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INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY — PUBLICATION NO. 1 1 



kerosene, and the remainder commonly use ocote 

 for lighting. All sleep on floor mats. There is 

 but one cart in the community since all the roads 

 are but foot trails to Icuacato, El Tepamal and 

 Teremendo, Quiroga, and Caringaro. There are 

 no radios or phonographs, nor even one sewing 

 machine in La Tirimicua. It has no store, 

 tendajon, school, or other type of building or enter- 

 prise not connected with agriculture. There is 

 but one literate person in the community. As a 

 sideluie in the "off-season," the men do cut wood, 

 burn charcoal, transport water and wood and 

 charcoal, cut zurumuto (a grass used for thatching 

 and packmg), gather Spanish "moss" and tahar- 

 dillo (a composite) for use in packing pottery and 

 woodwork in Quiroga, elaborate crude wooden 

 bowls used in the lacquer industry in Quu'oga, 

 hunt squirrels and rabbits, and gather capulin 

 and tejocote fruit in season. In general this rancho 

 is muy triste — very sad or depressing. 



ATZIMBO 



The rancho of Atzimbo is probably the most 

 prosperous and most sophisticated of the ranchos 

 belonging to Quiroga. Possibly this condition 

 derives from the fact that Atzimbo is the oldest 

 puesto or rancho developed within that portion of 

 the Hacienda de Itziparamuco which now belongs 

 to Quiroga. However, the factors influencing the 

 original selection of the site (good soil, fairly good 

 water supply, location on a road from Vafladolid 

 to Tzintzuntzan and Patzcuaro, etc.) probably 

 have been of the greatest importance. The pres- 

 ent settlement of Atzimbo is located on a bench 

 or mesa which slopes to the east and south from 

 the Cerro de TucuruUo (Cerro Jorullo, etc.) 

 toward the once fertile Plan and Joya de Atzimbo 

 which constitute the lowest portion of the hanging 

 valley occupied by the headwaters of the Arroyo 

 del Salto. In the past generation or two, denu- 

 dation and erosion have deepened the channel of 

 the arroyo upstream from the falls or El Salto so 

 that in the heart of the joya the channel has cut 

 some 20 feet through aUuviiun and decomposed 

 volcanic ash to reveal the rubble of an old vol- 

 canic flow. Also, channeling and denudation have 

 stripped the arable soil from large areas along the 

 mesa margins, leaving a "badlands" of infertile 

 tepetate. The lands claimed by Atzimbo march 

 with those of Caringaro, Sanambo or El Tigre, 

 La Noria, Cuenembo or Puerta de Cuenembo, 



Zirandangacho, and Quiroga. The^paved high- 

 way from Morelia passes just a quarter of mile to 

 the north of the settlement, and along this high- 

 way it is abont 2.5 miles west-northwest to 

 Quiroga to\vn. The old road from Alorelia to 

 Tzintzuntzan, which passes along the east side 

 of the settlement, is still used as a trail to the 

 Puerta de Cuenembo and other settlements to 

 the south, and ramifications north and east from 

 the old road lead to Caringaro, Sanambo, El 

 Tigre, and La Noria. The elevation of the 

 rancho on the mesa is 2,230 meters, which places 

 the entire area within the tierra templada. 



Atzimbo first appears in records as a puesto of 

 the seventeenth century Hacienda de Itzipara- 

 muco, under the name San Bartolome Atzimbo. 

 By some time in the eighteenth century the area 

 of the present rancho was converted into the 

 independent Hacienda de Atzimbo. This ha- 

 cienda came into the hands of its tenant farmers 

 some time in the nineteenth century, prior to 

 1870. During the latter half of the nineteenth 

 centurj' and until 1908 there were frequent con- 

 fhcts between the Comunidad de Indigenas de 

 Quiroga and the parcioneros of the hacienda and 

 ex-hacienda of Atzimbo over lands along the 

 banlvs of the Arroyo del Cerro Azul, from La 

 Tep6ricua up stream through the area known as 

 Las Tinajas and extending northward up the 

 slopes of the Cerro de La Muneca (Cerro de la 

 Mina, etc.). In 1908 the dispute was settled by 

 dividing the disputed area equally between the 

 two parties. As mentioned previously, Atzimbo 

 has had mixed relationships with Quiroga and 

 Tzintzuntzan, and although now it is definitely a 

 part of the municipality of Quiroga in all civil 

 matters and buries its dead in the Quiroga ceme- 

 tery, it is still nominally included within the parish 

 of Tzintzuntzan. The chapel in Atzimbo is one 

 of the oldest in the area, and it possesses two bells 

 one of which dates from 1825. Although known 

 throughout its colonial history by the name San 

 Bartolom^ Atzimbo, at present there is much un- 

 certainty in Atzimbo as to the patron saint and 

 some say that it is San Isidro— the patron saint of 

 farmers. The name Atzimbo has been derived 

 from two sources: (a) from Atzunba, the legendary 

 sister of the last Tarascan ruler, who presumably 

 owned all of the area, and (b) from Atzimu (lugar 

 lodoso), meaning place of mud or clay. The first 

 derivation seems to be the better. 



