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INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY— PUBLICATION NO. 1 1 



roosters, and pullets lead in numbers with a total 

 of 60; and there is 1 turkey. There are 16 cows, 

 20 work oxen, 1 bull, 18 calves, 4 horses, 6 burros, 

 11 pigs, 52 beehives, 15 dogs, 8 cats, and no sheep 

 or goats. 



The houses, perched on rocky ledges or located 

 on ridges between arroyos, are connected by the 

 merest of footpaths, excepting for those situated 

 along the main traces from the pila de agua and the 

 chapel to the highway. All 15 of the structures in 

 Caringaro are of 1 story and dos aguas, and none 

 has windows excepting the chapel, which has 5. 

 Wood, stone, and adobe are the chief wall mate- 

 rials (5 houses with walls of wood and adobe, 3 of 

 planks alone, 2 of adobe alone, 1 of stones, 2 of 

 wood and stone, and 2 of wood, stone, and adobe). 

 Thu'teen of the buildings are either whitewashed 

 or have been mudplastered. The principal roofing 

 material is tile (11 houses), and the others are 

 combinations of tile, shake, and grass. Three 

 houses approximate conventional wooden irojes. 

 The houses vary from 2 to 4 rooms, but 9 houses 

 have only 2 rooms. The flooring is of earth in 9 

 houses, of earth and wood in 5, and 1 house has a 

 brick floor. Doorways range from 1 to 4 in 

 number, with 10 houses having but 2 doors. AH 

 of the houses have small yards, but the solares are 

 so small and rocky that only 5 of the better situ- 

 ated ones have associated sementeras, and 1 of 

 these has a huerto or small orchard. Owing to 

 situation at a lower elevation than Sanambo and 

 Icuacato, and in tierra templada, there is a greater 

 variety in fruit and ornamental trees and shrubs, 

 although the number is small. The chief elements 

 are 34 agaves, 29 peach trees, 17 zapote bianco, 17 

 chupire, 10 castor-bean shrubs, 9 tejocotes, and 9 

 ash trees, with a sprinkling of yuccas, cactuses, 

 chirimoyas, avocados, oaks, capuiin, willow, 

 quince, etc. Two of the houses have flowers in 

 macetas or flowerpots, and all of the others have 

 at least a few flowers among which the most 

 common are "geraniums," castillos (an introduced 

 African mint that has gone wild), rue, roses, and 

 tree tobacco. Two families raise a few chile 

 peppers. All water is obtained from the central 

 pila at the spring. The only cooking fuel is wood, 

 and illumination is chiefly petroleo (6 houses), ocote 

 (3 houses), and combinations of candles, pitch 

 pine, and kerosene in the other 3. Eight families 

 sleep only on mats, and 4 households have both 

 petates and wooden beds. There are 3 hand 



sewing machines in the rancho, but no radios, 

 phonographs, carts, or any other type of wheeled 

 vehicle. 



LA TIRfMICUA 



The rancho of La Tirimicua differs in a number 

 of respects from the other ranchos. Probably it 

 never was a part of the Hacienda Itziparamuco or 

 Hacienda Atzimbo, and its population (although 

 mestizo) is more Indian than that of the other 

 ranchos. Like Caiingaro and Atzimbo, it was 

 never mentioned as a pueblo, but there has been 

 a very close contact between La Tirimicua and 

 Quiroga since time immemorial. Until the 1880's 

 most of the lands in La Tu'imicua belonged to 

 Indians of Quiroga, and a number of members of 

 the Comunidad de Indigenas de Quiroga still own 

 lands in the area. During the 1890's Gerdnimo 

 Ponce of Quiroga bought the titles or esaituras of 

 property in La Tirimicua from some 30 members 

 of the Indian community; in 1907 he deeded his 

 La Tirimicua property to his 2 sons Luis K. Ponce 

 Estrada and Jesiis Ponce Estrada; and in 1941-42 

 their heirs sold these lands to Diego Fuentes Agu- 

 ilar and his wife Mercedes Rodriguez Sdnchez (na- 

 tives of Quiroga) who stUl possess them. During 

 the past 40 years these lands have been estimated 

 at areas ranging from 60 to more than 250 hectares, 

 and have been valued at 6,000 pesos (1907), 21,700 

 pesos (1937), and 13,450 pesos in 1945. The 

 rancho, as consolidated by Ger{5nimo Ponce and 

 his successors, is essentially the possession of one 

 family since all the other holdings in the rancho 

 area are not valued at more than about 8,000 

 pesos, and these holdings are mainly on the periph- 

 ery. Most of the inhabitants of the settlement 

 own the solares upon which theh- houses are built, 

 but they are all either renters of or workers for 

 the Fuentes. This condition obtains elsewhere 

 only in the rancho of Zirandangacho, most of 

 which is owned by two families. Being but an 

 appendage of Quiroga, and without resident land- 

 owners, the rancho never has had a chapel or a 

 patron saint. It is possible that, during the early 

 sixteenth century and before any of the congrega- 

 tions, there was an Indian puehlito on the mesa a 

 few hundred yards northwest of the present com- 

 munity. There are the remains of a ydcata on the 

 southeastern tip of this Mesa de Santiago, and 

 potsherds and artifacts are to be found weathering 

 out over most of the surface of the mesa. Possiblv 



