206 



INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL AKTHROPOLOGY — PITBUCATION NO. 1 1 



poor visibility due to the crowd and because of 

 our own incompetence in such matters, our notes 

 on the steps and the music are not worth repro- 

 ducing. After this dance many Uttle crude bateas 

 were distributed among the audience. The final 

 event was the gift of fruits and other local products 

 to the curate. Altogether the Corpus Chris ti 

 celebration preserves more of the spirit or atmos- 

 phere of the colonial period than any other still 

 extant in Quiroga. The dance of the batelleros 

 and the giving away of the miniature bateas 

 serve to accentuate the former importance of 

 batea making in Cocupao-Quiroga ; and the giving 

 of fruits and other items to the curate at this 

 time is a retention of an ancient and wide-spread 

 custom. However, many of the customs (de- 

 scribed by Escobar and other colonial authors 

 in Michoacdn) have disappeared here, although 

 retained in varying degree in a number of more 

 Indian communities. Among these customs are 

 such as displaying numerous elements of the 

 flora and fauna, execution of masked dances, and 

 display by all artisans of their wares in the plaza 

 and the giving away of examples. 



The other important festivals we did not ob- 

 serve. These are: Michaelmas or the Dia de San 

 Miguel on September 29 (especially important 

 to the inhabitants of the ex-barrio of San Miguel), 

 at which time there is much music, fireworks, and 

 consumption of a special dish known as pozole 

 batido; the fiesta of Cristo Key on the last Sunday 

 in October; and the great festival of the patron 

 saint San Diego on November 13 and through an 

 entire week, at which time there are dances of 

 the Moros y Cristianos, costumes of great variety, 

 and much music and fireworks. The other 

 religious festivals are celebrated principally within 

 the church, and only a few are accompanied by 

 music, fireworks, dances, and other exterior dis- 

 plays. Among the lesser festivals of some im- 

 portance are La Purificaci6n de Maria or Cande- 

 laria (Candlemas) on February 2; Martes de 

 Camaval (Shrove Tuesday) and several days pre- 

 ceding; San Jose on March 19 — the barn swallows 

 are supposed to return on this day; Ascension 

 Day, which in 1945 coincided with Mother's Day 

 on May 10; San Isidro, May 15; San Juan Bau- 

 tista, June 24; San Pedro y San Pablo Ap6stoles, 

 June 29; Preciosisima Sangre de Nuestro Seflor, 

 July 1; San Vicente de Paul, July 19; Santiago el 

 Mayor, Ap(5stol, July 25; La Asuncion, August 



15; San Bartolome Ap6stol, August 24; Nuestra 

 Senora de los Remedios, September 1; San 

 Nicolas Tolentino, September 10 (chiefly in Santa 

 Fe) ; San Francisco de Asis, October 4 ; Vigilia de 

 Todos Santos to Dia de los Muertos, October 31 

 to November 2; Purlsima Concepci6n December! 

 8; Nuestra Senora de Guadalupe, December 12 ;| 

 and Dia de los Inocentes (All Fools Day) Decem- 

 ber 28. There is not much celebration of national 

 patriotic holidays. The most important of these 

 are the Grito de Dolores and so-called independ- 

 ence day September 15-16; May 5, commemorat- 

 ing the victory over the French at Puebla in 1862; 

 February 5, celebrating the constitutions of 1857 

 and 1917; the Dia de la Raza, October 12; and 

 November 20, celebrating the Commencement of 

 the Madero Revolution in 1910. 



RELIGIOUS ATTITUDES 



We made no attempt to ascertain the religion 

 of the people in Quiroga since such questioning 

 would have aroused needless antagonism. Ac- 

 cording to the census of 1940 all the inhabitants 

 of the ranchos were Roman Apostolic Catholics, 

 as were all but 55 persons in Quiroga town. These 

 55 persons (49 of whom were in the Calvario 

 district) were listed as having no religion. Ac- 

 tually the census returns are not reliable since it 

 is commonly assumed that everyone is a Roman 

 Catholic. We noticed some of the original census 

 schedules in which the column for religion had 

 been filled out completely as Catolico although 

 there were not enough people in the censused unit 

 to complete the schedule — which revealed the 

 bias of the census taker. Probably there is a 

 somewhat greater number of people (perhaps as 

 many as 150) who should be listed as without 

 religion since nearly all of the ejidatarios and their 

 families are outside of the "pale" of good orthodox 

 Roman Catholics. However, these individuals 

 were raised as Roman Catholics and in terms of 

 actual beliefs probably are as much Roman 

 Catholics as most of the individuals who go to 

 mass and confess. These people are anticlerical 

 rather than anti-Catholic. There are no Protes- 

 tants, Jews, or members of other faiths, although 

 possibly two or three individuals might qualify as 

 confirmed atheists. There are no pagans, and 

 the retention of primitive pagan Indian beliefs and 

 superstitions is probably no more than the amount 

 of pagan superstition that is current among 



