Santo Domingo
Hueyapan is a small town in the rural northeastern part of the
MexicanThe United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
stateThe United Mexican States is a federation made up of thirty-one "free and sovereign states". These states constitute one federated State or Union. The federal government has exclusive jurisdiction over the Federal District, a territory which does not belong to any state but to all, as well as...
of
MorelosMorelos is one of the 31 constituent states of Mexico. Morelos has an area of about , making it the second-smallest of the country's states. Morelos is bordered by Mexico State to the north-east and north-west, the Federal District to the north, Puebla to the east, and Guerrero to the south-west...
, which belongs to the municipality of
Tetela del VolcánTetela del Volcán or simply Tetela, is a city in the Mexican state of Morelos. It is located on the slopes of the volcano Popocatépetl. .The city serves as the municipal seat for the surrounding municipality of the same name...
. It lies at an elevation of ca 2000-2500 metres above sea level on the southern slopes of the active volcano
PopocatépetlPopocatépetl is an active volcano and, at , the second highest peak in Mexico after the Pico de Orizaba . Popocatépetl is linked to the Iztaccíhuatl volcano to the north by the high saddle known as the Paso de Cortés, and lies in the eastern half of the Trans-Mexican volcanic belt.The name...
. To the west of Hueyapan runs the
Amatzinac riverThe Amatzinac river also called Tenango is a Mexican river in the states of Morelos and Puebla. It flows south from its spring in the foothills of Popocatepetl and south through the canyon which is also called Amatzinac and reaches the dry plain near Chalcatzingo. It gives waters to the...
, to the north is the Popocatépetl-Iztaccíhuatl natural reserve, and to the south the town of
TlacotepecZacualpan de Amilpas is a city in the Mexican state of Morelos.The city serves as the municipal seat for the surrounding municipality, with which it shares a name.The municipality reported 7,962 inhabitants in the year 2000 census....
and to the east is the
municipality of TochimilcoThe Mexican state of Puebla is divided into 217 municipalities :-External links:* , Enciclopedia de los Municipios de México *...
which belongs to the state of
PueblaPuebla is a Mexican state located in the south-central part of the country, to the east of Mexico City. The state borders Veracruz to the east, Hidalgo, Mexico State, Tlaxcala, and Morelos to the west, and Guerrero and Oaxaca to the south. The state's largest cities are Puebla and Tehuacan, it has...
.
The inhabitants of Hueyapan are of
NahuaThe Nahuas are a group of indigenous peoples of Mexico. Their language of Uto-Aztecan affiliation is called Nahuatl and consists of many more dialects and variants, a number of which are mutually unintelligible....
ethnicity and the
Nahuatl languageNahuatl is a group of related languages and dialects of the Nahuan branch of the Uto-Aztecan language family. Collectively they are spoken by an estimated Nahua people, most of whom live in Central Mexico...
is spoken by most adults.
Santo Domingo
Hueyapan is a small town in the rural northeastern part of the
MexicanThe United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
stateThe United Mexican States is a federation made up of thirty-one "free and sovereign states". These states constitute one federated State or Union. The federal government has exclusive jurisdiction over the Federal District, a territory which does not belong to any state but to all, as well as...
of
MorelosMorelos is one of the 31 constituent states of Mexico. Morelos has an area of about , making it the second-smallest of the country's states. Morelos is bordered by Mexico State to the north-east and north-west, the Federal District to the north, Puebla to the east, and Guerrero to the south-west...
, which belongs to the municipality of
Tetela del VolcánTetela del Volcán or simply Tetela, is a city in the Mexican state of Morelos. It is located on the slopes of the volcano Popocatépetl. .The city serves as the municipal seat for the surrounding municipality of the same name...
. It lies at an elevation of ca 2000-2500 metres above sea level on the southern slopes of the active volcano
PopocatépetlPopocatépetl is an active volcano and, at , the second highest peak in Mexico after the Pico de Orizaba . Popocatépetl is linked to the Iztaccíhuatl volcano to the north by the high saddle known as the Paso de Cortés, and lies in the eastern half of the Trans-Mexican volcanic belt.The name...
. To the west of Hueyapan runs the
Amatzinac riverThe Amatzinac river also called Tenango is a Mexican river in the states of Morelos and Puebla. It flows south from its spring in the foothills of Popocatepetl and south through the canyon which is also called Amatzinac and reaches the dry plain near Chalcatzingo. It gives waters to the...
, to the north is the Popocatépetl-Iztaccíhuatl natural reserve, and to the south the town of
TlacotepecZacualpan de Amilpas is a city in the Mexican state of Morelos.The city serves as the municipal seat for the surrounding municipality, with which it shares a name.The municipality reported 7,962 inhabitants in the year 2000 census....
and to the east is the
municipality of TochimilcoThe Mexican state of Puebla is divided into 217 municipalities :-External links:* , Enciclopedia de los Municipios de México *...
which belongs to the state of
PueblaPuebla is a Mexican state located in the south-central part of the country, to the east of Mexico City. The state borders Veracruz to the east, Hidalgo, Mexico State, Tlaxcala, and Morelos to the west, and Guerrero and Oaxaca to the south. The state's largest cities are Puebla and Tehuacan, it has...
.
Ethnography
The inhabitants of Hueyapan are of
NahuaThe Nahuas are a group of indigenous peoples of Mexico. Their language of Uto-Aztecan affiliation is called Nahuatl and consists of many more dialects and variants, a number of which are mutually unintelligible....
ethnicity and the
Nahuatl languageNahuatl is a group of related languages and dialects of the Nahuan branch of the Uto-Aztecan language family. Collectively they are spoken by an estimated Nahua people, most of whom live in Central Mexico...
is spoken by most adults. The name of the town comes from the Nahuatl language and means
"on the great water" referring to the abundant water resources of the locality. The people of Hueyapan mostly practice subsistence agriculture: They produce maize, beans, squash, peach, avocado and plums. The people of Hueyapan are also known for their woolen products such as
ponchoA poncho is a garment designed to keep the body warm, or if made from a watertight material, to keep dry during rain. It was created by the Peruvians and is now known in over 150 countries over the world.- Types of poncho :...
s (
gabán in the local Spanish),
shawlA shawl is a simple item of clothing, loosely worn over the shoulders, upper body and arms, sometimes also over the head. It is usually a rectangular or square piece of cloth, that is often folded to make a triangle but can also be triangular in shape...
s (
rebozo) and skirts (
chincuete) of thick woolen cloth. The thread is made on traditional spindles called
malacates, dyed with natural dyes (such as
AñilAñil is the common name of the flowering plant Indigofera suffruticosa in the family Fabaceae. In Hawaiian it is known as either ‘Inikō/Inikoa, or Kolū; in Fijian it is called Vaivai; the Samoans call it La‘au mageso; on Guam it is called Aniles; and in Tonga it is referred to as ʻakauveli .Añil...
,
WalnutWalnuts are plants in the family Juglandaceae. They are deciduous trees, 10–40 meters tall , with pinnate leaves 200–900 millimetres long , with 5–25 leaflets; the shoots have chambered pith, a character shared with the wingnuts but not the hickories in the same family.The 21 species...
husks,
St John's wortSt John's wort is the plant species Hypericum perforatum, also known as Tipton's Weed or Klamath weed, but, with qualifiers, is used to refer to any species of the genus Hypericum. Therefore, H. perforatum is sometimes called Common St John's wort to differentiate it...
)and the fabric is woven on backstrap looms.
Cultural aspects of Hueyapan and particularly the ethnic identity of the Nahuas of Hueyapan have been described in the book
Being Indian in Hueyapan by
AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
anthropologist Judith Friedlander. The
Nahuatl dialectNahuatl, a member of the Uto-Aztecan language family, consists of a large number of dialects, many of which belong to one or another dialect continuum. As of 2008, the Mexican government recognizes thirty that are spoken in Mexico . Some specialists exclude Pipil...
of Hueyapan has been the object of a few small studies. Karen Dakin and Diana Ryesky have done an ethnolinguistic and dialectal survey of Nahuatl in Morelos, and they describe the dialect of Hueyapan as a typical central dialect with some traits particular of the Morelos varieties. In 1949 Miguel Barrios Espinosa, a teacher from Hueyapan, published a collection of folktales from Hueyapan in the nahuatl language in the journal
Tlalocan. An article by Patrick Johansson (1989) deals with the grammatical encoding of honorifics in the Nahuatl language. Currently SIL linguists are working on Morelos Nahuatl, collaborating with speakers from Hueyapan and from Cuentepec.
History
According to
DuránDiego Durán was a Dominican friar best known for his authorship of one of the earliest Western books on the history and culture of the Aztecs, The History of the Indies of New Spain, a book that was much criticized in his lifetime for helping the "heathen" maintain their culture.Also known as the...
, Hueyapan was founded by people from
XochimilcoXochimilco is one of the sixteen delegaciones or boroughs within Mexican Federal District. It is located within Mexico City, south of the city center. To the north it has borders with Coyoacán, Tlalpan and Iztapalapa; to the west with Tláhuac; and to the southeast with Milpa Alta...
around 902 CE, conquered by the Aztecs under
Moctezuma IIMoctezuma , also known by a number of variant spellings including Montezuma, Moteuczoma, Motecuhzoma and referred to in full by early Nahuatl texts as Motecuhzoma Xocoyotzin
and shortly thereafter
conquered by a Spanish forceThe Spanish colonization of the Americas was the settlement and political rule over much of the western hemisphere which was initiated by the Spanish conquistadors and fought mostly by their native allies...
led by female
ConquistadorConquistador is the term widely used to refer to the Spanish soldiers, explorers, and adventurers who brought much of the Americas under the control of Spain in the 15th through the 17th centuries following Europe's discovery of the New World by Christopher Columbus in 1492...
María EstradaMaría de Estrada was a woman to arrive in Mexico with the expedition of Hernán Cortés as well as the one of the very few women of European descent to take part in and survive the Spanish conquest of Mexico.She is mentioned as the only woman in Cortés's party in the sources of Conquistador Bernal...
in 1524.
Between 1563 and 1573 the
Dominican orderThe Order of Preachers , after the 15th century more commonly known as the Dominican Order or Dominicans, is a Catholic religious order founded by Saint Dominic in the early 13th century in France...
constructed a convent dedicated to
Santo DomingoSaint Dominic , also known as Dominic of Osma, often called Dominic de Guzmán and Domingo de Guzmán Garcés was the founder of the Friars Preachers, popularly called the Dominicans or Order of Preachers , a Catholic religious order...
in Hueyapan. The Convent is now an ex-convent functioning as the town's Catholic church. Fray
Diego DuránDiego Durán was a Dominican friar best known for his authorship of one of the earliest Western books on the history and culture of the Aztecs, The History of the Indies of New Spain, a book that was much criticized in his lifetime for helping the "heathen" maintain their culture.Also known as the...
stayed here for a while and is thought to have compiled much of the information for his Crónica here.
In colonial times Hueyapan was part of the
encomiendaThe encomienda is a trusteeship labor system that was employed by the Spanish crown during the Spanish colonization of the Americas and the Philippines. In the encomienda, the crown granted a person a specified number of natives for whom they were to take responsibility. The receiver of the grant...
originally given to the Estrada family, but was later laid directly under the Spanish throne. Until recently, access to Hueyapan from other communities was limited, but in the past twenty years infrastructure has made transport to and from Hueyapan much easier.
In the 1970s and 1980s marijuana was produced in and around Hueyapan and the town received negative attention from the Mexican media. Government forces occupied the town for brief periods and arrested many citizens both rightfully and wrongfully.
The 2000 general election, in which Mario Soberanes (of the Nueva Alianza party) was elected president of the Municipality of Tetela del Volcán,
http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/notas/379504.htmlhttp://www.oem.com.mx/elsoldecuernavaca/notas_e.asp?urlnota=sec3-061006 was the first time a citizen of Hueyapan had been elected to this position, and was also the first time a local president came from a party other than the
PRIThe Institutional Revolutionary Party is a Mexican political party that wielded power in the country—under a succession of names—for more than 70 years. The PRI is a member of the Socialist International, as is the rival Party of the Democratic Revolution , making Mexico one of the...
.
External links