In 1764 there appeared in Mexico City El fénix del amor, a history of the celebrated image of the crucified Christ at La Piedad, written by Dr Agustín Francisco Esquivel y Vargas, a distinguished Creole canon of Valladolid cathedral. On Christmas Eve 1687, so local tradition averred, a poor fisherman and his family dug out the rooted trunk of a thepame tree, only to find that, when they threw it on their fire, it was not consumed: instead the flames revealed the features of Christ on his cross imbedded in the wood. Soon after, three Indian sculptors visited the family and raised the image's face by cutting the beard free from the breast. News of this momentous discovery spread through the entire district of Tlazacalca and lots were cast to determine what name the image should bear and where it was to be kept. In the event it was called Nuestro Señor de la Piedad – Our Lord of Mercy – and was left in a hamlet of three cottages, which promptly renamed itself La Piedad. Soon visited by pilgrims, the first miraculous cure occurred when Doña Emerenciana of Jaloltitlan, hitherto paralysed, rose from her wheelchair and walked. Such was the strength of local veneration that, when the parish priest removed the image to Tlazacalca, over 200 armed men sallied forth to recover it, returning in triumph. There after, two successive owners of the great hacienda of Santa Ana Pacueco, Alonso Altamirano and Pedro Pérez de Tagle, provided funds and labour for the construction, first of a chapel in 1699–1702, and then of a splendid new church completed in 1741–52.