MOCHE: A PERUVIAN" COASTAL COi\LML"NI-n-— GILUX 



67 



be women's work, but there are a few men who take 

 part ; both sexes can be curers and witches, ahhough 

 there is a tendency for women to preempt the former 

 specialty and men the latter. Both men and women 

 ser\-e as teachers in the schools ; in the pueblo, men 

 teadi boys and women teach girls. 



Children begin to do chores about the age of 6. 

 Girls are given tasks about the house, such as carry- 

 ing water or sweeping out the sleeping room. Boys 

 help with weeding, watching the cows, and with the 

 irrigation. I have seen no young children doing or 

 tr> ing to do hard labor. 



GEOGR-\PHICAL SPECIALIZATION 



It has already been noted that the pJaya tends to 

 specialize in sea fishing, while the campina specializes 

 in agriculture and horticulture. 



SPECIALTIES 



The specialties will be listed once more : Car- 

 pentry, masonrj-, adobe making, tailoring, dress 

 making, barbering, cobbling, blacksmithing, tinsmith- 

 ing, fireworks making, baking bread, basketn.- and 

 mat making, playing musical instruments, singing 

 professionally, embroidering, butchering, keeping 

 shop, reading and writing (ser\-ing as a professional 

 scribe), sea fishing, hat making, midwifery-, curing, 

 witchcraft. 



All of these specialties require special talents, 

 training, or economic resources. As already indi- 

 cated, few of them are sufficiently well represented in 

 the community to constitute distinct groups large 

 enough to be recognized and organized as group 

 units in the society. The only exceptions are the 

 carpenters, the masons, the fishermen, and the pro- 

 fessional musicians. The carpenters and masons are 

 not recognized as groups. The fishermen are set off 

 from the remainder of the conmiunity, but are not 

 organized among themselves. Only the professional 

 musicians who play instruments in the bands are 

 organized, but this organization is only that required 

 by the nature of band music and does not extend into 

 social life in general. There is only one blacksmith 

 (perhaps iron worker would be the better term) , two 

 tinsmiths (both are Japanese at present), one hat 

 maker, and one cobbler. Two of the barbers are 

 Japanese. The scribes are not registered by the 

 Govenmient, but work on an informal basis for 

 fees: they cannot be regarded as professional, and 

 their services are part-time — when some illiterate 



Mochero needs help ; the two most active scribes are 

 forasteros. 



The curers and witches who operate on a profes- 

 sional or commercial basis number perhaps a dozen 

 in all. but, far from being organized, they regard each 

 other with mutual suspicion and rivalry. The brujo's 

 (witch's) calling is phrased in terms of aggression 

 and counter-aggression between brujos. 



Division of labor and specialization exist in Moche, 

 but the specialties occupy no positions in the organi- 

 zation of groups within the society-. This may be 

 partially due to the attitude of individualism which 

 dominates many aspects of life and which must be dis- 

 cussed later. Also, it must be recognized that Moche 

 is still a ; • rural peasant societv" in which 



one shoui'i !!■ : c.xyect to find highly organized and 

 compact groups of specialists in economic activities. 

 There is still the tendency for every man to be a jack- 

 of -all-trades. As one of my informants said, quoting 

 a proverb of Lambayeque origin, 



Dc brujo, de cohetero, u tinterillo, no hay cholo que 



no entienda su poquiUo. 

 (Ot [being a] bruto, a rocket maker, or sh>-ster 



lawyer there is no cholo [L e., man] who doesn't 



know his bit.) 



In other words, everyone knows something about all 

 the specialties. 



DISTRIBUTION OF MALE L.\BOR FORCE 



Up to the time I left Peru in November 19-M-, de- 

 tailed reports of the age and sex composition of the 

 population of the District of Moche had not been 

 worked up by the Department of the Census. How- 

 ever, we may make a rough calculation which, in 

 round numbers at least, may be fairly near the truth. 

 The Department has already published age and sex 

 figures from the census of 1940 for the Department of 

 La Libertad, of whicli Moche is a part. For the De- 

 partment as a whole, males of the age group 20 to 59 

 inclusive constitute 21 percent of the total population 

 of the Department.'*^ The total population of Moche 

 is given by the census of 1940 as 3,773. We have 

 subtracted 500 from this figure as representing the 

 forasteros. and we have subtracted 135 individuals 

 counted on the Haciendita and the "Hacienda Moche" 

 (students and staff of the Agricultural School), leav- 

 ing a total of 3,138 true Mocheros. Twenty-one per- 

 cent of this figure is 659, which, if our other 



*2 Censo Xacional, 1941, iimmmbered table followicg p. 52, "Fobki- 

 cion Xominalmenie Censada de Cada DefartamenTo co los Gmpos de 

 edad de 20 a 59 . . ." . 



