5 Apr 2017

Nephites and Lamanites, or Maya?

by | posted in: Archaeology, Miscellenea | 0

Have you ever heard of the Nephites or Lamanites?   If you are a Mormon, you have.   If you are not a Mormon, you probably know them by their real name, the Maya.   Here is the story of how the names became linked:

In 1841, an American adventurer named John Lloyd Stephens and a British artist named Frederick Catherwood stayed at the ruins of Tulum for over a week during their tour of Yucatán.   Although the pair found the ruins covered in vines and trees, they also discovered signs of recent rituals and offerings left behind by the Maya in one of the buildings.   Stephens later wrote a book about the trip, Incidents of Travel in Yucatán, and published it in 1843.   Engravings of drawings made by Catherwood at Tulum were included in the book.   It was a run-away best-seller. ....CONTINUE READING

4 Apr 2017

Cozumel and the slave trade

by | posted in: Cozumel History | 0

The frequently heard statement that Cozumel was abandoned in the 1700s due to predations by bands of roving pirates is nearly true.   The island was an easy target for buccaneers and in the mid-1600s the Spanish government finally decided to move the population inland, to towns like Chemax and Xcan Boloná that were far from the marauders’ reach.   Some Cozumelenos did, in fact, move to the mainland.   However, many stayed on the island and were joined by English dyewood cutters, later known as “piratas.” ....CONTINUE READING

1 Apr 2017

Coatis, Pizotes, or Coatimundis

by | posted in: Cozumel Natural History | 0

The white-nosed coati (Nasua narica) is a species of coati and a member of the family Procyonidae, which also includes other coatis, raccoons, olingos, and kinkajous.   Local names include Pizote, Coatimundi, and Tejón.   It averages about 9-15 pounds in weight, but males are much larger than females, and small females weigh as little as 6 pounds and large males as much as 30 pounds.   On average, their total length is about 45 inches, about half of that being the tail length. ....CONTINUE READING

31 Mar 2017

El Grito de Dolores

by | posted in: Mexican History | 0

Some poorly informed sources may translate El Grito de Dolores as “the scream of pain” (don’t laugh, I saw it written so in the English section of a Cozumel newspaper once!), but it actually means the “The Cry of Dolores” and refers to the cry for independence made by the catholic priest Miguel Hidalgo in the town of Dolores, Mexico in the early morning of September 16, 1810. ....CONTINUE READING

30 Mar 2017

A Priest with a Cement Overcoat

by | posted in: Archaeology | 0

A few years after the War of the Castes had gotten underway in Yucatan, a new religious cult sprang up among the rebel ranks; el Culto de la Cruz Parlante (the Cult of the Talking Cross).   The members of this cult were called the Cruzoob, the Spanish word for “cross” pluralized by the Mayan suffix oob.   The origins of the cult can be traced back to the Mayan “talking idols,” one of which had been located on Cozumel when the Spanish arrived in 1517; the temple of Ixchel in San Gervasio, which contained the “talking idol” described by Francisco López de Gómara in 1552.   The interior of the temple had a small room in the back where the statue of the goddess Ixchel stood.   Gómara stated it was a room “…where they kept a very strange idol, very distinct from the others. The body of this great idol was hollow, made of baked clay and fastened to the wall with mortar, in back of which was something like a sacristy, where the priests had a small secret door cut into the side of the idol, into which one of them would enter, and from it speak to and answer those who came to worship and beg favors. With this trickery, simple men were made to believe whatever the god told them.” ....CONTINUE READING

29 Mar 2017

Connecting Capote, Cozumel, and the Killers of the Clutters

by | posted in: Cozumel History | 0

In 1959, Truman Capote read a story in the New York Times about the murders of the Clutter family and immediately began to write a book about the killers.   It took him five years to finish writing it.    He published his story first as a four-part series of articles beginning with installment number one in the September 25, 1965 edition of the New Yorker magazine under the title In Cold Blood: The last to see them alive.   The book, In Cold Blood, was published immediately afterwards in 1965 by Random House. The book was made into a movie by the same name in 1967. ....CONTINUE READING

21 Mar 2017

Maria Uicab, La Santa Patrona y Reina de Tulum

by | posted in: Hispanohablantes, Yucatan y Quintana Roo | 0

Unos años después de que la Guerra de las Castas se había puesto en marcha en Yucatán, un nuevo culto religioso apareció entre las filas de los rebeldes; El Culto de la Cruz Parlante.   Los miembros de este culto fueron llamados el Cruzoob, la palabra cruz pluralizada por el sufijo Maya, oob.   La creencia en una cruz que habla no era difícil para los Maya, quien tienen una larga tradición de “ídolos habladores,” dos de los cuales se habían localizados en Cozumel cuando los Españoles llegaron en 1518; una en el templo de Ixchel en San Gervasio, que contuvo el “ídolo hablador” descrito por Francisco López de Gómara en 1552, y otra localizada en Xamancab (hoy San Miguel) descrita por Juan Díaz en 1518.   El interior del templo en Xamancab tenía un pequeño cuarto en la espalda donde la estatua del ídolo parlante estaba de pie.   Gómara declaró que esto era un cuarto “donde ellos guardaron a un ídolo muy extraño, muy distinto de los demás. El cuerpo de este gran ídolo era hueco, hecho de arcilla cocida al horno y sujetó a la pared con mortero, en la espalda era algo como una sacristía, donde los sacerdotes tenían un pequeño puerta secreto cortado en el lado del ídolo, en el cual una de ellos entraría, y desde adentro el ídolo hablan a y contestan aquellos que vinieron para adorar y pedir favores. Con este engaño, los hombres simples fueron hechos para creer cualquier cosa el dios les dijo.” ....CONTINUE READING

13 Mar 2017

Traveling in San Blas back in the 1980s

by | posted in: Miscellenea, Travel | 0

The Cunas strictly regulated all commercial trade in San Blas. The San Blas Comarca is an autonomous region of the Republic of Panama, very similar to an United States Indian reservation, but with the added right to make trade agreements and treaties with other countries, and is not subjected to any oversight by anything like a Bureau of Indian Affairs, as we have in the states. ....CONTINUE READING

13 Mar 2017

Traveling by dugout Canoe along the coast of Panama

by | posted in: Miscellenea, Travel | 0

In the 1980’s and ‘90’s I was engaged in the business of acquiring ethnographic material directly from indigenous Central and South American coastal and riverine cultures and selling that material to museums and collectors in the US and abroad.  One of the cultures that I worked with extensively during that period was that of the Cuna Indians of San Blas, Panamá. ....CONTINUE READING

11 Mar 2017

Blowing Smoke

by | posted in: Miscellenea, Philological Observations | 0

“Quit blowing smoke up my ass” (meaning “quit lying”), is a phrase that has its origin in the practice of…no kidding… blowing smoke up asses.

The practice began in pre-Columbian North America, where wild tobacco was harvested by Indians and smoked in clay or stone pipes, as well as to be used to produce smoke for use in a clyster, or enema.  Later, the Indians subjected their horses to these tobacco-smoke enemas as well as each other, as this illustration from the 1700s shows: ....CONTINUE READING

11 Mar 2017

Aluxes and Duendes

by | posted in: Ethnology, Miscellenea | 0

An alux (Mayan: [aˈluʃ], plural: aluxo’ob [aluʃoˀːb]) is the name given to a type of sprite or spirit in the mythological tradition of certain Maya peoples from the Yucatán Peninsula and Guatemala.  Aluxes are conceived of as being small, only about knee-high, and in appearance resembling miniature traditionally dressed Maya people.  Tradition holds that aluxes are generally invisible but are able to assume physical form for purposes of communicating with and frightening humans as well as to congregate together.  They are generally associated with natural features such as forests, caves, stones, and fields but can also be enticed to move somewhere through offerings.  Their description and mythological role are somewhat reminiscent of other sprite-like mythical entities in a number of other cultural traditions (such as the Celtic leprechaun, the Scandinavian Gnome, or the European Troll and Gremlin), as the tricks they play are similar. ....CONTINUE READING

10 Mar 2017

El Castillo and the Lighthouse Theory

by | posted in: Archaeology, Yucatan & Quintana Roo | 0

In 1985, I took part in the “Tulum Lighthouse Project,” a project of the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia (INAH) which was underwritten by the National Geographic Society and the Kempner Fund.  The project was the idea of Michael Creamer, an American who came up with the theory that the twin window/vent holes on the ocean-facing side of the building in Tulum known as “El Castillo” could act as a sort of range light system for Mayan canoes attempting to cross over the reef at night to land on the beach next to the building. ....CONTINUE READING

10 Mar 2017

El día que nos llegó el barco

by | posted in: Hispanohablantes, Historia de Cozumel | 0

En 1948, Cozumel languidecía.  El “boom“ del chicle era una memoria distante, la base aérea americana dejó de materializarse, y la cantidad de buques que paraban en el muelle era la mas mínima en la historia de la isla. Los tiempos eran difíciles. Pero las cosas estaban a punto de cambiarse. El barco de la suerte estaba por llegar. ....CONTINUE READING

10 Mar 2017

El Espíritu de San Louis de Charles Lindbergh nunca aterrizo en Cozumel

by | posted in: Hispanohablantes, Historia de Cozumel | 0

Charles Lindbergh hizo su primer vuelo a México el 13 de diciembre de 1927, cuando él voló sin escala de Washington al Campo de Balbuena en Ciudad de México, en su avión Espíritu de San Louis.   Él fue recibido por el Presidente de México, Plutarco Elías Calles, y después recorrió la ciudad durante unos días antes de volver al Campo de Balbuena, desde donde él hizo varios vuelos sobre Ciudad de México en un avión tipo Morane Saulnier de las Fuerzas Armadas Mejicanas, con número de registración 31A128. ....CONTINUE READING

9 Mar 2017

Flotsam, Jetsam, Litter, or Garbage, I Refuse to call it Rubbish

by | posted in: Cozumel Natural History | 0

Over 35 years ago, when I wrote my first travel guide to Cozumel, I included the recommendation that before you go to the east coast of the island, first go by a tlapalería and buy a small bottle of tiner (paint thinner) so you could clean the tar off of your feet after walking on the beach.  Back then, we had very little trash on the east coast beaches, but loads of tar and crude oil residue.  Today, the tar has disappeared, along with most tlapalerías.  However, the amount of garbage one finds today on the east coast beaches of Cozumel is truly astounding. ....CONTINUE READING

9 Mar 2017

A Cozumel without Coconut Palms

by | posted in: Cozumel Natural History, Miscellenea, Yucatan & Quintana Roo | 0

Can you imagine a Cozumel with no Coconut palms?  I’m not referring to what might happen if the Red Palm Mite has its way.  This voracious pest (Raoiella indica, also known as Raoiella eugenia) originated in the area around India, Iran, Arabia, and Egypt then jumped the ocean and landed on Cozumel’s shores, where it is now decimating the coconut palms as well as other species of plants. ....CONTINUE READING

5 Mar 2017

Abe Lincoln wanted to buy Cozumel

by | posted in: Cozumel History | 0

Most Americans were brought up to believe Abraham Lincoln was one of our greatest Presidents. As schoolchildren, we were told his belief in the equality of man led him to free the black slaves through his Emancipation Proclamation in 1862. However, reviewing the transcripts of his public speeches, the memoirs of those he worked with, and the public records, a very different Abe Lincoln comes to life. It would seem that the main reason he wanted to free the nation’s slaves, was to be able to then deport them, preferably back to Africa. Since the 1840s, Lincoln had been a member of the American Colonial Society, a group who, with the help of the US government, were instrumental in setting up colonies along the shore of Sierra Leone in 1820 for the express purposed of receiving deported black freedmen. The colonies were managed by a hodge-podge of missionaries, American government appointed functionaries, and black entrepreneurs. The colonies were not very successful, until most of them banded together in 1838, renaming their capital Monrovia, and their new unified colony Liberia. In 1847 they declared their independence, drawing the wrath of the US government, who refused to recognize the new nation. The ships bringing deportees stopped coming. ....CONTINUE READING

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