EMPIRES CHILDREN: THE PEOPLE OF TZINTZUNTZAN FOSTER 



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— and perhaps a more rapid destruction of 

 natural resources, particularly forests and soils. 

 But cooking is still done in clay pots and grid- 

 dles over open fires, and a petate mat is the 

 most common bed. The wheel, except for an 

 occasional oxcart, has had little effect within 

 the village, though the appearance of the train 

 and bus has been significant from the standpoint 

 of travel and transportation away from Tzin- 

 tzuntzan. 



Ancient forms of clothing no longer survive. 

 Cotton is still used, though none is grown lo- 

 cally, and the cut and construction of garments 

 is radically different. Wool has made possible 

 clothing which is much better suited to the cli- 

 mate than was ever possible in earlier times. 

 The aboriginal leather loin cloth, short skirt, 

 or long cotton cape would look as amusing to 

 a modern Tzintzuntzeiio as his own garb to an 

 inhabitant of the same village of 400 years 

 ago. The colorful modern "indigenous" cos- 

 tume of the Tarascans in fact is indigenous only 

 in that it is not of the city. 



Food habits have undergone significant 

 changes, though the staples remain the same: 

 beans and tortillas. Greater variety is now pos- 

 sible, since most of the pre-Conquest items are 

 still available, and a great many new foods 

 have been introduced. Meat and eggs are con- 

 sumed in much larger quantities, and milk, 

 coffee, sugar, wheat products, and new garden 

 and fruit crops make for greater opportunities 

 for a better balanced diet. 



In the basic economic organization of the 

 village, perhaps fewer changes have taken place 

 than in any other aspect of life. Pottery, farm- 

 ing, and to a lesser extent fishing and trade, 

 seem to have been the basic occupations at the 

 time of the Conquest, just as they are today. 

 In all categories, notable changes and improve- 

 ments have been made. Pots are now glazed 

 and fired in kilns; wheat has become the most 

 important cash crop, and has been integrated 

 thoroughly into the rhythm of agriculture; new 

 fish are found in the lake, and improved tech- 

 niques are known to take them; in addition to 

 the canoe and human back, trade moves via the 

 burro, mule, truck, and train. But in all cases, 

 these are improvements in techniques only, and 

 do not constitute fundamental changes in the 

 economic system. 



The introduction of the wooden plow, drawn 

 by oxen, is a more significant change than the 

 acceptance of wheat, since it makes possible 

 much more eificient use of the cultivator's time. 

 The possibilities of animal fertilizer to enrich 

 intensively farmed milpas are not fully under- 

 stood, and few formal attempts are made to 

 improve the soil in this way. Important pre- 

 Conquest crops still used, in addition to maize 

 and beans, are squash, chiles, tomatoes, chayo- 

 tes, cherimoyas, alligator pears, zapotes, limas, 

 limones, nispero, and capulines. But the Tzin- 

 tzuntzeno has no idea that others — onions, car- 

 rots, lettuce, cabbage, melons, broadbeans, peas, 

 peaches, apricots, and figs — were unknown in 

 the land four centuries earlier. 



The introduction of domestic animals has 

 produced a greater change in the economy, it 

 would appear, than that of new crops. Turkeys, 

 except for the dog the only pre-Conquest domes- 

 ticated "animal," are today kept by very few 

 people. Perhaps the chicken is, on account of 

 its size, more useful and therefore has replaced 

 the earlier bird. A chicken can be killed to 

 feed the family alone; there is great hesitancy 

 in killing a turkey for anything short of a major 

 fiesta. Oxen, cows, horses, mules, and burros 

 are the most important domestic animals, and 

 It would be difficult to visualize life without 

 them. Pigs, for reasons which I do not fully 

 understand, are much less numerous than in 

 many parts of Mexico. Perhaps only those towns 

 which produce more than enough maize for 

 home consumption, or which have extensive 

 wooded areas near at hand in which the animals 

 can root, can afford to fatten pigs for sale and 

 export. Certainly, cooking lard is indispensable, 

 more so than the meat itself, and Tzintzuntzan 

 must go to Quiroga and Patzcuaro to satisfy its 

 needs. 



Fishing probably has declined in importance 

 with the gradual mestization of the village. As 

 an occupation, it is intimately bound to the Ta- 

 rascans, and with the increasing mestization of 

 the entire lake region, it will be interesting to 

 note whether as an industry it will decline in 

 importance, or whether non-Tarascans will take 

 it up. Relatively little is known about ancient 

 fishing methods. The most important techniques 

 in use today, the seine and gill nets, probably 

 are of European introduction. But a general 



