panel depicts Kokopelli.
120 Chapter Four
Fig. 66: Petroglyph showing Kokopelli, the hunchback flute player.

Fig. 67: Panels depicting a pair of lizards and a human and a Kokopelli.
Fig. 68: Panels depicting the sun and a second Kokopelli playing its flute.
Other panels depict themes also found in pre-Hispanic petroglyphs,

such as a bird and different types of flowers, which also had ritual
significance. Two panels depict what appear to geometric figures, a type

of flower, or perhaps a type of cactus that may represent a group of peyote
buttons (Lophophora williamsii). Peyote grows low to the ground and in
groups of individual buttons. It contains psychoactive alkaloids used by
native shaman to produce vision quests, and in curing. If the identification
of the figure as Peyote is correct, it would provide further evidence of the
persistence of traditional religious practices in the mission.
The inclusion of themes in the Opodepe church design element also
found in earlier pre-Hispanic petroglyphs such as the fertility deity
Kokopelli, suggests the persistence in the Sonora missions of traditional
religious beliefs alongside Catholicism. The native artists who created the
design element on the façade of the Opodepe church created a visual
document that celebrated Kokopelli and other pre-Hispanic iconography.
This may not have been the only instance of the persistence of traditional
religious practices among the Tehuima (Ópata). José Refugio de la Torre
Curiel described a dance called the dagüinemaca described in documents
in the nineteenth century. This dance, along with a second known as the
jojo, incorporated traditional cultural elements such as reciprocity. The
jojo had a foundation in oral memory, but also had a millenarian content
based on the belief in the return of a figure, perhaps Moctezuma, who
122 Chapter Four
would guarantee a better future. 48 Although forged in colonial society and

Jesuit and later Franciscan missionary influence, these dances could not be
divorced from traditional values tied to traditional religious beliefs.
Conclusions
The Catholic missionaries who initiated the “spiritual conquest” of the
native populations of Mexico believed that they had supplanted and
suppressed traditional religious practices. However, the evidence
demonstrates otherwise. The incorporation of embedded stones with
images of pre-Hispanic deities and the inclusion of pre-Hispanic
iconography in ostensibly Catholic images demonstrates native agency in
defining the nature of their religious beliefs and practices and the ways in
which they incorporated Catholicism into their belief system. Moreover,
the persistence of sacrifices to Tláloc, Xipe Tótec, and other gods showed
that these gods had not lost their power in the face of the Spanish conquest
and the arrival of the Christian gods, Jesus and the host of saints.
The missionaries suppressed the Culhua-Mexica state religion and the
worship of gods such as Huitzilopochtli disgraced by the Spanish triumph.
The practice of public human sacrifice disappeared. However, Tláloc and
Xipe Tótec brought and continued to bring rain and the fertility of the soil
that made agriculture prosper, and guaranteed the survival of a society
supported by agriculture. The missionaries used violence at times in an

attempt to suppress the water-earth-fertility religion, but failed to offer an
alternative to gods that had sustained agriculture for centuries.
The native artists who painted the murals at the Augustinian convent at
Malinalco incorporated the ostensibly Catholic iconography into a duality
of belief that was consistent with their traditional religious system that the
missionaries failed to replace. The murals contained both a Catholic
message and represented a flowery song that had meanings different from
what the missionaries had intended. The hypothesis that the “disk frieze”
design element found on public indigenous structures such as the tecpan
provide further evidence of the persistence of pre-Hispanic religious
practices alongside Catholicism, and particularly the religion dedicated to
rain and the fertility of the soil.
The incorporation of pre-Hispanic religious iconography was not
unique to central Mexico. The design element on the façade of the church
48
José Refugio de la Torre Curiel, “Un mecenazgo fronterizo: El protector de
indios Juan de Gándara y los Opatas de Opodepe (Sonora) a principios del siglo
XIX,” Revista de Indias 2010, vol. LXX, núm. 248, 189.
at Opodepe, Sonora, incorporates images of Kokopelli, the hunchback flute

player and fertility deity. The Tehuima (Ópata), sedentary agriculturalists, did
not construct monumental architecture on the scale of the temples and
other structures in central Mexico. However, they did depict their world
and religious beliefs in petroglyphs. The native artists who created the
design element on the façade of the church at Opodepe incorporated
iconography also found in petroglyphs, including Kokopelli. The depiction
of Kokopelli at Opodepe had the same function as the embedded stones
analyzed in this chapter.
Table 7: Jesuit Missions in Sinaloa and Sonora in 1624
Missionary Mission Population

Diego de Guzmán Mocorito 900
Alberto Clerici Guasave 3,000
Blas de Paredes Bamoa 1,300
Ignacio Zavala Baboria 1,050
Leonardo Latini/Patino Chicorato 1,400
Juan Calvo Yecorato 920
Vicente Águila Ahome and Suaqui 5,058
Martín Azpilcueta Tehueco 2,567
Juan Castini Sinaloa 6,570
Juan Varela Tecori 10,400

Diego de la Cruz Nobor 5,500
Miguel Godínez Tepahui 5,400
Pedro Méndez Potam 7,250
Juan Ardenas Vicam 4,000
Guillermo Otón Torin 3,800
Tesamo 5,400
Francisco Olinano Tecoripa 2,750
Onabas 100
Source: Pater Masten Dunne, S.J., Pioneer Black Robes on the West Coast
(Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1940), 217.
124 Chapter Four
Table 8: The Number of Jesuit Missionaries Stationed on the Sinaloa-

Sonora Missions, 1604-1625
Year Number of Year Number of

Missionaries Missionaries
1604 6 1615 13
1605 7 1616 17
1606 8 1622 26
1610 11 1624 27
1612 15 1625 27
1614 13
Table 9: Baptisms in the Sinaloa-Sonora Missions, 1591-1631
Year Baptisms Year Baptisms Year Baptisms Year Baptisms

1591- 25,897 1615 1,703 1621 11,340 1628 5,474
1609
1610 2,586 1616 4,155
1622 8,343 1629 4,762
1611 1,745 1617 4,675
1623 11,221 1630 8,697
1612 2,075 1618 4,479
1624 6,000 1631 8,808
1613 1,613 1619 7,421

1625- 13,056
1626
1614 5,420 1620 7,600 1627 4,170
CHAPTER FIVE
REPRESENTATIONS OF DEATH
AND THE CHALLENGE OF EVANGELIZATION
Caves served different functions in Mesoamerican cosmology. As

mentioned above, for example, Tláloc gave humans the gift of corn and
other cultigens from a cave located in a sacred mountain. Caves were also
important in the pre-Hispanic conceptualization of death, and were
believed to be the portal to the underworld.1 Following the Spanish
conquest and the launching of evangelization campaign and repression of
traditional religious practices, caves became places of refuge for
individuals who wished to continue practicing pre-Hispanic rituals. They
were also places to hide paraphernalia associated with those rituals such as
sacred bundles that contained idols of gods. Missionaries attempted to root
out pre-Hispanic rituals that took place in caves, and to confiscate
paraphernalia. One example of the confiscation of paraphernalia occurred

at Ñundecu (Achiutla) in Oaxaca in the late sixteenth century. A
Dominican missionary robbed precious stones from burials he found in a
cave not far from the doctrina recently established there.2
The act by the Dominican missionary of robbing a native burial site
introduces the topic of this chapter, which is how concepts and the
iconography of death figured in the evangelization of native population.
The representation of death as an iconographic theme by missionaries in
the sixteenth century was complicated by parallels to pre-Hispanic
iconography, and this figured in the decision to not draw upon
contemporary European iconography of death for the images used in the
attempt to indoctrinate the natives in the new faith.
1
Linda Manzanilla, “Las cuevas en el mundo mesoamericano,” Ciencias 36
(Octubre-Diciembre, 1994), 59-66.
2
Manuel Hermann Legarazu, “Religiosidad y bultos sagrados en la Mixteca
prehispánica,” Descatos 27 (2008), 75-94.
126 Chapter Five
Fifteenth-Century European Iconography of Death

The iconographic theme of death as the grim reaper and the triumph of
death appear less commonly in sixteenth century Mexico, and these
themes were not included in the public space of the new sacred complexes
as a tool in religious indoctrination of natives in central Mexico. This
stands in marked contrast to the common use of death in the public space
of churches and in publications in late medieval Europe, and particularly
in the late fifteenth century. The Dance of Death or the Danse Macabre
evolved as an important European iconographic theme following the
demographic catastrophe of the Black Death (1347-1350). It depicted
death carrying off all members of society from powerful civil and religious
leaders to the poor.3 Death is shown as a skeleton and at times carries a
scythe, and dances with different members of society. The Dance of Death
was a graphic reminder of the fragility of life and the inevitability of death.
A representative example is the mural in St. Mary’s church at Beram,
Croatia painted around 1474 (see Figure 69).
Fig. 69: The Dance of Death from St. Mary’s church, Beram, Croatia. One
depiction shows Death carrying a scythe used to harvest souls. Image from
Wikipedia Commons, and is in the public domain.
Late medieval European murals also depicted death armed with a bow
and arrows used to claim the souls of the dead. Death shoots his intended
victims with arrows. An example of this iconography is found in the mural
3
Johan Mackenbach, “Social Inequality and Death as Illustrated in Late Medieval
Death Dances,” American Journal of Public Health 85:9 (1995), 1285-1292.
Representations of Death and the Challenge of Evangelization 127
on the exterior wall of the oratorio di disciplina in Clusone, located in

northern Italy that was painted in 1485. The upper register depicts the
Triumph of Death. Death is flanked by two skeletal minions, one armed
with a bow and arrows and the second with a primitive firearm (see Figure
70-71). Death’s minions use their weapons to claim their victims. The
lower register is a conventional depiction of the Dance of Death.
Fig. 70: Mural depicting the Triumph of Death and the Dance of Death on an
exterior wall of the Oratorio di Disciplini in Clusone, Italy. The mural was painted
in 1485. Photograph by Paolo da Reggio licensed under the Creative Commons
Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unreported license.
128 Chapter Five
Fig. 71: Detail of the Triumph of Death depicting Death’s skeletal minions
shooting victims with arrows and a primitive firearm.
A second example of this form is found in the Franciscan convent San

Francisco de Morelia (Castellón, Spain) (see Figures 72-73). The sala

capitular of the convent where the mural is found was built between 1427
and 1442, which establishes the range of dates for the painting of the
mural. Different members of society dance with death. In one part of the
mural program death depicted as a skeleton armed with a bow fires two
arrows at an intended victim in an arbol de la vida (Tree of Life) (see
Figure 74). The surviving mural is a fragment of what was a much larger
depiction of the theme of the triumph of death, or perhaps the dance of
death.4 There are other examples from Spain as well. There are murals
depicting death in five Galician churches: Santa María de Abades; Santa
María de Cuiña; San Xulián de Moraime; Santa María de Mosteiro; and
the chapel of Nosa Señora da Ponte in Arante. Four of the five depict
4
Víctor Infantes, Las Danzas de la Muerte: Génesis y desarrollo de un género
medieval (siglos XIII.XVII) (Salamanca: Ediciones Universidad Salamanca, 1997),
343; Ángela Franco, “Algunas fuentes medievales del Arte Renacentista y
Barroco,” Anales de Historia del Arte (2008, Volumen Extraordinario), 73-87.
death as an archer with a bow and arrow. The fifth shows death carrying a
scythe, shovel, and coffin.5
Fig. 72: Depiction of the Dance of Death from the Franciscan convent San
Francisco de Morelia (Morelia, Valencia, Spain). Photograph by Chixoy licensed
under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unreported license.
5
Alicia P. Suárez-Ferrín, “Ab Aquilone Mors: Sobre la orientación simbólica de
las imágenes góticas de la muerte triunfante en el interior de las iglesias gallegas
(estudio revisado, corregido y aumentado,” Anuario Brigantino 26 (2003), 339-
372. Also see Robert H. Jackson, “Representaciones de la muerte en las doctrinas
del centro de México durante el siglo XVI,” in Arturo Vergara Hernández,
coordinator, Arte y Sociedad en la Nueva España (Pachuca: UAEH, 2014), 39-70.
130 Chapter Five
Fig. 73: Different members of society dance around death. Photograph by Chixoy
licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unreported
license.
Fig. 74: Death shoots an arrow at a Tree of Life. Photograph courtesy of Santiago
Lopez Pastor.
Iconography of Death at Sixteenth Century Mexican

Convents
War, famine, and disease claimed the lives of many each year in early
modern Europe, and death continued to be a common iconographic theme
in the sixteenth century. Disease and famine killed many natives in central
Mexico in the decades following the Spanish conquest, but the
missionaries did not commonly employ death as an iconographic theme.
Three representations of death as a skeleton survive in sixteenth century
central Mexican convent complexes, and two were executed in the private
space of the cloister primarily to remind the missionaries themselves of the
inevitability of death. They are found at Malinalco (Edo de Mexico) and
Huatlatlauca (Puebla), both Augustinian doctrinas, and San Gabriel
Cholula (Puebla), a Franciscan establishment.
The depiction of death at Malinalco is found in a niche in the lower
cloister of the convent (see Figure 75). It is a conventional depiction of
death as the grim reaper of souls, equipped with a scythe used to harvest or
reap crops and the souls of the dead as depicted in the Dance of Death
132 Chapter Five
mural at Beram, Croatia. Death stands next to an Augustinian missionary

in a pose reminiscent of the Dance of Death. Although most likely painted
by native artists, the Malinalco mural was designed to remind the
missionaries themselves of their mortality. The second example is the
representation of the skeletal King of Death in the portería of the
Franciscan convent San Gabriel Cholula (Puebla) (see Figure 77). Death
holds a bow and an arrow. On either side are symbols that identify the
figure as the King of Death; a skull and crossbones with a royal crown on
the skull. Snakes slither around the skull and crossbones.
In the Huatlatlauca mural (see Figure 76), death holds a bow and
arrows, and is claiming his victims, who are different members of society.
It is a conventional depiction of the Triumph of Death. The turquoise
backdrop of the mural suggests native influence in its execution, using a
color traditionally used in Mesoamerican murals. Huatlatlauca is an
interesting case in that the Franciscans initially founded the mission, and
then ceded the jurisdiction of the doctrina to the Augustinians in exchange
for another district in Michoacán. At the time of the writing of the
Relación Geográfica in September of 1579, the Augustinians administered
the doctrina, and three missionaries resided on the mission.6 The
Franciscans initiated the construction of a church, and the Augustinians
directed the building and decoration of the cloister.
Another sixteenth century representation of the Triumph of Death
survives in the so-called Casa del Dean in Puebla City, on the second floor
of the house built in the late sixteenth century (see Figures 78-79). The
dean of the Puebla Cathedral chapter Tomás de la Plaza had the house
built and decorated between 1563 and 1580. Death depicted as a skeleton
with a scythe rides in a horse drawn chariot that runs over its victims. It is
one panel in a larger series that depicts sibyls and triumphs, and three
sibyls ride in the chariot with death. This representation of death and the
larger series was a more sophisticated renaissance iconographic
presentation created for an elite urban Spanish audience with more refined
artistic tastes.7
6
Acuña, Relaciones Geográficas del Siglo XVI: Tlaxcala, II: 201-206.
7
María Della Buisel, “Aspectos de la tradición clásica en América: Silabas y
triunfos en la Case del Deán de Puebla de los Ángeles (México),” Auster 12, 103-
131.
Fig. 75: Death depicted as the grim reaper and an Augustinian missionary at
Malinalco (Estado de México).
Fig. 76: Mural at Los Reyes Magos Huatlatlauca (Puebla) depicting the triumph of
death. Death armed with a bow claims his victims by shooting them with arrows.
134 Chapter Five
Fig. 77: Mural depicting death in the portería of the Franciscan convent San
Gabriel Cholula (Puebla). Death carries a bow and arrows.
Fig. 78: Death riding in a chariot runs over his victims. Mural from the Casa del
Dean (Puebla City).
Fig. 79: Detail of the mural showing death holding a scythe.
136 Chapter Five
Fig. 80: Mictlantecuhtli the God of death and the underworld. Statue in the Museo
del Templo Mayor.
The missionaries in central Mexico elected to not use images of death

in the religious indoctrination of the natives in the sixteenth century, and
focused instead on sin and the final judgment that satisfied objectives of
colonial social policy, such as the effort to suppress pulque consumption.
There are several explanations as to why the central Mexican missionaries
chose not use images of death to re-enforce the message imparted in their
doctrinal indoctrination. An important and compelling factor may have
been the parallel use of skeletal depictions of death in pre-Hispanic
religious iconography. The missionaries most likely realized that natives
would associate contemporary European images of death with
Mictlantecuhtli, the god of death (see Figure 80). A second example was
the association of skeletons and skulls with human sacrifice and the
practice of displaying the skulls of sacrificial victims on racks known as

Tzompantli, often found next to temples dedicated to Huitzilopochtli (see
Figure 81). The iconographic representation of death depicted as a
skeleton would have been counterproductive in the campaign launched by
the missionaries to eradicate the old religious practices, particularly after
the 1585 Third Church Council decree that called for the elimination of
pre-Hispanic religious iconography.
Fig. 81: Detail of depiction of a tzompantli from the Templo Mayor of

Tenochtitlán.
As already noted in the previous chapter, Third Church Council

ordered the removal of embedded pre-Hispanic stones incorporated into
the church and convent buildings, although this goal proved to be elusive.
The next section discusses embedded stones in the Franciscan convent
church at Xochimilco, and its relationship to native beliefs regarding
death.
138 Chapter Five
“The Dark Temple,” Death, and Embedded Stones

in the Franciscan Convent at Xochimilco
The Franciscans initiated the construction of San Bernardino de Siena
in Xochimilco sometime between 1525 and 1535, and staffed the convent
until its secularization in 1786. 8 It was a populous and important
Franciscan mission in the sixteenth century. In 1568, for example, the
population of Xochimilco and its visita Milpa Alta was around 31,000.9
Construction of the church and convent may have been completed by the
1580s. Antonio de Ciudad Real described the convent in the mid-1580s,
by which time work on the church had been completed:
The convent is also founded on the lake in the middle of the town, it has
two lower cloisters and another two upper, none of them have corridors,
although they have begun to build them, all that are dormitories and cells,
quarters and offices lower and upper are finished along with the church, all
built of masonry, but the top of the door was falling and it had to be
leveled and built again…The name of the convent is San Bernardino, and
six missionaries lived there.10
There are embedded pre-Hispanic stones of skulls and flowers in the

nave of the church at Xochimilco. It was common for the missionaries to
direct the construction of their new sacred complexes on pre-Hispanic
temples. The Franciscans may have chosen the ruins of the temple of the
fertility goddess Cihuacoatl (also known as Quilaztli), the patron of
Xochimilco, as the site for their church and convent dedicated to San
Bernardino de Siena (see Fig. 82).11 The skulls and flowers found in the
nave of the Franciscan church most likely came from the temple of
8
Richard Conway, “Náhuas and Spaniards in the Socioeconomic History of
Xochimilco, New Spain, 1550-1725,” unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Tulane
University, 2009, 21.
9
Sherburne F. Cook and Woodrow Borah, Ensayos sobe historia de la población,
3 vols., first Spanish edition (Mexico, D.F.: Siglo XXI, 1980), vol. 3, 30.
10
The original quote reads: “El convento, que también está fundado sobre la
laguna en medio del pueblo, tiene dos claustros baxos y otros dos altos, y ninguna
dellos tenia corredores, aunque ya los comenzaba a hacer, todo lo demás, que es
dormitorios y celdas, aposentos y oficinas altas y baxas esta acabado con la iglesia,
labrado todo de cal y canto, aunque lo alto de la puerta de la iglesia se iba cayendo
entonces y había necesidad de derribarse y que se hiciera de nuevo…La vocación
del convento es de San Bernardino, moraban en el seis religiosos.” De Ciudad
Real, Relación breve y verdadera, vol. 1, 173.
11
Eleanor Wake, personal communication, April 23, 2013.
Cihuacoatl, and would have afforded the Xochimilcas a way to continue

worshipping the goddess. Diego Durán, O.P., described the temple of
Cihuacoatl in the following terms:
The place where this temple was is the place the boys [los muchachos]
formerly called "the house of the devil," and I think today it is called the
Devil's House…It was called this because of the many idols and stone
figures of different forms that were there, which, as I said, the boys [los
muchachos] would go see, as a thing of fear, not daring to go inside,
because of the name they had put of the house of the devil, because in
truth the name fits, having been the house where the demon was so served
and honored. This multitude of idols and effigies were those, that I said,
were up against the walls, accompanying the goddess in that dark place,
and today the Indians call that house Tlilan that house, so we can take
away its name as the house of the devil and call it "the dark house," as was
its old name.12
The reference to Tlilan as the “dark house” may identify the temple as
having been a representation of the underworld and the inclusion of stones
from the temple in the nave of the church gave the new sacred complex
dual meaning, one in the Catholic belief system and the second in the pre-
Hispanic. It was another example of the natives creating a dual vision of
the sacred.
12
Durán, Historia, vol. 1, chapter XII, 131. The quote in Spanish reads: “El lugar
donde estaba este templo era donde antiguamente los muchachos llamaban "la casa
del diablo," y creo que hoy en dia la llaman asi...Llamabanla la casa del diablo por
los muchos idolos y figuras de piedra de diferentes maneras que alli habia, las
cuales iban a ver, como digo, los muchachos, como por cosa de espanto, no osando
entrar dentro, por el nombre que le tenian puesto de casa del diablo, como en
realidad de verdad le cuadra el ombre, por haber sido casa donde el demonio fue
muy servido y honrado. Esta multitud de idolo y efigies eran los que dije que
estaban arrimados a las paredes, acompanado a los dioses en aquel lugar tenebroso
y hoy en dia la llaman los indios a aquella casa Tlilan, de manera que podemos
quitarle el nombre de casa del diablo y llamarla "la casa tenebrosa," como fue su
atniguo nombre.”
140 Chapter Five
Fig. 82: Skull embedded in the nave wall of convent church San Bernardino de
Siena Xochimilco.
The Late Colonial Iconography of Death

In the collection of sacred art at the former Dominican convent San
Juan Bautista Coixtlahuaca (Oaxaca) are two panels reminiscent of the late
fifteenth century theme of the triumph of death and dance of death
discussed above. They are from a later date, either the late seventeenth or
eighteenth centuries, at a time when an association of European images
with native iconography of death was no longer major concerns. The two
panels most likely formed part of a larger side altar within the church that
may have depicted the final judgment, or may have been individual
paintings in a series on this theme that hung on the church walls. The first
panel shows a skeletal death about to claim the soul of a man that, from his
form a dress, may be a cleric or member of a religious order. The state of
his body shows that decomposition to a skeletal state had not begun. The
second panel depicts a dead man whose body has already begun to
decompose. The man wears a breast plate military armor piece, and
symbols above the body indicate that he may have been a warrior king.
The symbols include a helmet and a crown.
Fig. 83: Section of a panel from Coixtlahuaca depicting death holding a scythe.
The Coixtlahuaca panels are similar to other paintings at other sites

related to the theme of death that date to the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries. These paintings are often associated with the final judgment.
Two examples are preserved in the church of the Hospital de la Santa
Caridad in Sevilla, Spain, and served as a reminder that death claimed all
members of society including members of the church hierarchy. The first
painting shows death carrying a scythe. Death is surrounded by symbols of
ecclesiastical authority including a bishop’s robes, cross, and other items.
The second painting shows the body of a bishop in different stages of
decomposition, re-enforcing the theme of the inevitability of death and the

corruption and decomposition of the physical body. The body was a
temporary state occupied in preparation for judgment before God that was
symbolized by the scale that appears above the cleric’s body.
Death and the corruption and decomposition of the body appear in
other representations of the final judgment. One example is the side altar
in the Franciscan church San Luis Obispo Huamantla (Tlaxcala). The
upper panels depict the crucifixion and scenes from the Passion of Christ.
The middle panels depict the final judgment, and the lower three panels
show the torment of sinners in hell and the corruption and decomposition
of the physical body.
142 Chapter Five
depicting death with a scythe.
Fig. 85: A painting from the Hospital de la Santa Caridad (Sevilla, Spain) showing
a bishop claimed by death, the corruption of the physical body, and judgment.
144 Chapter Five
Fig. 86: Side altar at San Luis Obispo Huamantla depicting the Crucifixion of
Christ, the final judgment, the torment of sinners in hell, and the decomposition
and corruption of the physical body.
An eighteenth century artifact from Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan) used in

processions re-enforced the idea of the inevitability of death, and invoked
the earlier theme of the triumph of death. It is a depiction of a skeletal
King of Death seated in a chair. The King of Death holds a scepter and
what appears to be a weapon to be used to claim his victims. By the later
periods of the colonial period the Church was no longer as concerned with
the continued worship of pre-Hispanic death deities in central Mexico as it
had been during the first stages of the “spiritual conquest.” It is another
example of how the theme of the inevitability of death and corruption of
the body reappeared in religious iconography.
Fig. 87: Figure of the King of Death from Santo Domingo Yanhuitlan. This figure
most likely was used in processions.
146 Chapter Five
Burial Practices and Grave Robbing

The Dominican missionary and chronicler Francisco de Burgoa, O.P.,
related an incident of grave robbing by a Dominican missionary at
Ñundecu (Achiutla). Ñundecu was the site of an important oracle that the
chronicler described as the scene of “obscene rites.”13 The first missionary
assigned to Ñundecu (Achiutla), Benito Hernández, O.P., did battle with
Satan and his demonic minions. Hernández’s act of grave robbing was of
such significance as to be included in De Burgoa’s account. Hernández
discovered a burial cave on one of the mountains near Ñundecu, perhaps
on the same mountain as the oracle. There were burial bundles, or bodies
wrapped in cloth with burial offerings, including gold medallions and
precious stones. Hernández stole the precious stones and gold “on their
idols” to buy silver ornaments for the sacristy of the church he had built.14
Fig 88: Primitive church at San Miguel Achiutla (Ñundecu). The silver ornaments
Hernández bought with the proceeds from the sale of gold and precious stones probably
adorned this structure, used until the completion of the larger permanent church.
13
Burgoa, Geográfica descripción, vol. 1, 318.
14
Ibid., 338-341. The Dominican missionaries also attempted to identify and
destroy sacred bundles associated with pre-Hispanic Ñudzahui religious practices.
On the sacred bundles see Hermann Lejarazu, “Religiosidad y bultos sagrados, 75-
94.
One objective of the Dominican missionaries was to introduce and

impose Iberian Catholic cultural practices on the Ñudzahui and other native
peoples of central Mexico, such as burial practices. When Hernández
discovered the burial bundles in the cave near Ñundecu, he believed he
was doing battle with the Demon, since in his mind the pre-Hispanic burial
practices were idolatrous and inspired by Satan. The missionaries imposed
Christian burial practices that entailed the placement of corpses in the
ground. Archaeological evidence from Yucundáa (Teposcolula) shows
that, to a certain extent, the Dominicans were successful in imposing this
cultural norm. An archaeological team headed by Ronald Spores
discovered a common grave at the hilltop Yucundáa site that dated to the
mid-1540s, during a major epidemic outbreak. The bodies placed in the
common grave were not accompanied by burial offerings characteristic of
pre-Hispanic Ñudzahui burials.15 At least in this instance, the missionaries
had the bodies of the plague victims buried following Christian practice.
Fig 89: The second church built at San Miguel Achiutla (Ñundecu), showing the
pre-Hispanic temple platform the Dominicans chose as the site for their convent
complex.
15
Spores, et al, “Avances de investigación,” 286-305; Warinner, “Life and Death
at Teposcolula Yucundáa.”
148 Chapter Five
Conclusions
The iconographic theme of death posed a problem for the sixteenth
century missionaries, given the similarity between the late medieval
European representations of death as a skeleton with internal organs, and
representations of Mictlantecuhtli, the central Mexican god of death and
the underworld. The missionaries stressed other themes such as the final
judgment with an emphasis on the control of sin associated with certain
pre-Hispanic practices, such as the consumption of pulque that had ritual
significance. At the same time, as shown in the archaeological record from
Yucundáa, the missionaries transformed pre-Hispanic burial practices that
they had characterized as being idolatrous. However, there is also evidence
of the persistence of pre-Hispanic beliefs related to death, as seen in the
case of the Franciscan convent church San Bernardino de Siena
Xochimilco where the natives used the space of the new sacred structures
for their own use by incorporating embedded stones from a pre-Hispanic
temple. As discussed in a previous chapter, the natives created a duality of
the sacred that included their own deities and those the missionaries
brought. The grave robbing incident at Ñundecu (Achiutla) showed that
the imposition of the new cultural norm was not always successful, at least
in the early stages of the cultural war.
CHAPTER SIX
CONFRATERNITIES AND THE RITUAL

OF PENITENCE:
CATHOLIC PRACTICE OR RITUAL
SELF-SACRIFICE?
While the missionaries waged war against Satan for the hearts, minds,
souls, and loyalty of the natives, they also offered salvation to those who
embraced the true faith and strove to eliminate the sins of the body
through repentance. Repentance was an essential element of salvation, and
penitence was a common response to what was viewed as the corrupting
influence of secular society and the sins of the body. Repentance in the
central Mexican missions was a stylized ritual generally organized by
cofradias (confraternities) that staged processions such as the santo
entiero held on Good Friday during Easter week, in which the faithful
recreated the carrying of Jesus’ body from the cross to his tomb. Some
participants in the processions scourged their bodies to eliminate sin. The
central element of the santo entierro was a sculpted and articulated model
of Christ’s body carried during the procession. During the colonial period
the santo entierro was carried on a litter. They generally are now stored in
a wooden and glass casket prominently displayed in the church when not
employed in processions, and are found today at many churches in central
Mexico. Other cofradías, such as the Vera Cruz, organized processions
often identified by the term procesión de sangre, because the participants
whipped their bodies to eliminate sin.
Lay confraternities were an important element in the evangelization
strategy, and functioned to provide social organization and an outlet for
the expression of religiosity. Confraternities that staged penitential and
santo entierro processions had their origins during the late medieval
period in Europe, but became increasingly popular during the sixteenth
150 Chapter Six
century in cities such as Sevilla in Spain.1 In the sixteenth century

processions became an integral element of the Easter week observation
that took place in the week before Easter Sunday. In an earlier period the
Easter celebration actually took place in the week following Easter
Sunday, and did not include processions or the other elements that
characterized it during the early modern period.2
The first documented example of processions that involved self-
flagellation was in Italy in the years 1260-1261. The practice spread across
Europe, and particularly in the fourteenth century with the crisis of the
Black Death epidemic (1347-1350) and in response to other moments of
societal stress such as drought and war, and natural disasters. These were
spontaneous manifestations of faith in late medieval Europe, and were
responses to the popular belief and the teachings of the Church that God
sent disease and caused drought as a punishment for sinful behavior.3
The missionaries had penitential processions depicted in murals to
remind themselves of the constant need to reject sin and to engage in acts
of contrition and self-punishment, and to teach the natives the Christian
concept of penitence. The procession usually started in the church, exited
the church and circled the atrium and stopped at the chapels (capillas de
posa) where the missionary would preach a doctrinal point, and then
entered the cloister. Mural themes in the cloisters included the Passion of
Christ, the stages leading to the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus.4 The
crucifixion and resurrection were key doctrinal points the missionaries

stressed in the religious instruction.
1
On the origins of confraternities that organized processions and the inclusion of
processions during Easter week see Susan Verdi Webster, Art and Ritual in Golden
Age Spain. Sevillian Confraternities and the Processional Sculpture of Holy Week
(Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1998), 19-25.
2
Ibid., 24-27.
3
Ibid., 25.
4
For a discussion of the organization of Holy Week penitential processions at
Huexotzingo see Elena Estrada de Gerlero, “El programa pasionario en el convent
franciscano de Huejotzingo,” Jahrbuch fur Geschichte von Staat, Wirtschaft und
Gesellschaft Lateinamerikas 20 (1983), 642-662, and Verdi Webster, “Art, Ritual
and Confraternities in Sixteenth-Century New Spain,” 15. Estrada de Gerlero and
Verdi Webster argued that murals of penitential processions in the church at
Huejotzingo (Puebla), and the convents at Teitipac (Oaxaca), and Huaquechula
(Puebla) were used in penitential processions organized by confraternities
established among the native populations by the late sixteenth century. Estrada de
Gerlero examined records from several Franciscan doctrinas and the Huejotzingo
mural in her article, whereas Verdi Webster analyzed the murals themselves and
documents produced by the confraternity of the Vera Cruz at Huejotzingo.
Confraternities and the Ritual of Penitence 151
From the perspective of the missionaries the sinful behaviors of the

natives such as pulque consumption opened them to demonic influence,
and led to apostasy or idolatry. The missionaries stressed sin and the final
judgment in their efforts to evangelize the natives, and taught penitence
and mortification of the flesh as the path to salvation. However, in terms
of native religious beliefs, penitential practices in processions was most
likely seen as being similar to the self-sacrifice and penitence employed by
natives in central Mexico prior to the Spanish conquest, such as self-
sacrifice of blood to placate the gods.5 A parallel can be seen with the self-
sacrifices made to the rain deity Dzahui documented in the Yodzocahi
(Yanhuitlan) inquisition case discussed above. Don Francisco allegedly
drew blood from his ear lobe and tongue to sprinkle on the site of the
temple the Dominicans had ordered demolished to make way for their
sacred complex. Moreover, practitioners of traditional religion viewed
drought and epidemics in the 1530s and 1540s in the Mixteca Alta as a
manifestation of the anger of Dzahui and other gods as a consequence of
the Christian intrusion.6
Beliefs and ritual practices among the Be'ena'a paralleled those of the
Ñudzahui. The relaciones geográficas reports also recorded details of
Be'ena'a rituals, although, as previously discussed, the information on
religious practices varied from report to report. The report for Teitipac
noted that: “They worshipped the demon making very ugly idols and faces
[masks] of stone in his figure to which they sacrificed dogs and Indian
slaves [.]”7 The report on Guaxilotitlan (Huitzo) provided more detail. It
described the role of priests called picana, who organized the rituals and
sacrifices, which included self-sacrifice: “…they sacrificed taking blood
from their ears and tongue; and in a ceremony they celebrated during the
year in the house of their sacrifices, they killed one of the prisoners that
they brought from the wars they had, asking their idols to give them
strength for their wars.”8 The natives may have viewed penitential
processions as being acts of self-sacrifice.
5
Don Francisco, the lord of Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan), and others allegedly made
blood sacrifices on the site of a temple that the Dominicans had ordered destroyed.
Moreover, Don Francisco reportedly ordered the people of Yodzocahi to continue
to worship their old gods on the temple site. See Terraciano, The Mixtecs of
Colonial Oaxaca, 280.
6
Ibid.,, 265-267.
7
Del Paso y Troncoso, Papeles de Nueva España. Segunda Series Geografía y
Estadística Tomo IV, 111.
8
Ibid., 198.
152 Chapter Six
Murals depicting santo entierro and penitential processions survive at

three central Mexican missions: two Franciscan doctrinas in Puebla, and
the Dominican mission San Juan Bautista Teitipac in Oaxaca. The first
example is a polychrome mural depicting penitents wearing black and
white hoods and robes located at the Franciscan doctrina San Martín de
Tours Huaquechula (Puebla). The lead penitent carries the arma Christi or
symbols associated with the crucifixion, which identifies the penitential
procession as taking place during Easter week, and most likely on Good
Friday. The penitents wearing black robes scourge themselves with
disciplinas (whips used for self-flagellation). The mural appears on the
wall of a niche in the corridor on the second story of the cloister (see Fig.
90).
The second mural depicting penitents is located on the south wall of
the church of the Franciscan convent San Miguel Arcángel Huejotzingo
(Puebla). On the opposite wall a badly deteriorated mural depicts Jesus on
the cross surrounded by a group of black and white robed penitents, which
identifies the mural program with the santo entierro. The mural on the
south wall shows a procession with elements in common with the Teitipac
murals discussed below. Franciscan missionaries carry the santo entierro
on a liter, and are followed by white and black robed penitents. One group
of the penitents is shown carrying the arma Christi, while others engage in
self-flagellation. This element of the mural is different from that at
Teitipac, since the mural combines the santo entierro procession with self-
flagellation by penitents (see Figs. 91-92).9
Art historian Susan Verdi Webster interprets the mural to have been a
form of recognition of the Vera Cruz cofradía that existed at the convent
in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries.10 The penitential
murals also played a dual role in the iconography of the war against Satan.
It served to remind the natives of the importance of penitence as the way
to eliminate the sins of the flesh, and as a tool to channel native religiosity
in a form that ostensibly was Christian through the organization of
processions. Other visual representations of processions corroborate the
details shown in the Huexozingo church mural program. A late eighteenth
century painting in the convent church at Singuilucan (Hidalgo) depicts a
santo entierro procession with Jesus’ body being carried on a liter. White
robbed penitents are shown with blood on the backs of their robes from
self-flagellation (see Figure 93).
9
Ibid., 16-19.
10
Ibid., 22.
The most extensive mural program depicting a santo entierro procession

is in the portería of the Dominican doctrina San Juan Bautista Teitipac.
Teitipac was an important Be’ena’a community in the Central Valley of
Oaxaca. The Dominicans established a doctrina there around 1555, and in
the early 1570s the four Dominicans stationed there had responsibility not
only for Teitipac, but also four neighboring communities. They were
Tlacolula, Macuilsuchil, Teutitlan [del Valle], and Tlacochahuaya. In
1571, the five communities counted a total of some 2,800 tributaries, or a
population of about 11,000.11
Fig. 90: Penitential procession from a mural at the Franciscan convent San Martín
de Tours Huaquechula (Puebla).
11
García Pimentel, Relación de los obispados de Tlaxcala, Michoacán, Oaxaca y
otros lugares en el siglo XVI,), 70-71. Jean Elizabeth Florence Starr, “Ideal Models
and the Reality. From Cofradía to Majordomo in the Valles Centrales of Oaxaca,
Mexico,” unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of Glasgow, 1993, 107-108.
154 Chapter Six
Fig. 91: Mural depicting a penitential santo entierro procession during Holy Week
and beneath it the santo entierro casket with the body of Jesus, from the church at
San Miguel Arcángel Huejotzingo (Puebla).
The missionaries organized cofradías to offer natives a new ostensibly

Christian outlet to manifest their spirituality. Art historians Elena Estrada
de Gerlero and Susan Verdi Webster argued that the cofradías that
organized the santo entierro processions were associated with Dominican
establishments, whereas the penitential confraternities such as Vera Cruz
were Franciscan.12 On one wall of the Teitipac portería is a representation
of the descent of Christ’s body from the cross. In the mural a group of
Dominican missionaries lower the body from the cross, which
symbolically initiated the santo entierro procession. The main panel
depicts the procession. In the lower register the santo entierro is carried by
a group of missionaries followed by a Spaniard carrying a banner and a
group of men and women. Several appear to be dressed as the Virgin
12
Estrada de Gerlero, “El programa pasionario,” 651-654, Verdi Webster, “Art,
Ritual and Confraternities in Sixteenth-Century New Spain,” 20.
Mary, Mary Magdalene, and John the Baptist. In the upper register is a
group of hooded penitents who carry the arma Christi such as the ladder.13
Fig. 92: North wall mural that adjoins the Porciuncula door. The mural depicts
Jesus on the cross surrounded by black and white robed penitents.
Fig. 93: Detail of an eighteenth century painting on cloth showing a penitential

santo entierro procession (Church of the ex-convent of Singuilucan, Hidalgo).
13
Ibid., 20-22.
156 Chapter Six
Fig. 94: The church and portería of the Dominican doctrina San Juan Bautista
Teitipac (Oaxaca). The photograph was taken on Maundy Thursday as local
residents organized a procession.
Fig. 95: Mural program in the portería at Teitipac.
Fig. 96: A group of Dominican Missionaries lower Christ’s body from the cross.
Mural from San Juan Bautista Teitipac.
Fig. 97: The santo entierro carried by a group of missionaries followed in the
procession by hooded penitents who carry arma Christi.
158 Chapter Six
Fig. 98: Detail of mural showing the santo entierro.

Fig. 99: Detail of mural showing hooded penitents carrying the arma Christi.
There is no ambiguity as regards the role of the confraternities in the

colonial-era Catholic agenda in Mexico. They served to organize and
channel popular religiosity in support of the evangelization process, and to
offer new rituals that focused on key doctrinal points to replace the old
religious practices. The confraternity of the Rosary that figures in the story
of the miracle of the virgin of the rosary discussed in chapter 1 is an
example. Using confraternities as an evangelization strategy was common
in other Spanish missions during the colonial period. One example comes
from the Jesuit Chiquitos missions in lowland South America (eastern
Bolivia). The Jesuits reported the organization of congregaciones similar
to confraternities. The Jesuits did not provide many details regarding the
activities of the congregaciones other than to note the religious fervor of

the congregants, their attendance at mass, and the recitation of the rosary.
One exception was a 1734 report on San José mission that described a
funeral procession for a congregant. The report noted that other
congregants and the leaders of the congregación attended the dying and
prepared the passage to the afterlife. This description, in turn, suggests that
the natives incorporated traditional burial practices, and particularly the
involvement of other clan members in the burial through the
congregación. The natives only minimally involved the Jesuit missionary
in the public phase of the burial.14 The mission residents readily
incorporated the congregaciones into their practice of Catholicism, and
most likely used them to provide cover for the practice of some traditional
religious-social practices, including the role of clan chiefs in public rituals
such as the burial described in the 1734 report.
Processions also formed a very important part in the manifestation of
the new faith as practiced in the Paraguay missions. From the very
beginning of the missionary program the Jesuits stationed on the Paraguay
missions received instructions to incorporate chapels dedicated to Our
Lady of Loreto in the urban plans for the mission complexes, and chapels,
such as those at Loreto and Santa Rosa missions, played a central role in
processions.15 Reports from the Paraguay missions noted the organization
14
The report noted that: “Quando alguno de los congregantes llega al articulo de la
muerte, desde que recibe el Sacramento de la Extremaunción, le asisten los
congregantes, sus hermanos, con mucha devoción, rogando, y rogando a Dios por
el, paraque le de una buena muerte. Y quando se difiere la muerte, se remudan
unos quedando otros en bastante numero, aunque sea toda la noche no permitiendo
se quede solo el enfermo, en aquel tiempo, sin que aya algunos de sus hermanos,
que le asistan y encomienden a Dios en aquel tranza.” The report described
funerary practices in the following terms: “Asisten con mucha devoción a los
entierros: cargando los cuerpos de los Difuntos los mas principales del Pueblo. Y
al deponer los cadáveres en la Sepultura, tienen como emulación entre si sobre
qual Primero ha de coger el Cuerpo: señanandoase en este el mismo Corregidor y
los demás Capitanes del Pueblo.” See “Annua del Pueblo de S. Joséph. Año de
1734,” Biblioteca Nacional, Archivo General de la Nación, Buenos Aires,
Argentina (hereinafter cited as BNAGN).
15
See Norberto Levantón, “Un pueblo misional con un importante patrimonio
religioso: Algunas problemáticas en torno a la investigación de la arquitectura de
Nuestra Señora de Loreto (provincia jesuítica del Paraguay),” Internet site:
http://arquitecturamisionera.blogspot.com/search?updated-min=2008-01-
01T00%3A00%3A00-08%3A00&updated-max=2009-01-01T00%3A00%3A00-
08%3A00&max-results=4. On the role of the posa chapels see Verdi Webster,
“Art, Ritual, and Confraternities,” 36-37.
160 Chapter Six
of penitential processions during Holy Week similar to those described

above that included self-flagellation.16 Jesuits in both the Paraguay and
Chiquitos missions also ordered penitential processions during epidemic
outbreaks.17 Processions in the Paraguay and Chiquitos missions may have
been similar to those depicted in the murals at Huaquechula, Huejotzingo,
and Teitipac.
Conclusions
Processions evolved in early modern Europe as a way to focus and
direct popular religiosity, particularly during periods of societal crisis such
as wars, natural disasters such as earthquakes, and epidemics. The
Catholic Church stressed the need to repent for sin in order to restore
God’s grace that obviously had been lost, as evidenced by his wrath in
punishing society. Processions that incorporated self-flagellation were
manifestations of the belief that the pious had to mortify the flesh in order
to eliminate sin and regain God’s grace. In the early modern period pious
laymen organized confraternities that maintained the paraphernalia
employed in and organized the processions at key points during the ritual
calendar, such as on Good Friday during Easter week.
Documentary and visual evidence shows the early establishment of
confraternities in the central Mexican missions, and, as discussed in
chapter 1, the miracle of the Virgin of the Rosary was related to the
confraternity of the rosary established by the Dominicans. The murals at
Huejotzingo, Huaquechula, and Teitipac depict santo entierro and
penitential processions with self-flagellation. An eighteenth century painting
from the convent church at Singuilucan also depicts a santo entierro
procession with self-flagellation. The natives adopted penitential processions
in the round of ritual observations. However, the question remains how
they conceptualized the meaning of processions.
16
Anua de las doctrinas del Paraná, AC #935.
17
Anua de las doctrinas del Paraná, 1695, AC #922. During a measles epidemic at
Santa Ana in 1695, the Jesuits organized a procession that included penitential
self-flagellation. In response to an epidemic at the Chiquitos mission San Francisco
Xavier, the Jesuits organized two processions. One involved carrying a statue of
the Virgin Mary through the mission. See Juan Cervantes, San Francisco Xavier,
May 12, 1739, Annua del Pueblo de S Xavr de 1738, BNAGN, #6468/18. The
Jesuits in the Chiquitos missions organized congregaciones dedicated to the
Virgen Mary that enrolled many mission residents, and first appear in the record in
the 1730s. See, for example, No Author, San José, No Date, Annua del Pueblo de
S Joseph, BNAGN #6127/11.
The hypothesis here is that the processions, and particularly those that
involved self-flagellation, also functioned as a cover for continued auto-
sacrifices made to the old deities. The Yanhuitlan inquisition investigation
uncovered evidence of persistence of the pre-Hispanic practice of auto-
sacrifice, the shedding of one’s blood taken from the ear lobe or tongue.
Don Francisco allegedly made auto-sacrifices on the site of a temple the
Dominicans had leveled to make way for the construction of the church
and convent, and encouraged others to do so. Other sources, such as the
relaciones geográficas reports from around 1580, also reported the pre-
Hispanic practice of self-sacrifice. In the case of the Yodzocahi inquisition
investigation, the evidence pointed to self-sacrifices having been made to
Dzahui to placate the deity’s anger. Moreover, the use of confraternities or
similar organizations to practice traditional beliefs was not limited to
central Mexico. In a previous study I argued that natives used the
congregaciones organized on the Jesuit Chiquitos missions in what today
is eastern Bolivia to continue traditional burial practices within the clan
organization.18
Processions and ritual penitence continue to figure in the round of
religious observations in Mexico. An example is the staging of the santo
entierro procession on Good Friday of Easter Week as a part of a larger
penitential procession known today as a “silent procession.” Hooded and
robed penitents, sometimes walking barefooted, carry the santo entierro
casket. Penitents from other confraternities carry statues of the crucified

Jesus, the Virgin Mary, or of Mary holding the body of Jesus already
removed from the cross. “Silent processions” are now a common element
of Easter Week celebration in many Mexican cities, and small towns as
well (see Figure 100). The content and context of these penitential
processions, however, while outwardly similar to those of the sixteenth
century, were fundamentally different for the reasons already discussed
above.
18
Jackson, “Social and Cultural Change on the Jesuit Missions of Paraguay and the
Chiquitos Mission Frontier,” 1-39.
162 Chapter Six
Fig. 100: Bare-footed penitents participating in a “Silent Procession” in Queretaro

on Good Friday (2014) carry a santo entierro casket. Photograph courtesy of César
Cortés Cortés.
CONCLUSIONS
The missionaries who arrived in Mexico in the wake of the Spanish

conquest visualized the sacred in terms of European cultural norms, and
visualized the miraculous as a result of the direct intervention of God, the
Virgin Mary in her different manifestations such as the Virgin of the
Rosary, and the saints and martyrs. Their vision of the sacred was framed
in the context of an ongoing war against Satan and his demonic minions,
and the missionaries believed that pre-Hispanic Mesoamerican religious
traditions were inspired by the evil one. Their writings are replete with
references to vanquishing the demon, and they identified the different pre-
Hispanic deities as one or another satanic manifestation. The iconography
of evangelization showed demons tempting natives receiving instruction in
the mysteries of the new faith, and the symbolic act of baptism not only
represented the ritual of incorporation into the Christian community but
also triumph over the demon. The missionaries also stressed sin, and how
sin would lead to an eternity of suffering in hell tormented by hideous
demons. The missionaries identified certain cultural-religious practices,

such as pulque consumption, with demonic influence. The cross became a
symbol of the triumph of the new faith and the triumph over the demon.
The three missionary orders introduced a new iconography of the
sacred and used images as teaching aids in their effort to evangelize the
natives. This study opened with a discussion of the mural in the upper
cloister of the Dominican doctrina at Tetela del Volcán (Morelos) that was
an example of Dominican triumphalism that memorialized a miraculous
event that allegedly occurred in 1541. The miraculous event took place
against the backdrop of a controversy between the three missionary orders
over the form of baptism. It essentially was over how the Franciscans
managed their evangelization campaign in the 1520s and 1530s, and
particularly the administration of mass baptisms with minimal religious
instruction. The miraculous event depicted in the mural took place only
two years following the trial and execution of don Carlos Ometochtzin, the
tlatoani of Tezcoco who was accused of straying from the true faith. He
had been a Franciscan protégé and his baptism was outwardly an
important achievement at an early stage of the Franciscan evangelization
campaign. However, his trial presented clear evidence of the superficiality
of the Franciscan approach to evangelization, and of the persistence of
164 Conclusions
traditional religious beliefs alongside the new faith. The Dominican

visualization of the miraculous at Tepetlaóxtoc heralded the salvation of a
high status native man through divine intervention. The message was that
compliance with Catholic Church sacraments guaranteed salvation, and
divine intervention saved the soul of the native man from an eternity of
torment in hell.
The Dominican triumphalism that visualized the miraculous had to be
tempered against the reality of how the native populations in central
Mexico visualized the sacred in ways different from that of the missionaries,
and of what the missionaries expected. The missionaries believed that the
new faith had replaced the pre-Hispanic beliefs of the natives, and were
confident in the superiority of Catholicism and Iberian culture. However,
this proved to be a false sense of confidence, as the Church uncovered
growing evidence of the persistence of traditional religious practices
alongside Catholicism. The trial of don Carlos Ometochtzin was only one
instance of formal inquisition proceedings initiated in response to what the
missionaries defined as apostasy and idolatry. The Coatlan and Yodzocahi
(Yanhuitlan) investigations launched in Oaxaca only a few years following
the occurrence of the miraculous at Tepetlaóxtoc were examples. The
inquisition uncovered a systematic campaign to obstruct Dominican
evangelization, and evidence of continued sacrifices to the old gods, and
particularly the rain deity Dzahui. The Ocuila inquisition investigation
similarly found evidence of sacrifices that most likely were made to the
rain and fertility deities Tláloc and Xipe Tótec. The native
conceptualization of the sacred was based on a dualism where Christian
and pre-Hispanic deities co-existed, which was different from the
exclusivistic Catholic vision of the sacred.
Evidence of the persistence of pre-Hispanic beliefs can also be found
in what ostensibly was Christian iconography, and in the incorporation of
embedded pre-Hispanic stones in the new sacred structures the missionaries
had built, as well as other colonial-era structures. The strategic placement
of a stone with the face of Tláloc at the rear of Santiago Tlatelolco church
was no accident. As Church officials noted prior to the third Mexican
Church Council meeting in 1585, the natives paid too much attention to
the embedded stones. The inclusion of this embedded stone created a
duality in which Tláloc and Jesus shared the same sacred space, in the
same way that Tláloc and Huitzilopochtli shared the space of a temple in
the sacred precinct of Tenochtitlan. The inclusion of song and speech
glyphs in the lower cloister murals at Malinalco provides another example
of the incorporation of pre-Hispanic iconography in Christian murals. The
glyphs converted the depictions of local plants and flowers into a pre-
Hispanic ritual flower song.
The earlier interpretation of Robert Ricard that posited a rapid and
facile evangelization and conversion proves, under close scrutiny, to have
been inaccurate. The missionaries launched a “culture war” to eliminate all
vestiges of the old beliefs, but their evangelization campaign was
incomplete if not superficial. In the logic of the native world view the new
faith did not offer a new version of the sacred sufficient to replace the pre-
Hispanic deities of the rain and fertility that had provided for central
Mexican farmers for centuries prior to the arrival of the Spaniards. Many
instances of idolatry and the symbolism and iconography incorporated into
the new sacred complexes were associated with the water-earth-fertility
religion centered on the deities Tláloc and Xipe Tótec, or in the case of the
Ñudzahui territory in Oaxaca, on Dzahui. In the sacred as visualized by the
native populations, these deities challenged Jesus and the other Christian
gods in importance in the decades following the Spanish conquest.
Inquisition investigations and public executions, such as those depicted in
Lienzo de Tlaxcala, sought to eliminate the competition from these deities.
A Late Colonial Musical Interlude: The Chuchumbé
An incident occurred in the middle of the mass being celebrated in the
cathedral in Xalapa (Veracruz) on January 7, 176. As the priest raised the
host, the organist played the Chuchumbé, a satirical song and dance that
mocked Catholic priests, and in particular Mercedarians, Franciscans, and

Jesuits, for their loose morals. The inquisition also investigated a group of
people from Veracruz City in connection with the song and dance. They
were Juan Soler, and three women named Simona, Ana, and María Ignacia
Fresca. A Mercedarian named Nicolás Montero made the initial report to
the inquisition.1 The inquisition banned the Chuchumbé, and it was the
first song and dance banned in colonial Mexico. Over the next five
decades the investigated investigated at least 43 dances, but only
prohibited one other by edict, the Jarabe gatuno.2
In describing the Chuchumbé, the inquisition record noted that:
…it is danced, in ordinary houses, by mulattoes and people of broken color
[afro-mestizos-gente de color quebrado], not by serious people or
circumspect men, and yes soldiers, sailors, and people without a trade
1
Alejandro Martínez de la Rosa, “Las mujeres bravas del fandango. Tentaciones
del infierno,” Relaciones 133 (invierno 2013), 119-120.
2
Elena Deanda-Camacho, “Ofensiva a los oídos piadosos: Poéticas y políticas de
la obscenidad y la censure en la España trasatlántica,” unpublished PhD
dissertation, Vanderbilt University, 2010, 214-215.
166 Conclusions
[broza]…they sing it while the others dance it, that is [danced] between
men and women, or that is four women dancing, with four men, and the
dance is with gestures, wriggling, shifting, all contrary to honesty, and a
bad example to those who see it, as assistants, by mixing in it, gestures arm
to arm [de tramo en tramo], hugging, and belly to belly.3
The style of the dance offended the sensibilities of Church officials, as

also did the song lyrics that mocked the sexual mores of the members of
the religious orders, and of the clergy in general. The song satirized
members of the orders that had sexual relations, in violation of Church
rules. The song opens with a Mercedarian publicly raising his habit to
show his penis, and talks of the sexual relations with women by members
of three religious orders. The prohibition of the song was not the first
instance in which the Church attempted to control dances and music. In
the sixteenth century, the Church sought to systematically suppress dance
and music associated with pre-Hispanic religious beliefs and practices. In
the mid and late eighteenth century, Church and civil officials investigated
songs and dances that they found to be morally unacceptable, and reported
other incidents similar to the one described in Xalapa, the playing of
satirical songs during mass.4
Table 10: Text of El Chuchumbé

En la esquina está parado On the corner is standing

un fraile de la Merced a friar of la Merced
con los abitos alzados with his habit raised
enceñando el chuchumbé. showing the chuchumbé.
Que te pongas vien
que te pongas mal Whether you like it or not
el chuchumbé te e a de agarrar. the chuchumbé is going to get you.
Esta vieja santularia This old false saint
3
Quoted in Martínez de la Rosa, “Las mujeres bravas,” 119. The original quote
reads: “esto se baila, en casas ordinarias, de mulatos, y gente de color quebrado; ni
entre gente seria, no entre hombres circunspectos, y sí soldados, marineros, y
broza…se cantan mientras los otros lo bailan, o ya sea entre hombres y mujeres, o
sean bailando quatro mugeres, con quatro hombres, y que el baile es con
ademanes, meneos, sarandeos, contrarios todos a la honestidad, y mal ejemplo de
los que lo ven, como asistentes, por mezclarse en él, manoseos, de tramo en tramo;
abrazos, y dar barriga, con barriga.
4
Margarita Orozco Trejo, “Maldad y prohibición: Dos percepciones en las danzas
rituales de principios de la corona,” in Robert H. Jackson, editor, Evangelization
and Cultural Conflict in Colonial Mexico (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge
Scholars Publishers, 2014), 87-96.
que va i biene a San Francisco Comes and goes to San Francisco

toma el Padre, daca el Padre she takes the Father, andd the
y es el Padre de sus hijos. Father gives
De mi chuchumbé de mi cundabal and is the Father of her children.
que te pongas vien que te voi aviar. Of my chuchumbé of my cundabal
El demonio de la china [lover?]
del barrio de la merced put it well and I’ll fill you up
y como se sarandiava The demon from China
metiéndole el chuchumbé. from the neighborhood of la
Que te pongas vien Merced
que te pongas mal and how he shakes it [his body]
el chuchumbé te a de agarrar. sticking the chuchumbé in her.
Eres Marta la piadosa Whether you like it or not
en quanto a tu caridad the chuchumbé is going to get you.
que no llega pelegrino
que socorrido no va. You are the pious Marta
Si vuestra merced quisiera as to your charity
yo le mandara don’t come ragamuffin
el cachivache de verinduaga. you won’t get it.
En la esquina ai puñaladas If you would like
ay Dios que será de mí I will send you
que aquellos tontos se matan these small things of verinduaga.
por esto que tengo aqui. At the corner there are stabbings
Si vuestra merced no quiere venir oh God what will be of me
conmigo those fools kill themselves

Señor Villalva le dará el castigo. for what I have here.
Animal furioso un Sapo If you don’t want to come with me
ligera una lagartija Mr. Villalva will give you the
y mas baliente es un papo punishment.
que se sopla esta pija. Furious animal a Toad
Si vuestra merced no quiere venir a light lizard
conmigo and braver is a craw
Señor Villalva le dará el castigo. that this cock blows.
Y si no vienes de buena gana If you don’t want to come with me
te dará el premio Sr. Villalva. Mr. Villalva will give you the
Me casé con un soldado punishment.
lo hicieron cabo de esquadra And if you don’t come willingly
y todas las noches quiere Mr. Villalva will give you the prize.
Su merced montar la guardia. I married a soldier
Save vuestra merced que, save they made him the corporal of the
vuestra merced que canta la Misa le squadron
han puesto a vuestra merced. and every night he wants
Mi marido se fue al Puerto You to mount the guard.
por hacer burla de mi You know, you know, to sing the
el de fuerza a de bolver Mass they have put before you.
por lo que dexó aquí. My husband went to the Port
168 Conclusions
Que te pongas vien que te pongas [Veracruz]

mal for having made fun of me
con mi chuchumbé te e de aviar. for sure he will return
Y si no te aviare yo te aviare for what he left here.
con lo que le cuelga a mi Whether you like it or not
chuchumbé. I will fill you with my chuchumbé.
Qué te puede dar un fraile And if it doesn’t fill you I’ss fill
por mucho amor que te tenga you up
un polvito de tabaco with what hangs from my
y un responso quando mueras. chuchumbé.
El chuchumbé de las doncellas What can a Friar give you
ellas conmigo, y yo con ellas. for all the love that he has for you
En la esquina está parado a powder of tobacco [snuff]
el que me mantiene a mí and a responsary when you die.
el que me paga la casa El chuchumbé of the maidens
y el que me da de vestir. they with me, and I with them.
Y para alivio de las casadas On the corner is standing
bibir en cueros, y amancebadas. he who maintains me
Estaba la muerte en cueros he who pays my house
sentada en un escritorio, and he who gives me to wear.
y Su Madre le decia And to the relief of the married
no tienes frio demonio. [women]
Vente conmigo To live naked, and in concubinage.
vente conmigo Death was naked
que soi soldado de los amarillos. seated at a desk,

Por aqui pasó la Muerte and your mother told him
con su abuja y su dedal you aren’t cold demon.
preguntando de casa, en casa Come with me
ay trapos que rremendar. come with me
Save vuestra merced que I am a soldier of the yellows [skin
save vuestra merced que, color]
la puta en quaresma Death passed by here
le han puesto a vuestra merced. with his needle and thimble
Por aqui pasó la muerte asking from house, to house
poniendome mala cara if there are rags to mend.
y yo cantando le dige You know that
no te apures alcaparra. you know that,
Si vuestra merced quisiera y no se the whore in lent
enojara they have put for you.
carga la jaula se le quedara. Death passed by here
Estava la muerte en cueros frowning at me
sentada en un taburete and I singing told him
en un lado estaba el pulque don’t hurry caper-bush.
i en el otro el aguardiente. If you want, and doesn’t get angry
Save vuestra merced que, save carrying the cage would be for you.
vuestra merced que Death was naked
que me meto a gringo, y me llevo a sitting on a stool

vuestra merced. on one side was pulque
Quando me parió mi Madre and aguardiente on the other.
me parió en un campanario You know that, your Worship
quando vino la partera knows
me encontraron repicando. that a foreigner sticks it to me, and I
Repique y repique le han puesto take it to you.
a vuestra merced si no se enoja se When my Mother bore me
lo dire. she gave birth to me in a belfry
Quando se fue mi marido when the midwife came
no me dejó qué comer they found me ringing.
y yo lo busco mejor Ding and dong they have put it
bailando el chuchumbé. if you don’t get angry, I’ll tell you
Sabe vuestra merced que, save it.
vuestra merced que When my husband left
meneadora de culo le an puesto a he didn’t leave me what to eat
vuestra merced. nd I looked for it better
Mi marido se murio dancing the chuchumbé.
Dios en el cielo lo tiene Do you know that, do you know
y lo tenga tan tenido that
que acá, jamás, nunca buelba. they have put [the name] “manager
Chuchumbé de mi cundaval of ass” to you.
que te pongas bien que te boi aviar
que si no te abiare, yo te aviare My husband died
con lo que le cuelga a mi God in heaven has him

chuchumbé. and they can have him there
El demonio del Jesuita so that he will never return here.
con el sombrero tan grande Chuchumbé of my cundaval
me metia un surriago if you like it I’ll fill you up
tan grande como su padre. and if it doesn’t fill you I’ll fill you
Si vuestra merced quisiera, y no se up
enojara, la fornicadorita se le with what hangs from my
quedara. chuchumbé.
The demonic Jesuit
with the very large hat
he stuck a whip [penis] in me
as large as his father.
If you want, and if you won’t get
angry, the little fornicator will stay
with you.
170 Conclusions
The song is now a part of the repertoire of musical groups that play the
regional music from Veracruz, the son jarocho, and is considered to be
one of the classic songs in the genre. I was first introduced to a modern
version of the song by the talented Oaxacan musicians Jeisel Torres
Carreño and Susana Harp. The story of the song, it having been the first
banned in Mexico, intrigued me, and I looked for references to document
its content and context. Although the incidents described in the inquisition
case occurred more than two hundred years following the initiation of the
evangelization campaign in central Mexico, this history contains similar
elements to the way that the native populations visualized the sacred in
their own terms. In this case the people who sang and danced the
Chuchumbé, mostly people of color, challenged the colonial status quo and
official version of behavior and reverence for the established state religion.
The Xalapa organist and the individuals from Veracruz called before the
inquisition had created their own vision of the sacred that devalued the
members of the religious orders because of their personal behavior. The
missionaries no longer had the moral authority to impose their beliefs as
they had had during the initial evangelization campaign in the sixteenth
century. The song refers to the demonic Jesuit, the Franciscan who
fathered the children of a woman called a “false saint,” and the
Mercedarian who lifted his habit to display his penis on a street corner.
According to the song, the priest was no better than a pimp.
The song and the vision of the sacred that engendered it challenged the
authority of the Church, and the Church’s claimed monopoly over morals.
It is no wonder that the Mercedarian Nicolás Montero went to the
inquisition to complain about the song. However, the times had changed.
Martín de Valencia and Juan de Zumárraga had condemned native leaders
to death for adhering to their own vision of the sacred, one that did not
conform to that of the missionaries. In the early 1540s, the Crown
prohibited the missionaries from condemning native leaders to death for
idolatry, a measure taken for pragmatic reasons. The Crown relied on
native political leaders to govern in the system of indirect rule created in
colonial Mexico, and the actions of the Franciscans threatened to alienate a
group vital to the governance of the indigenous populations. When Diego
de Landa, O.F.M. echoed the belief that the persistence of idolatry could
lead to other forms of resistance such as rebellion, he did not realize that
the methods an earlier generation of missionaries had used also
engendered resistance. He may have wanted to condemn the native leaders
of Man to death, but no longer had the authority to do so. Ironically, the
actions of the first Franciscans who applied capital punishment to suppress
the continued practice of the traditional indigenous beliefs, and the
resulting backlash by the Crown, created conditions that facilitated the

persistence of an indigenous vision of the sacred based on a duality that
incorporated traditional and new beliefs.
For the natives, the start of the rainy season in the late spring was
miraculous, and to ensure the timely return of the rains it was necessary to
honor and make sacrifices to the deities that had guaranteed the bountiful
crops that had sustained civilization for centuries. The new vision of the
sacred introduced by the missionaries did not offer viable alternatives to
the native vision of the miraculous and sacred. Rather, the imposition of
Spanish rule and of a new religion only brought disaster in the form of
drought and lethal epidemics. The old gods that had brought the miracle of
life-giving rain and the fertility of the soil were angry. The missionaries
had not been able to impose a new vision of the miraculous on the natives,
and failed to completely eradicate the practices and sacrifices associated
with the rain and fertility deities.
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INDEX
Actopan, 107 Cofradias (Confraternities), 44, 145

Almoloyas, 48 Congregación, 39, 159
Altépetl, 6, 33, 34, 43, 56 Cortés, Hernán, 22, 24, 25, 98, 111
Amecameca, 90, 93-95 Coyoacán, 37
Aniñe, 40, 108 Cuauhxicalli, 76
Antequera, 36, 37, 38 Cuauxicalco, 76
Arizpe, 115 Cucurpe, 115, 117
Atlatlauhca[n], 37 Cuilapam, 48
Atl tlachninolli, 94 Danse Macabre (Dance of Death),
Atoco (Nochixtlán), 49 126
Bacadehuachi, 115 De Abrego, O.P., Gerónimo, 78
Bamoa, 112, 113 De Aguilar, O.S.A., Antonio, 26
Barranca de Metztitlán, 107 De Angulo, O.P., Juanes, 80
Basilio, S.J., Tomás, 114 De Balsalobre, Gonzalo, 4
Bavispe, 115 De Burgoa, O.P., Francisco, 78, 146
Beltrán De Guzmán, Nuño, 111, De Camargo, Diego, 29
112 De Gante, O.F.M., Pedro, 20
Beram (Croatia), 126, 132 De la Anunciación, O.P, Domingo,

Cabeza de Vaca, Álvar Núñez, 112, 12
113 De la Cruz, O.P., Domingo, 46
Caxan (1-Eagle), 79, 80 De la Cruz, O.P., Juan, 15, 15, 71
Cerro de Culhuacán (Cerro de la De la Plaza, Tomás, 132
Estrella), 74 De las Cabras, Gonzalo, 34
Cerro de Tlálocan, 74 De Landa, O.F.M., Diego, 28, 30,
Chacchuapa, 80 170
Chila, 15, 49 De Mendoza, Antonio, 38
Cihuacoatl, 138, 139 De Molina, O.F.M., Alonso, 23
Chiquitos missions, 9, 158, 160, 161 De Narváez, Pánfilo, 112
Cholula, 131, 132 De Peralta, Catalina, 40
Chontales, 50 De Santa Caterina, O.P., Cristóbal
Chuchumbé, 165, 166, 170 Jordán, 37
Clusone (Italy), 127 De Santo Domingo, O.P., Domingo,
Coathinchan, 74 48
Coatlan, 5, 6, 7, 164 De Tapia, S.J., Gonzalo, 113
Coatzacualco, 39 De Valencia, O.F.M., Martín, 70,
Codex Borbonicus, 97, 99, 100 170
Codex de la Cruz Badiano, 100 De Zumárraga, Juan, 3, 25, 170
Codex of Francisco Hernández, 100 Del Castillo Maldonado, Alonso,
Codex Tlatelolco, 55 112
182 Index
Disinuu (Tlaxiaco), 36. 38, 48, 49, Malinalco, 7, 96, 97-107, 122, 131,
50 132
Dolores, 115, 117, 118 Maní, 28, 30, 84, 170
Don Carlos Ometochtzin, 3, 4, 6, Méndez, O.P, Juan Bautista, 38
25, 26, 29, 31, 71, 84, 163, 164 Mictlantecuhtli, 136, 148
Don Francisco, 8, 9, 68, 69, 71, 80, Mixes, 50
151, 161 Mixquic, 88
Dorantes de Carranza, Andrés, 112 Molcaxtepec, 79
Durán, O.P, Diego, 1, 71, 86, 139 Molotlan, 23, 24
Dzahui, 7, 9, 67, 78-80, 81, 82, 90, Náhuas, 2, 7, 40, 81, 108
151, 161, 164, 165 Náhuatl, 2, 23, 39, 48, 98
El Nio Icesave, 113 Névome (Pimas Bajos), 115, 117
Encomienda, 33, 36, 49, 112 New Mexico, 112, 113
Gómez, O.P., Vicente, 48 Nexapa, 50, 51
Guasave, 113 Ñudzahui, 7, 39, 40, 45, 46, 48, 49,
Guaxilotitlan (Huitzo), 151 67, 69, 78, 80, 81, 82, 147, 151,
Hernández, O.P., Benito, 146 165
Huajuapan, 49 Nuestra Señora de los Dolores
Huamantla, 141, 144 Xaltocan, 117
Huaquechula, 87, 152, 153, 160 Nueva Galicia, 111
Huatlatlauca, 131, 132, 133 Ñundecu (Achiutla), 49, 125, 146,
Huaxtepec (Oaxtepec, Morelos), 6, 147, 148
37, 38, 41, 42 Ñunine (Tonalá), 49
Huehuecoyotl, 100 Oaxtepec, 14, 36, 37, 42
Huejotzingo, 152, 160 Ocotlán, 49

Huepac, 115 Ocuila (Ocuilan), 7, 26, 27, 164
Huexotla, 25 Opodepe, 8, 110, 117, 121, 123
Hueyapan, 14, 38, 71 Panchimalco, 23, 24
Huitzillan, 23, 24 Pánuco, 112
Huitzilopochtli, 7, 24, 26, 73, 85, Paris, S.J., Francisco, 113
86, 122, 137, 164 Pérez de Rivas, S.J., Andrés, 114
Hymeris Pimas, 115 Peyote, 121
Inguiteria, 34 Pimeria Alta, 115
Isthmus of Tehuantepec, 50 Procesión de sangre, 149
Ixmiquilpan, 103, 104, 106 Qhuau, 78
Ixtlilxochitl, 22 Quacusiqhi, 78
Jaltepec, 49 Quauchchichinollan, 23, 24
Jarabe Gatuna, 159 Rodríguez, O.P., Miguel, 48
Juego de Pelota, 88 Sahuaripa, 114, 115
Karankawas, 112 San Francisco de Morelia
Kaua Kaandiui (“Place Where the (Castellón, Spain), 124, 129
Heaven Was”), 80 San Francisco Xavier del Bac, 116
Kokopelli, 119, 121, 123 San Ildefonso de los Be’ena’as, 37
Macuilsu’chil, 49 Santo Entierro Procession, 9, 99,
Magdalena de Kino, 116 149, 152, 153, 154, 160, 161
Seri (Tepoca), 116, 117
Sevilla, 71, 141, 142, 150 Totolapan, 37, 42

Sinaloa, 112, 113 Toyna Yoco, 78
Sinaloa River, 112, 113 Tuape, 117
Singuilucan, 152, 160 Tzompantli, 137
Sisibutari, 114 Upper Pimans, 114
Son Jarocho, 170 Ures, 113, 115
Sonora, 8, 110, 111, 112, 113, 114, Valladolid, 37
115, 116, 117, 121, 123 Valle de Mezquital, 107, 111
Tamazula, 113 Vázquez, Francisco, 36
Tecomaxtlahuaca, 49 Vázquez de Coronado, Francisco,
Tecpan, 7, 55, 107, 108, 122 113
Tehuima (Opata), 113 Virgin of the Rosary, 5, 6, 9, 10, 14,
Tepantitla (Teotihuacán), 28, 73, 75, 16, 17, 18, 31, 71, 158, 160, 163
76 Villa de San Felipe y Santiago de
Teitipac (Zetoba), 38, 49, 99, 151, Sinaloa, 113
152, 153, 154, 160 Voladores (yosicoyahandi-“fly like
Tejupa[n], 35, 49, 79 an eagle”), 80
Temalcatl, 76 Water-earth-fertility religion, 7, 26,
Teotitlan [del Valle], 49 73, 95, 108, 122, 165
Tepetenchic, 23, 24 Xaco (7-Rain), 80
Tepetlaóxtoc, 5, 6, 12, 14, 16, 17, Xalapa, 165, 166, 170
31, 32, 36, 164 Xipe Tótec, 7, 71-77, 81, 85, 93, 94,
Tepoztlán, 14, 19, 20, 23, 24, 37, 95, 96, 122, 164
38, 39, 43 Xiú, Francisco de Montejo, 27
Tetela de Volcán, 5 Xochimilco, 74, 117, 137, 138-140,

Tetzacualco, 74 148
Tezcoco, 3, 4, 5 12, 22, 24, 25, 31, Xoxoteco, 107
71, 74, 163 Yaguinzi, 79
Third Church Council (1585), 3, 7, Yacapichtlan (Acapistla,
26, 84, 137 Yecapixtla), 37, 41, 42
Tlacaxipeualiztli, 76 Yanacuu, 79
Tlacochahuaya, 49, 153 Yautepec, 14, 23, 37, 43
Tlacolula, 49, 153 Yecora, 115
Tlacopan (Tacuba), 74 Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan), 5, 6, 7, 8,
Tlatlauhqui Tezcatl, 76 9, 34, 46, 48, 51, 67, 68, 69, 70,
Tlacuiloque, 97 78, 79, 80, 82, 144, 151, 161,
Tlalmanalco, 90-95 164
Tlaquiltenango, 20, 21, 40, 43 Yodzocoo (Coixtlahuaca), 48, 51,
Tlayacapa(n), 37, 41, 42, 44, 45, 88, 90
108 Yoémem (Yaqui), 113, 116
Tlatelolco, 3, 7, 26, 35, 55, 83, 84, Yoreme (Mayo), 114
86, 87, 104, 164 Yoyotzin, Jorge, 22
Tláloc, 7, 26, 28, 29, 71-77, 81, 83, Yucundáa (Teposcolula), 36, 46, 51,
85, 86, 87, 88, 90, 91, 94, 95, 52, 55, 56, 108, 147
104, 122, 164, 165 Yucundayy (Tequistepec), 49
Tlilan, 139 Yutatnuhu (Apoala), 80
184 Index
Zaachila, 48, 49 Zempoala, 95


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Visualizing the Miraculous,

Visualizing the Sacred

This book first published 2014

Cambridge Scholars Publishing

12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

Copyright © 2014 by Robert H. Jackson

ISBN (10): 1-4438-6402-1, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-6402-2

List of Tables .............................................................................................. ix

Acknowledgements ................................................................................. xvii

Chapter One ............................................................................................... 11

Chapter Two .............................................................................................. 33

Chapter Three ............................................................................................ 67

Dateline Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan) 1542: “Idolatry” and an Inquisition

Chapter Four .............................................................................................. 83

Chapter Five ............................................................................................ 125

Chapter Six .............................................................................................. 149

Conclusions ............................................................................................. 163

Selected Bibliography ............................................................................. 173

Index ........................................................................................................ 181

Table 1: Political organization of the Tributary Province of Huaxtepec

in the sacred precinct at Tenochtitlan

Fig. 47: Embedded stone that is a representation of Xipe Tótec on the

tecpan at Tlayacapan (Morelos)

Fig. 74: Death shoots an arrow at a Tree of Life

Fig. 98: Detail of mural showing the santo entierro

It is difficult to document the elusive, such as what people believed,

In my approach to this research topic I benefited from intellectual

The Dominican missionary Diego Durán, O.P., wrote about problems

Durán was one of a number of missionaries and Catholic Church officials

scholars to systematically describe the process of evangelization.2 Ricard

the text of a sixteenth century religious play for performance on Holy

context of the trial, including the Franciscan efforts to suppress traditional

practitioners from other communities, and translated them from one

sacred landscape. Moreover, the embedded stones allowed the natives to

The first group of missionaries from the Order of Preachers (Ordo

simplified and minimized the colonial bureaucratic structure. The

Yodzocahi (Yanhuitlan) cases that other scholars have examined in more

upon an incident of grave-robbing by a Dominican missionary.

and processions in sixteenth century Mexico. Murals and a painting survive

VISUALIZING THE MIRACULOUS:

On the second floor of the cloister of the ex-Dominican convent San

Baptism marked salvation through incorporation into the Christian

in 1562, initiated the construction of a new convent at Tetela del Volcán.

Fig. 4: Santa María Magdalena Tepetlaóxtoc, built on top of a temple platform.

The section of the upper cloister mural that is conventionally identified

mural program that originally covered an entire wall. A small fragment of

In the lower register the blindfolded native is led away by a demon,

demon claiming a condemned man.

Fig. 7: A mural in the lower cloister of Nuestra Señora de la Natividad Tepoztlán

The exemplum mural program on the second floor of the cloister at

The baptism controversy and evidence of apostasy

mass baptisms on the grounds of the limited number of missionaries in

Fig. 8: Mural in the portería of Santo Domingo de Guzmán Tlaquiltenango that

The decision that individual natives made to receive or reject baptisms

conquest?” A series of censuses prepared between 1535 and 1540 provide

whom information on baptism is not given are not included in the

1543.24 The baptism by the Franciscans of don Carlos Ometochtzin

resulted in his also being accused of concubinage. Don Carlos Ometochtzin

Fig. 9: Ruins of the Augustinian convent at Ocuila (Estado de México).

PROPRIAE SALUTIS AB INDIS REMOVENDIS appears in vol. II, 224-227. The

Other high profile anti-idolatry cases occurred over the following

The general response to idolatry and apostasy was harsh retaliation,