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INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY — PUBLICATION NO. 13 



Occasionally, excessive rain damages the fields. 

 To halt the downpour, a palm which has been 

 blessed on Palm Sunday is lighted and the house 

 smoked with it; or the little pestle of the recep- 

 tacle in which sauce ingredients are ground is 

 placed on the hot coals. Hail sometimes falls in 

 April and slashes the leaves of the corn, but usually 

 the harvest is not affected; we heard of no tech- 

 nique for mitigating the effects of hail. 



An eclipse, of the sun or of the moon, is bound 

 to damage the corn, while its effects on vanilla, 

 chili, and fruit trees are even more devastating. 

 Concerning eclipses, there is considerable confu- 

 sion and informants tend to attribute to them 

 any crop failure for which there is no obvious 

 cause. Most Totonac are fully aware of the dates 

 of eclipses, because they are listed in the indis- 

 pensable household almanac known as the Cdlen- 

 dario Galvdn. One informant's statement may be 

 regarded as representative: 



Now the ear of corn is about to dry ; soon it will be 

 ready to harvest. But I open the husks. Outside the ear 

 looks well, but inside there are worms. It was an eclipse. 

 There is the chili field, but the fruit is dropping. It was 

 an eclipse. There are eclipses for corn and eclipses for 

 chili. The one which we had was for corn, but that of 

 next August will be for chili. 



Against eclipse the chief protection for the corn 

 is the red maize. For other cultivated plants, a 

 red rag set up in the field or attached to the fruit 

 tree is considered effective. 



HARVEST 



In a favorable season, the maize grows tall and 

 luxuriantly — to a height between 3 and 4 m. As 

 the ears begin to dry, they bend downward on the 

 stalk with their own weight. It is said that some 

 who plant on tierra de vega — of which there is very 

 little in Tajin — deliberately bend the upper half 

 of the stalk, together with the ear, for protection 

 from birds. This is not good Tajin practice, and 

 a local farmer disapproves, saying that with such 

 treatment "the grains are very thin." 



On the whole, local maize seems slow to mature. 

 Informants vary widely in their estimates and, 

 by and large, they are quite unable to calculate the 

 number of days which lapse from planting until 

 ears are sufficiently ripe to be prepared in the form 

 of bollitos. However, every man knows what day 

 he plants and generally he can give an approximate 



date for cutting the first ears. Even with these 

 two relatively fixed points, estimates vary widely. 



All, however, agree that the small white corn 

 ripens 10 to 15 days sooner than does the large 

 white ; some informants include yellow corn in this 

 early-ripening category. All likewise are agreed 

 that, irrespective of the kind of seed involved, 

 maize planted in summer ripens sooner than that 

 planted in winter. The summer planting of the 

 large white maize may produce in the course of 

 90 to 120 days, according to different informants. 

 The range for winter planting is about the same, 

 but more individuals give a higher figure. 



By and large, summer planting (usually July 

 16) produces corn for bollitos de elote (p. 153) by 

 All Souls' Day (November 2) . And winter plant- 

 ing (usually November 30) provides edible fresh 

 ears by early or mid- April. By the Day of the 

 Holy Cross (May 3), corn is sufficiently dry to be 

 prepared in the form of tortillas, provided the 

 store from the previous harvest is exhausted and it 

 is necessary to dip into the new crop. 



The very first young ears are made into gruel 

 (atole). Later, as the kernels become somewhat 

 harder, the ears are roasted or the maize is pre- 

 pared in the form of bollitos. 



There is no first fruits or harvest ceremony. "We 

 merely eat the corn ; we give thanks to no one, and 

 we light no candles." Modesto Gonzalez was 

 frankly astonished by the Huastecan practice, de- 

 scribed to him by Roberto Pavon, of burying the 

 first ears in the field. Nor is there any counterpart 

 of the old Huastecan custom of smoking with in- 

 cense the tamales made of new corn (Tapia Zen- 

 teno, p. 107). Furthermore, there is absolutely 

 nothing to suggest the elaborate ceremony — not 

 precisely a harvest ceremony, but certainly one 

 strongly linked with fertility — which Starr (pp. 

 252-253) describes in some detail for the Totonac 

 of Santa Maria, near Tlacuilotepec. 



The new maize is collected gradually, over a 

 period of weeks ; little by little, it is brought from 

 the field, as needed. In part, for this reason, most 

 Totonac are surprisingly vague concerning the 

 actual amount harvested. Many from pura flojera 

 (sheer laziness), we are told blithely, allow the 

 ripe corn to remain in the field a considerable time. 

 For example, in April, Antonio Bautista was just 

 getting around to gathering the last of the maize 

 which had ripened the previous December. How- 



