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INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY— PUBLICATION NO. 2 



formerly given them all to the priest. In recent 

 years, he stated, the cabildo members began 

 taking half for themselves. When the new 

 priest came, people decided they no longer 

 wished the cabildo and spoke to the priest. He 

 abolished the cabildo and barred the members 

 from the church so that alms would now be 

 given directly to the priest. 



Still another man, one who probably gave the 

 best-informed statement, which gained weight 

 because he was both an anti-Church and anti- 

 cabildo man on general principles, pointed out 

 some of the history of the affair. According 

 to this informant, when the priests were for- 

 bidden to function in the church, the cabildo 

 was responsible for bringing priests to town 

 secretly and helping them to hold services in 

 private houses. This involved very consider- 

 able expenses. (There seems little reason to 

 doubt these statements, which were verified in 

 other connections.) In the meantime, inas- 

 much as people believed it necessary to take 

 seeds, i.e., maize and wheat, to the church, they 

 continued their gifts, which were received and 

 stored by the cabildo. This informant believed, 

 however, that the quantities were probably less 

 than usual inasmuch as there was no one to 

 urge them. Out of this fact probably rose the 

 real basis of the quarrel. When it began to 

 appear that there was small likelihood of a 

 resident priest returning, the cabildo began 

 selling the accumulated grain, utilizing the 

 profits to defray the considerable expenses of 

 smuggling priests into the town. For the peo- 

 ple it was difficult to tell whether the expenses 

 claimed were correct or not. When a priest 

 finally was reestablished in Cheran, the cabildo 

 presented him with an account of their trans- 

 actions. Many believed that this account was 

 incorrect and that the cabildo had been guilty 

 of defalcation. It was then that the idea began 

 that the cabildo should be done away with. 

 However, it is unlikely the cabildo received any 

 profits after the return of the priests. The 

 priest made an investigation of the affair and 

 as a result the cabildo tried to force him to leave 

 the town. (This last accusation seems ade- 

 quately disposed of by the letter from the 

 Bishop mentioned above.) When the new 

 priest arrived in 1940, he announced his inten- 



tion of reopening the investigation and stated 

 that, as the cabildo would probably try to get 

 rid of him, too, he had better get rid of the 

 cabildo right away. 



An aspect of the situation which had not 

 been resolved at the termination of the study 

 was the effect of the change upon the mayor- 

 dom'ias formerly in the charge of the cabildo. 

 It was the belief of many, including the priest, 

 that applicants for a maijordomia would simply 

 apply to him. The priest was quoted as saying 

 that he had no intention of interfering with the 

 local customs. None of the cargueros consulted 

 seemed ever to have thought of the possibility 

 of the change effecting the operation of the 

 system. The cabildo nevertheless has a pro- 

 prietary interest in the saints and there v/ere 

 some indications that the cabildo was willing 

 to suppress some of the customs. The iiandnies 

 did not perform the pastorela in 1940. The 

 prioste refused to put up anything for the 

 dance, or even participate when a cousin offered 

 to pay all the expenses. The parents of all but 

 one of the uandnces also apparently welcomed 

 the excuse for avoiding the expenses involved. 

 The cabildo also attempted to forbid the 

 carguero of the Holy Child to sponsor the per- 

 formance of the ncgrito dance (described be- 

 low) although this was a traditional duty of 

 the carguero. As he was one of those who 

 attacked the cabildo and claimed to have been 

 forced to make heavy contributions in order to 

 get the ■mayordomia, he sought the permission 

 of the priest and held the dance despite the 

 cabildo's objections. 



The progressive element in the town was of 

 the opinion that the demotion of the cabildo 

 would mean the early disappearance of the 

 mayordomias. However, this overlooked the 

 several mayordoniias which functioned outside 

 the cabildo system, and it is doubtful if the dis- 

 appearance of the mayordomias will be particu- 

 larly accelerated by this change. There is some 

 possibility of this, of course, and one of the 

 curious features of the situation is that a priest 

 who apparently is conservative and who does 

 not wish to interfere with the local customs 

 should have been responsible for this attack 

 upon them and for alienating the most conser- 

 vative Church group from his support. 



