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| TRIUMPHS and TRAGEDY, a History
of The Mexican people (Chapter 1) |
by Prof. German Estrada
February, 2004 |
THE FOREFATHERS (2nd
part). continues
Men and women, be
they Europeans or natives of a world an ocean apart,
do not live in a vacuum; they inhabit a physical
environment, a land which, in turn, helps to mold
their way of life and that of their community,
particularly if they are an "archaic" people
who, because of the absence of technology and machinery,
are subservient to the whims of an all-powerful Mother
Nature. We must, therefore, get under way our study
of pre-Hispanic societies with the geographical domain
on which they built their civilizations and which,
conversely, influenced parameters of Spanish colonial
society.
When Charles I asked, "What is the land like?" an
envoy sent by Cortés picked up a sheet of
paper and crumpled it into a ball. Then, opening
his hand, he let the paper unfold in his palm, saying, "It's
like this, Sire." That twisted and wrinkled land
helped set historical contours. Though cast in the
form of a cornucopia, it was, more often than not,
an empty horn of plenty.
Pre-Columbians inhabited
a topsy-turvy land. The Valley of Mexico, which
sat atop the Mesa Central, or plateau, was fertile.
Referred to as Anáhuac
by its native inhabitants, it encompassed the present
basin of Mexico but included lands to the east known
as Tlateputzco by the early dwellers. It was a much
coveted and beautiful land, at its core lakes, among
them Texcoco, the largest, fed by waters from the
melted snow of the surrounding mountains. Beyond
them lay sierras and lowlands, heat and cold, and
tropical jungle. North of Anáhuac were arid
expanses where cactus and thickets of mesquites thrived,
an austere and endless steppe country, according
to the ancients of Anáhuac, a "place of dry
rocks...of death from thirst and...starvation." Along
both coasts were gigantic mountain ranges, stretching
from current borders of the United States
south to the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, where they disappeared
to rise again in Chiapas in a forest of mountains
and hills. Nestled between the ranges was the Mesa
Central, rising from 4,000 feet at Ciudad Juárez,
gateway to the North American Southwest, to over
8,000 feet in the south. The volcanic peaks of Popocatepéctl,
Iztaccihuatl, and Orizaba towered dramatically over
the coastal ranges and split the central plateau
into dissimilar pieces. Lesser volcanoes encircled
them, while giant ravines swept inland for hundreds
of miles from both coasts. Just 8 percent of the
land was level, and much of the flat country lay
in soil-impoverished Yucatán or the arid north.
Mountains occupied two-thirds of Mexico's total area,
about one-fifth that of the continental United States.
Because of the mountains, altitude and not
latitude set the life of ancient Mexicans, who spoke
of going up or down, not of traveling south or north.
There were three distinct levels. From sea level
to 3,000 feet lay the tierra caliente ,
or the hot lands, usually tropical but arid in the
northwest. Above them to 6,000 feet was the tierra
templada , or temperate zone, much of it desert.
The tierra fría , the cold lands,
rose still higher, often barren and inhospitable.
At the heart of Mexico was the Mesa Central, a plateau
favored by nature. The north was an extension of
the mesa but arid except for occasional rains. On
the west was the Pacific slope, rich but cut off
from the mesa by unconquerable mountain ranges; on
the east lay the Gulf slope, fertile but unhealthy.
Present-day Michoacán, Guerrero, Oaxaca, and
Chiapas formed the mountainous region of the south,
Jutting into the Gulf of Mexico was the peninsula
of Yucatán. Completing the geographic picture
was the arid arm of Lower California, isolated by
the Gulf of California and the desert of Sonora.
We'll continue with this fascinating
book.
estradanav@yahoo.com
Prof. Germán
Estrada is the author of the best selling book,
"México
Mágico: Everything You Wanted To Know
About... But Nobody Told You..." available in Puerto
Vallarta at The Net House, Mail Boxes, Etc., Books,
Books as well as directly from the author by internet.
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