¹ Troops from the Mixteca region of Puebla and from central Guerrero separately invaded Oaxaca, gained adherents, and converged on the city of Oaxaca. Troops from the Tehuacán, Puebla joined forces with insurgents in the Cañada region of Oaxaca. These incursions were vital to the development of the Revolution in the state, see Chassen, , Oaxaca, pp. 410 Google Scholar ff.; Chassen, and Martínez, Héctor G. “El movimiento maderista en Oaxaca,” in La Revolución en las regiones (Guadalajara, México: Instituto de Estudios Sociales, Universidad de Guadalajara, 1986), pp. 195–241;Google Scholar and Medina, Héctor Martínez “Génesis y desarrollo del maderismo en Oaxaca (1909–1912)” in Martínez Vázquez, Víctor Raúl, et al, La Revolución en Oaxaca 1900–1930 (México, D.F.: Instituto de Administración Pública de Oaxaca, 1985), pp. 88–158.Google Scholar

² Following the lead of Ronald Waterbury in his comparison of Oaxacan peasants with the “revolutionary” peasants of Morelos, scholars have repeatedly labeled the former “passive” and “reactionary.” This facile condemnation has echoed down the pages of many recent volumes on the revolution while it ignores the history of campesino protest in the nineteenth century and the new literature which examines the varying facets of the revolution in Oaxaca (cited above). See Waterbury, Ronald “Non-Revolutionary Peasants: Oaxaca Compared to Morelos in the Mexican Revolution” Comparative Studies in Society and History 17:4 (1975);Google Scholar Ruiz, Ramon Eduardo, The Great Rebellion Mexico 1905–1924 (New York: W.W. Norton, 1980), p. 23;Google Scholar Jacobs, Ian, Ranchero Revolt The Mexican Revolution in Guerrero (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1982)Google Scholar pp. ix and xx; and Brading, David A. “Introduction” Caudillo and peasant in the Mexican Revolution (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980), p. 15.Google Scholar Even David LaFrance’s usually balanced analysis labels Oaxacan peasants “docile” in “Many Causes, Movements, Failures, 1910–13 The Regional Natures of Maderismo,” Benjamin, Thomas and Wasserman, Mark, eds. Provinces of the Revolution Essays on Regional Mexican History 1910–1929 (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1990), p. 25.Google Scholar For further discussion of this characterization, see Chassen, Francie R. “Capitalismo o comunalismo: Cambio y continuidad en la tenencia de la tierra en la Oaxaca porfirista,” in El Porfiriato: Síntesis y perspectivas, Buve, Raymond, Falcón, Romana and Rendón, Ricardo, eds., (Mexico, D.F.: Universidad Iberoamericana,Google Scholar forthcoming).

³ See Vázquez, Martínez, et al, La Revolución en Oaxaca;Google Scholar Arellanes, Anselmo, Chassen, Francie R., Martínez, Héctor G., Martínez Vázquez, Víctor Raúl, Ruiz Cervantes, Francisco José and Silva, Carlos Sánchez “Síntesis historica de la Revolución en Oaxaca” in Diccionario histórico de la Revolución en Oaxaca (Oaxaca: Instituto de Investigaciones Sociológicas de la Universidad Autónoma Benito Juárez de Oaxaca and Instituto Estatal de Educación Pública de Oaxaca, 1997), pp. 15 Google Scholar ff.; Ruiz Cervantes, Francisco José, La Revolución en Oaxaca El movimiento de la Soberanía (1915–1920) (México, D.F.: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1986);Google Scholar Garner, Paul, La Revolución en provincia Soberanía estatal y caudillismo en las montañas de Oaxaca (1910–1920), (México, D.F.: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1988).Google Scholar

⁴ See LaFrance’s, David G. analysis of disparate social groups in the Maderista revolution in Puebla, The Mexican Revolution in Puebla, 1908–1913 (Wilmington: Scholarly Resources, 1989).Google Scholar

⁵ Traditionally, anthropologists have estimated Oaxaca to have 16 indigenous ethnic groups (Amuzgo, Chatino, Chinanteco, Chocho, Chontal, Cuicateco, Huave, Ixcateco, Mazateco, Mixe, Mixteco, Nahuatl, Popoloca, Triqui, Zapoteco, Zoque) besides the group identified as Spanishspeaking. In addition, Miguel Bartolomé and Alicia Barabas include the Afro-Mexican population of the Costa Chica and the Tacuates, a group previously not recognized separately from the Mixtecos, “Notas a la segunda edición” in Barabas, Alicia and Bartolomé, Miguel, eds. Etnicidad y pluralismo cultural: la dinámica étnica en Oaxaca (México, D.F.: Conacult, 1990)Google Scholar, pp. xiii ff.

⁶ Taylor, William B., Drinking, Homicide, and Rebellion in Colonial Mexican Villages (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1979), p. 3;Google Scholar Guha, Ranajit “The Prose of Counter-Insurgency” in Guha, Ranajit and Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty, eds., Selected Subaltern Studies (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), pp. 63 Google Scholar ff. In Latin America, records were written in “a metalanguage of crime,” in Gilbert Joseph’s words, to criminalize violent or potentially violent behavior by working classes, see “On the Trail of Latin American Bandits: A Reexamination of Peasant Resistance” Latin American Research Review 25:3 (1990), 24.

⁷ See E. Bradford Burns’ explanation of the Quebra-Quilo Tax Revolt, 1874–75 in the Brazilian Northeast. Brazilian peasants protected “their informal title to the land by reducing to ashes the legal records. In most cases, those peasants had taken physical possession of the land and worked it over the generations without title. They faced possible eviction by anyone who could show the proper paper authenticating legal ownership,” The Poverty of Progress (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980), pp. 119–120.

⁸ Joseph, , “On the Trail,” p. 24.Google Scholar Guha is more pessimistic on this account, believing that most historians, conservatives and radicals alike, have been complicit with the code of counter-insurgency, see “The Prose of Counter-Insurgency,” pp. 72 ff.

⁹ Alcoff, Linda “The Problems of Speaking for Others,” Cultural Critique no. 20 (1991–92), 15.Google Scholar

¹⁰ Chassen and Martínez consider this a millenarian movement in “El retorno al milenio mixteco.”

¹¹ Linton, Ralph “Nativist Movements” in American Anthropologist 155:2 (1943), 230 CrossRefGoogle Scholar ff. See also Wallace, Anthony “Revitalization Movements” in American Anthropologist, 58 (1956)CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Barabas, Alicia, Utopías Indias Movimientos sociorreligiosos en México (México, D.F.: Editorial Grijalbo, 1989).Google Scholar

¹² With respect to distinction of population by race, physical anthropologists have rejected race as a scientific form of classification. Moreover, as Brackette F. Williams points out, social scientists “now recognize that the prototypical features of the races of mankind were invented, transferred, and institutionalized during colonial maneuvers to justify conquest, slavery, genocide, and other forms of social oppression,” “A CLASS ACT: Anthropology and the Race to Nation Across Ethnic Terrain,” Annual Review of Anthropology 18 (1989), 431.

¹³ The importance of indigenous ethnic movements in Latin America today has encouraged scholars to study the historical background. However, as Kearney underlines, the present resurgence is taking place in an era of globalization and “postdevelopment,” very distinct conditions from those of 50 or a 100 years ago. The present article refers to this literature insofar as it may help explain the reality of indigenous groups in Mexico on the eve of Revolution. See Kearney, , “Introduction: Indigenous Ethnicity and Mobilization in Latin America,” Latin American Perspectives 23:2 (1996), 5–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar On recent developments of Mixtee ethnic identity outside of Oaxaca, see Kearney, , “Mixtee Political Consciousness: From Passive to Active Resistance” in Nugent, Daniel, ed. Rural Revolt in Mexico and U.S. Intervention (La Jolla: University of California at San Diego, 1988)Google Scholar and Nagengast, Carole and Kearney, Michael “Mixtee Ethnicity: Social Identity, Political Consciousness, and Political Activism” Latin American Research Review 25:2 (1990).Google Scholar

¹⁴ Urban, and Sherzer, , “Introduction” to Urban, Greg and Sherzer, Joel, eds., Nation-States and Indians in Latin America (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1991), p. 4;Google Scholar see Brackette Williams on the historical evolution of the term “ethnicity” in “A CLASS ACT,” 401 ff.; Smith, Carol A., Guatemalan Indians and the State: 1540–1988 (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1990).Google Scholar

¹⁵ Bruner, Jerome “The Language of Education,” in Actual Minds, Possible Worlds (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1986), p. 123.Google Scholar For Latin America, see Kearney, , “Introduction,” 7;Google Scholar Stefano Varese, “The Ethnopolitics of Indian Resistance in Latin America,” and Stephen, Lynn “The Creation and Recreation of Ethnicity: Lessons from the Zapotee and Mixtee of Oaxaca,” in Latin American Perspectives,Google Scholar op. cit.; Campbell, Howard Blaine “Zapotee Ethnic Politics and the Politics of Culture in Juchitán, Oaxaca (1350–1990),” Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Wisconsin, 1990, pp. 11–12 Google Scholar and Zapotee Renaissance Ethnic Politics and Cultural Revivalism in Southern Mexico (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1994), pp. 242–46; Warren, Kay B. “Transforming Memories and Histories: The Meanings of Ethnic Resurgence for Mayan Indians,” in Stepan, Alfred, ed., Americas New Interpretive Essays (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), p. 207;Google Scholar and Batalla, Guillermo Bonfil, Mexico Profundo Reclaiming a Civilization (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1996), pp. 10 Google Scholar and 139.

¹⁶ Schryer, Frans J., Ethnicity and Class Conflict in Rural Mexico (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), pp. 319 Google Scholar ff.

¹⁷ Varese, , “The Ethnopolitics of Indian Resistance,” p. 58;Google Scholar see also Borah, Woodrow “Race and Class in Mexico,” Pacific Historical Review 24 (1954)Google Scholar; Morner, Magnus, Race Mixture in the History of Latin America (Boston: Little, Brown, Co., 1957)Google Scholar; or for Oaxaca, , Chance, John, Race and Class in Colonial Oaxaca (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1978).Google Scholar

¹⁸ Bonfil Batalla has noted that in contrast to the Western inclination toward specialization of knowledge, it is “difficult to establish the boundaries between what is economic and what is social” in Mesoamerican cultures, and also between “what is believed from what is known, myth from historical memory and explanation …” given the belief in the unity of humans beings and nature, Mexico Profundo, pp. 26–7.

¹⁹ “Yope” today is slang for Indian. See Campbell, , Zapotee Renaissance, pp. 242–46Google Scholar and “The Cocei: Culture, Class and Politicized Ethnicity in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec” Ethnic Studies Report 7:2 (1989); Barabas, Utopías Indias; Bartolomé, Miguel A. and Barabas, Alicia, Tierra de la palabra Historia y etnografía de los Chatinos de Oaxaca (México, D.F.: Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, 1982)Google Scholar; de la Cruz, Víctor, La rebelión de Tehuantepec (Juchitán: Ayuntamiento Popular de Juchitán, 1982)Google Scholar; Pastor, Rodolfo, Campesinos y reformas: La Mixteca, 1700–1850 (México, D.F.: El Colegio de México, 1986).Google Scholar

²⁰ Taylor, Drinking, Homicide, and Rebellion; Chance, John “La dinámica étnica en Oaxaca colonial,” in Barabas, and Bartolomé, , Etnicidad y pluralismo cultural, pp. 160 Google Scholar ff.; Francisco, Abardía M. and Reina, Leticia “Cien años de rebelión” in Romero Frizzi, Ma. de los Angeles, ed. Lecturas históricas del estado de Oaxaca (México, D.F.: Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Gobierno del Estado de Oaxaca, 1990), p. 435.Google Scholar See Stern’s, Steve “New Approaches to the Study of Peasant Rebellion and Consciousness: Implications of the Andean Experience” in Stern, , ed. Resistance, Rebellion and Consciousness in the Andean Peasant World (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1987), pp. 3–25.Google Scholar

²¹ Pacheco, Mardonio “Graves disturbios en Juquila en 1896” in Dominical, Magazin, El Imparcial, Oaxaca, 13 September 1953, 6 Google Scholar; Martínez Medina, Héctor Gerardo “La Ley de Hacienda y la rebelión de 1896 en el estado de Oaxaca,” paper presented to the Simposio: “Las formas de la resistencia india a 500 años,” Oaxaca, September 1992, pp. 4–6 Google Scholar; Miguel A. Bartolomé and Alicia M. Barabas were able to interview local people who remembered the movement, see Tierra de la palabra, pp. 42–3; Rojas, Basilio, Epístolas del Gringo Blas al Cubano José (México, D.F.: 1978), pp. 168–71.Google Scholar

²² So learned anthropologist Greenberg, James B. from his Chatino informants, see Santiago’s Sword Chatino Peasant Religion and Economics (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1981), p. 50 Google Scholar and Blood Ties Life and Violence in Rural Mexico (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1989), p. 22; Pacheco, , “Graves disturbios,” 6;Google Scholar Rojas, , Epístolas, pp. 171–74;Google Scholar Bartolomé, and Barabas, , Tierra de la palabra, p. 43.Google Scholar

²³ The coastal region of Guerrero to the west of Acapulco is known as the Costa Grande, see Jaime Salazar Adame, “Período 1867–1910” in Adame, Salazar, et al, Historia de la Cuestión Agraria Mexicana Estado de Guerrero 1867–1940 (México, D.F.: Gobierno del Estado de Guerrero, Universidad Autónoma de Guerrero, CEHAM: 1987), pp. 16–17;Google Scholar Velasco, Alfonso Luis, Geografía y estadística de la República Mexicana Tomo IX, Estado de Oaxaca (México: Oficina Tipográfica de la Secretaría de Fomento, 1891), p. 235;Google Scholar Esteva, Cayetano, Nociones elementales de geografía histórica del Estado de Oaxaca (Oaxaca: 1913), p. 194.Google Scholar

²⁴ Takahashi, Hitoshi “De la huerta a la hacienda: El origen de la producción agropecuaria en la Mixteca Costera” Historia Mexicana, 30:1 (1981);Google Scholar Spores, Ronald, The Mixtees in Ancient and Colonial Times (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1984), pp. 11–12;Google Scholar Ryesky, Diana “El desarrollo socio-económico de la Costa Chica de Oaxaca: Tiempos Prehispánicos hasta 1920,” in Munch, Guido, et al, El Sur de México Datos sobre la problemática indígena (México, D.F.: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 1980)Google Scholar; de Jordan, Barbro Dalhgren, La Mixteca Su cultura e historia prehispánicos (Oaxaca: Ediciones del Gobierno del Estado, 1979), pp. 94 Google Scholar ff.; Tibón, Gutierre, Pinotepa Nacional (México, D.F.: Editorial Posada, 1981), p. 17.Google Scholar Still today the towns of Corralero and Collantes directly on the ocean are almost entirely of Afro-Mexican population, with distinctive housing and customs, having been founded by escaped slaves.

²⁵ Ryesky, , “El desarrollo”, pp. 49–50 Google Scholar; Gracida, Manuel Martínez, Colección de cuadros sinópticos de los pueblos, haciendas y ranchos del Estado Libre y Soberano de Oaxaca (Oaxaca: Anexo No. 50 a la Memoria Administrativa presentada al H. Congreso, Imprenta del Estado, 1883).Google Scholar

²⁶ Fraser, Donald J. “La política de desamortización en las comunidades indígenas, 1856–1872” Historia Mexicana 21:4 (1972);Google Scholar Berry, Charles R., The Reform in Oaxaca, 1856–1876 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1981).Google Scholar

²⁷ See Berry, The Reform. The Central Valleys are in the heart of the state surrounding the capital city of Oaxaca. In 1878, 76 percent of the population spoke indigenous languages although by 1910, this statistic decreased to 49 percent, see Navarro, González “Indio y propiedad en Oaxaca” in Historia Mexicana 8:2 (1958), pp. 176–78;Google Scholar Esparza, Manuel “Los proyectos de los liberales en Oaxaca (1856–1910)” in Reina, Leticia coordinator, Historia de la cuestión agraria mexicana. Estado de Oaxaca (México, D.F.: Juan Pablos Editor, Gobierno del Estado de Oaxaca, Universidad de Oaxaca, Centro de Estudios Históricos del Agrarismo en México), p. 288.Google Scholar See Chassen, , “Capitalismo o comunalismo;” Regiones y ferrocarriles en la Oaxaca porfirista (Oaxaca: Carteles Editores, 1990);Google Scholar and “Cheaper than Machines: Women in Agriculture in Porfirian Oaxaca” in Vaughan, Mary Kay and Salamini, Heather Fowler, eds., Creating Spaces, Shaping Transitions: Women of the Mexican Countryside, 1850–1990, (Tucson: University of Arizona, 1994), pp. 27–50.Google Scholar

²⁸ Esparza, , “Los proyectos de los liberales,” 292.Google Scholar Available statistics do not always supply the exact quantity and value of adjudicated land or the name of the buyer. The cash value that appears is unreliable because lands would be undervalued to pay the lowest possible amount of taxes, as Cayetano Esteva commented in 1913, see Nociones, p. 35; AGEO, Reparto Agrario, Grupo II, Caja 11815–1912; AGEO, Adjudicaciones, Centro, Leg. 2, Exp. 17. In 1892, Gómez was a 48-year old rancher and cotton producer, owning property worth $200,000 pesos and by 1902, more cattle than any other rancher in the district, see Tibón, , Pinotepa, p. 19;Google Scholar AGEO, Agosto, 1902-Febrero, 1903, Sec. de Gobierno, Fomento, Estadísticas, Centro; AGEO Padrón Comercial, 1892 in Gobernación, 1831–98, Caja Suelta. Cosme del Valle’s property in Pinotepa was valued at 100,000 pesos in 1892, AGEO, Padrón Comercial, 1892 in Gobernación, 1832–98, Caja suelta.

²⁹ Atristáin, Darío, Notas de un ranchero Relación y documentos relativos a los acontecimientos ocurridos en una parte de la Costa Chica de febrero de 1911 a marzo de 1916 (México, D.F.: 1964), p. 17.Google Scholar See Silva, Luis Cossío “La Agricultura” in Villegas, Daniel Cosío, ed. Historia Moderna de México El Porfiriato, Vida Económica, (México, D.F.: Editorial Hermes, 1974) p. 94.Google Scholar

³⁰ In various lists formulated in this period of major haciendas or fincas in the state, Jamiltepec would invariably show very few, running from 1 (usually Dámaso Gómez Santa Cruz Hacienda) to 4 properties. See Chassen, Martínez, and Sánchez’ table “Haciendas y fincas de importancia” in the annex to Chassen, , Oaxaca, p. 448;Google Scholar AGEO, Agosto, 1902-Febrero, 1903. Sec. de Gobierno, Fomento, Estadísticas, Centro; for information on the Mixteca districts, see Martínez Gracida, Cuadros; Esteva, Nociones, p. 190; Atristáin, , Notas, p. 13;Google Scholar López Victoria, José Manuel, Historia de la Revolución en Guerrero (Chilpancingo: Gobierno del Estado de Guerrero, 1985), p. 31.Google Scholar

³¹ Pinotepa’s artisans also gained fame for their carpentry work, fine machetes, and beautiful textiles, Atristáin, , Notas, p. 14;Google Scholar Esteva, , Nociones, pp. 189–90.Google Scholar

³² See Chassen, , Regiones, pp. 33–35.Google Scholar

³³ A ship of the Cia. Naviera del Pacífico weighed anchor every 20 days to bring in supplies and take out the region’s products, serving as a small boon to the area’s economy, Chassen, Oaxaca, p. 185. Municipal president Francisco Carmona emphasized the ongoing Guerrero connection in a personal conversation with the author in May 1983. He insisted that Pinotepa had always had stronger ties to Ometepec and Acapulco and resented the intromission of the state government in the city of Oaxaca.

³⁴ See the social pages of the Oaxacan newspapers EI Correo del Sur and El Avance for 1909–13. In the first years of this century, Eleazar del Valle and Alfredo del Valle, sons of Cosme del Valle and María de Jesus Parada married Flora and Josefa Gómez respectively, daughters of Dámaso Gómez and Lorenza Sánchez. I thank Francisco José Ruiz Cervantes for sharing this information with me.

³⁵ AGEO, August 1902-February 1903, Sec. de Gobierno, Fomento, Estadísticas, Centro. Among the other actors in this story, Macedonio Díaz, a cotton and clothing merchant, had property worth $5,000. The next richest man in the town of Jamiltepec after Gómez was jefe político-to-be Manuel Iglesias, a 47-year old merchant, whose property was valued at $20,000, AGEO, Padrón Comercial 1892, Gobernación 1832-98, Caja Suelta.

³⁶ See Ian Jacobs, Ranchero Revolt; Schryer, Franz J., The Rancheros of Pisaflores. The History of a Peasant Bourgeoisie in Twentieth-Century México (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1980)Google Scholar and Camín, Héctor Aguilar, La Frontera Nómada, Sonora y la Revolución Mexicana (México, D.F.: Siglo XXI Editores, 1979);Google Scholar Garcini, Ricardo Rendón, El Prosperato Tlaxcala de 1885 a 1911 (México, D.F.: Siglo XXI Editores, 1993).Google Scholar

³⁷ Atristáin, , Notas, p. 12;Google Scholar Tibón, , Pinotepa, p. 27;Google Scholar see AGEO, Mayo 1911-12, Sec. de Gobierno, Abuso de Autoridad, Jamiltepec. The documents used in this study refer to tenant farmers, sharecroppers, and peons, which attests to the various combinations of landholding and labor patterns in the region.

³⁸ Atristáin, , Notas, p. 12;Google Scholar see the sources cited by Ryesky, , “El desarrollo,” pp. 50–51.Google Scholar For a monographic study of Afro-Mexicans on the Costa Chica, see Beltrán, Gonzalo Aguirre, Cuijla (México, D.F.: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1985), pp. 59 Google Scholar ff.

³⁹ Busto, Emiliano, Estadística de la República Mexicana, (México: Imprenta de Ignacio Cumplido, 1880);Google Scholar División Territorial de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos correspondiente al Censo de 1910 Estado de Oaxaca (México: Sec. de Hacienda, 1918); Atristáin, , Notas, p. 12;Google Scholar Esteva, , Nociones, p. 192.Google Scholar

⁴⁰ For instance, if the cacique Pedro Rodríguez were a descendant of the cacica Margarita Rodríguez, he assuredly would have been part Mixtec.

⁴¹ Not only the language but also customs and dress distinguished these different groups; the municipalities of Igualapa and Huehuetán had both Mixtee and Nahuatl-speaking villages. At the time of conquest, Igualapa and Ometepec were inhabited by the Ayacastecos, but according to Epigmenio López Barroso this language disappeared during the colonial period. In addition, the African population had mixed with the indigenous from an early period, to become Afro-mestizo, see Diccionario geográfico, histórico y estadístico del districto de Abasolo, del Estado de Guerrero, (México, D.F.: Ediciones Botas, 1967), pp. 91 ff., 142, and 195 ff.; Beltrán, Aguirre, Cuijla, pp. 38 Google Scholar ff.; and Díaz, Vicente Fuentes, Historia de la revolución en el estado de Guerrero (México: Nacional Impresora, 1960), p. 80.Google Scholar López Victoria and Renato Ravelo Lecuona refer to the indigenous troops in Guerrero as “indios” or “indígenas” and do not make any distinction among them according to language or culture. See Victoria, López, Historia de la Revolución, p. 31 Google Scholar ff. and Ravelo, , “Revolución campesina Zapatista y contrarrevolución terrateniente maderista (El caso de Guerrero)” in La revolución en las regiones, 1, pp. 159–73;Google Scholar “Periodo 1910–1920” in Adame, Jaime Salazar, et al, Historia de la Cuestión Agraria Mexicana Estado de Guerrero, p. 83 Google Scholar ff.; and La revolución Zapatista de Guerrero (México, D.F.: Universidad Autónoma de Guerrero, 1990).

⁴² Barroso, López, Diccionario, p. 23 Google Scholar ff.; Victoria, López, Historia de la Revolución, pp. 35 Google Scholar ff. On p. 43 López Victoria identifies Centurión as a sculptor but later on p. 56 he is elevated to architect. According to Leonardo Pasquel, Centurión had received a scholarship to study art in Europe from Governor Teodoro Dehesa of Veracruz, Rivera, Diego had also been a student in this group, see La Revolución en el Estado de Veracruz (México, D.F.: INEHRM, 1971), p. 39.Google Scholar

⁴³ Barroso, López, Diccionario, p. 24;Google Scholar Victoria, López, Historia de la Revolución, p. 43;Google Scholar Ravelo, , “Revolución campesina,” p. 160 Google Scholar and La revolución Zapatista, pp. 49–53. Atristáin also affirmed Maderista propagandists were already working in towns of Jamiltepec before the events of May 1911, Notas, pp. 17–18. Damián Flores in Guerrero reported to Porfirio Díaz rumors of seditious movements in Ometepec and Pinotepa as early as 4 March. Díaz alerted Governor Pimentel in Oaxaca who communicated with the Valle family in Pinotepa. They responded that they had no knowledge of any such problems. Colección Porfirio Díaz [hereafter CPD], Leg. 70, C. 11, Doc. 00511 ff. I appreciate the permission to use and cite this archive held by the Universidad Iberoamericana, Mexico City. Basilio Rojas commented on the presence of Enrique Aflorve in Puebla at the end of 1910 in his daily summaries of the news of the major newspaper of the city of Oaxaca, , El Avance in Efemérides oaxaqueñas, 1911 (México, D.F.: 1962), pp. 52–53.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ Rojas, , Efemérides, p. 38.Google Scholar Vital to the success of the occupation of Ometepec was the participation of a young woman, Librada Merlin, see Barroso, López, Diccionario, pp. 24–26;Google Scholar Victoria, López, Historia de la Revolución, pp. 57 Google Scholar ff.; Ravelo, , “Revolución campesina,” p. 186 Google Scholar and La revolución Zapatista, pp. 60 and 65; CPD, Telegramas L. 70, C. 19, Doc. 009205.

⁴⁵ Victoria, López, Historia de la Revolución, pp. 57 Google Scholar ff.; see Ravelo, , La revolución Zapatista, pp. 53 Google Scholar ff. on the history of the privatization of these lands in Guerrero.

⁴⁶ Barroso, López, Diccionario, pp. 26–27;Google Scholar Victoria, López, Historia de la Revolución, pp. 62 Google Scholar and 81–2.

⁴⁷ Victoria, López, Historia de la Revolución, pp. 100 Google Scholar ff.; Ravelo, , La revolución Zapatista, pp. 64 Google Scholar ff.

⁴⁸ Añorve was later reduced to leading a force of 200 men and by November 1911, divested of his command. Embittered, he died the following month in Puebla, see Barroso, López, Diccionario, pp. 14,Google Scholar 27–30 and 268; Victoria, López, Historia de la Revolución, pp. 114 Google Scholar ff.; Ravelo, , La revolución Zapatista, pp. 159 Google Scholar ff.

⁴⁹ Most significant of the pro-indigenous primary sources are their protests to the governor of Oaxaca, Benito Juárez Maza, located in AGEO, Sec. de Gobierno, Mayo, 1911–12, Abuso de Autoridad, Jamiltepec. There are also a few secondary sources favorable to the Mixtees. Gutierre Tibón’s journalistic narrative, Pinotepa Nacional, reproduces his interviews with indigenous survivors or their children and with descendants of the ranchers. Renato Ravelo Lecuona, professor at the University of Guerrero, is a major source for the revolution on the Costa Chica of Guerrero. He sees the Revolution as a class war between peasants and hacendados, with ethnicity simply reinforcing class differences, see “Revolución campesina zapatista;” “Período 1910–1920,” pp. 83 ff.; and La revolución zapatista. While Ravelo has done extensive archival work on the revolution on the Costa Chica, he also leans heavily on two sources favorable to the rancher version of the revolution: López Barroso, Diccionario and López Victoria, Historia de la Revolución.

⁵⁰ CPD, Tel. L. 70, C. 19, Doc. 009212; Archivo de la Secretaría de Defensa Nacional [ASDN hereafter] Exp. XI/481.5/206 C. 108, Does. 356–357 and 364.

⁵¹ There is no information on its activities after this. ASDN, Esp. XI/481.5/206 C. 108, Doc. 365; CPD, Tel. L. 70, C. 19, Docs, 009424–0099425; Rojas, Efemérides, p. 40 on the arrival of the gunboat.

⁵² Centurión had campaigned for Madero with Enrique Añorve in Guerrero in 1910, having been recommended to him by the Serdán brothers of Puebla. He returned to this region from Mexico City, directly after the assassination of the Serdán family, Ravelo, , “Revolución campesina,” 165 and La revolución Zapatista, p. 44 Google Scholar; AGEO, Junio 1911, Sec. de Gobierno, Correspondencia; Barroso, López, Diccionario, p. 25.Google Scholar

⁵³ In August 1983,1 coordinated the organization and classification of the municipal records of Pinotepa Nacional which, except for a handful of documents, dates from 1917. Local officials believed that the archive had been torched during the Revolution as is shown here.

⁵⁴ AGEO, Junio 1911, Sec. de Gobierno, Correspondencia. Thdis type of declaration lead to much confusion during the Revolution. Article 3 of the Plan of San Luis stated that lands, which had been illegally obtained, would be subject to revision, and possibly returned with indemnization. But many peasants believed or were led to believe that it would abolish the effects of the Ley Lerdo of 1856, which led to the alienation of most communal lands. What would determine the return of lands was whether the stipulated legal procedures had been respected when the lands were adjudicated. Frequently they had not been, and numerous villages were illegally dispossessed of their lands. See Ravelo, , La Revolución Zapatista, p. 53.Google Scholar

⁵⁵ The jefe político and the First District Judge were permitted to leave the region peacefully, AGEO, Junio 1911, Sec. de Gobierno, Correspondencia; AGEO, 1911, Sec. de Gobierno, Memoria, Varios Districtos; CPD, Telegramas. L. 70, C. 23, Doc. 011346. Basilio Rojas relates a much more violent occupation of Jamiltepec, , Efemérides, p. 45;Google Scholar Esteva, , Nociones, p. 196.Google Scholar Major Cruz did not remain in Jamiltepec. By mid-May, he had moved on to Putla and later united his forces with those under the command of General Gabriel A. Solís, which jointly marched on the capital city of Oaxaca. So Cruz was out of the region when the violence in Pinotepa occurred.

⁵⁶ AGEO, Mayo 1911–12, Sec. de Gobierno, Abuso de Autoridad, Jamiltepec. The lands in dispute evidently comprised part of the ancient communal lands of the Mixtees of the pueblos of Pinotepa, Ixcapa, Tlacamama, and Jicaltepec and were under the control of the Cacica Margarita Rodriguez, who possibly adjudicated them as her own property through the Ley Lerdo. She might have left them to the indigenous peasants if, indeed, they had formed part of the original lands of the community and were vital to their livelihood. In the same file, Iglesias says she actually left them to the town of Pinotepa not to the Indians and as per the Lerdo Law they were legally privatized. No information on this cacica has been found but considering that Pedro Rodriguez bears her surname and is considered cacique of Pinotepa, he may have been either her son or descendant, although surprisingly there is no reference to this. His violent opposition to the Mixtees recovering their lands seems to support this case.

⁵⁷ In subsequent documents in the same file the Mixtees provided more information about their working conditions. They protested that whereas historically they could take salt at no cost from the mines belonging to the town, they now had to pay a fee of three pesos. Where before they could freely let their livestock graze on the town’s common pastures, they were now charged 50 centavos yearly a head. They also complained that the ranchers would let their cattle graze freely, often causing destruction of the tenant farmers’ crops, AGEO, Mayo 1911–12, Sec. de Gobierno, Abuso de Autoridad, Jamiltepec; Tibón, , Pinotepa, pp. 26–28.Google Scholar

⁵⁸ AGEO, Mayo 1911–12, Sec. de Gobierno, Abuso de Autoridad, Jamiltepec. The Mixtees thought that Rodríguez was still municipal president, since he had recently held that office; nevertheless as cacique and regidor (official) he still wielded considerable power. Centurión never did return to Pinotepa, Añorve sent him to take part in the siege of Acapulco, Atristáin, Notas, p. 19.

⁵⁹ Mexican National Archives [AGN hereafter] Fondo Alfredo Robles Domínguez [hereafter, FARD], Vol. VI, Exp. 27, Fojas 58–60; Atristáin, Notas, p. 19. According to Pérez the real instigator was Everardo Rivero, “Apuntes,” p. 6.

⁶⁰ AGEO, Mayo 1911–12, Sec. de Gobierno, Jamiltepec, Abuso de Autoridad; Barroso, López, Diccionario, pp. 214–15.Google Scholar The name of this rancher from Tlacamama and defender of the Mixtees is ironic: composed of Columbus’ first name along with the surname of the conqueror of Mexico, Hernán Cortés, two men responsible for initiation of the exploitation of the indigenous peoples. Cristobal Cortés was not a poor man, but a member of the rancher class as seen above. In fact, his name appeared on a 1909 list of “principal ranchers” of the district, AGEO, Reparto Agrario, Grupo II, Caja 1,1909, Ganaderos. He may well be the same Cristóbal Cortés who was accused of being an instigator of the 1896 “War of the Pants” in Juquila who escaped before the military repression, see Rojas, , Epístolas, pp. 168–74Google Scholar and Pacheco, “Graves disturbios.”

⁶¹ Filemón Nolazco, one of the indigenous leaders of Igualapa who had taken part in the recuperation of land titles, accompanied Cortés to Pinotepa to free Domingo Ortiz. Both he and Everardo Rodríguez were later killed in a shootout in Igualapa on 24 May, see Barroso, López, Diccionario, pp. 213–15.Google Scholar Compadrazgo is the relationship that is established between adults when one is godparent to the other’s child; they refer to each other as compadres.

⁶² AGEO, May, 1911–12, Sec. de Gobierno, Jamiltepec. Pérez wrote that Melo had accompanied Cortés and was present at the shooting; and that thanks to Melo, who took charge of Cortés’ burial, Pinotepa did not suffer a worse fate, “Apuntes,” 6. Sra. Carmen López Martínez’s first recollection of the revolution was the murder of “Don Pedro” and Jesús Carmona over the question of land. Sra. López sold chile and tortillas in the market at that time. Interview, Pinotepa Nacional, 22 August 1983.

⁶³ The males of the Baños clan who went to Ometepec numbered about 20–25, AGEO, Mayo 1911–12, Sec. de Gobierno, Abuso de Autoridad, Jamiltepec.

⁶⁴ Ibid. Detailed information on the whereabouts of the Baños can be found in Atristáin, Notas, pp. 21–22 and Pérez, , “Apuntes,” p. 19.Google Scholar Now that Rodríguez was dead, this commission became the origin of the cacicazgo later established by Juan José Baños.

⁶⁵ The following narrative is constructed mainly from Tibón’s interviews with his informants in Pinotepa; Pérez, “Apuntes”; and Atristáin, Notas. Despite the understandable silence of the Mixtees on this vital factor, sources sympathetic to both sides attest to the attempt to recreate the Mixtee empire. Unfortunately no further information has been found on this fascinating chapter of the Mexican Revolution.

⁶⁶ See Spores, Ronald, The Mixtee Kings and their People (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1967) on Mixtee cacicazgos, pp. 110 Google Scholar ff., on the frequency and importance of female cacicas, pp. 134 ff. and The Mixtees in Ancient and Colonial Times, pp. 65–66 and 112; Atristáin, Notas, p. 22; Pérez, , “Apuntes,” p. 19.Google Scholar See Tibón, for Zárate’s description of these events, Pinotepa, pp. 26–30.Google Scholar

⁶⁷ Tibón, , Pinotepa, pp. 30–31;Google Scholar Atristáin, , Notas, p. 22;Google Scholar Pérez, , “Apuntes,” p. 19.Google Scholar

⁶⁸ This version assumes that Baños returned on 29 May 1911, Tibón, , Pinotepa, pp. 30–31.Google Scholar Atristáin wrote that Baños was away for about a week, Notas, pp. 21–23. Ravelo stated that Baños, returned on 25 May, La revolución Zapatista, p. 71.Google Scholar

⁶⁹ AGEO, Mayo 1911–1912, Sec. de Gobierno, Abuso de Autoridad, Jamiltepec.

⁷⁰ According to the Mixtees, the only thing that Juan José Baños did, after he returned to Pinotepa Nacional, was to go around settling old scores with his personal enemies: “Eberardo Rivero was assassinated with no crime committed and no due process,” AGEO, Mayo 1911–12, Sec. de Gobierno, Abuso de Autoridad, Jamiltepec. Pérez affirmed that Añorve ordered Baños to execute Rivero, , “Apuntes,” pp. 19–20 Google Scholar as did Atristáin, , Notas, p. 25.Google Scholar

⁷¹ See the Zárate account of popular memory of María Benita Mejía in Tibón, , Pinotepa, pp. 26–31.Google Scholar

⁷² The rancher’s voices can be heard in the reports of jefe político Iglesias and municipal president Amaya to the state government in the AGEO, Mayo 1911–12, Sec. de Gobierno, Abuso de Autoridad, Jamiltepec and especially in the ranchers’ complaints to Añorve and the Maderista authorities in AGN, FARD, Vol. VI, Exp. 27, Fojas 58–80. As is the custom the victors, two witnesses also composed their written accounts for posterity. Darío Atristáin penned the official history in his Notas de un ranchero and Juan Evencio Pérez Aguirre, son of the rancher/merchant María Aguirre, published a series of magazine articles in the 1930s on the revolution on the Costa Chica, “Apuntes.”

⁷³ AGN, FARD, Vol. VI, Exp. 27, Fojas 58–80. Tibón interviewed Arturo Rodríguez, son of Pedro, in, Pinotepa, pp. 14–15.Google Scholar Atristáin does not repeat the pillage permission story but says that the “ferocious” Cortés threatened Rodríguez that they would liberate Ortiz, any way they could, Notas, pp. 19–21 Google Scholar; Pérez wrote that 200 Indians asked for two hours to sack and pillage the stores of Pinotepa, , “Apuntes,” p. 6;Google Scholar see Rodriguez, ’ widow’s report in AGN, FARD, Vol. 6, Exp. 27, Fojas 58–80.Google Scholar

⁷⁴ Atristáin, , Notas, pp. 20–21.Google Scholar

⁷⁵ AGN, FARD, Vol. VI, Exp. 27, Fojas 58–80.

⁷⁶ Other itemizations can also be found in Ibid.

⁷⁷ Ibid.

⁷⁸ Ibid.; Atristáin, , Notas, pp. 21–22.Google Scholar The general pillage and sacking of Pinotepa expected by the gente de razón never did take place. Those who fled, quickly returned. The formal complaints made at the beginning of June mentioned: forced entry, threats, ill-treatment, dispossession of land titles, appropriation of arms and munitions, theft of alcoholic beverages and cigarettes, but no rapes or other murders.

⁷⁹ In a series of documents, the indigenous peasants narrated their story months after these events because they were still the object of constant ill treatment by landowners and had yet to receive any lands. The original of the complaint was relayed by the government official, Miguel de la Llave, a progressive liberal, to the jefe político with orders to investigate the case. The indigenous peasants were informed of this procedure on 16 October 1911. The jefe político was none other than the Porfirian politician, Manuel Iglesias, who produced only negative reports on the Mixtees, supplied by the municipal president of Pinotepa, see AGEO, Mayo 1911–12, Sec. de Gobierno, Abuso de Autoridad, Jamiltepec.

⁸⁰ Ibid.; see Joseph, , “On the Trail,” p. 22.Google Scholar It has not been possible to verify if Marcelino Ortiz was related to Domingo or not.

⁸¹ AGEO, Mayo 1911–12, Sec. de Gobierno, Abuso de Autoridad, Jamiltepec.

⁸² See Chassen, Francie R. “Los precursores de la revolución en Oaxaca” in Vázquez, Martínez, et al, La Revolución en Oaxaca, pp. 35–90.Google Scholar

⁸³ AGEO, Mayo 1911–12, Sec. de Gobierno, Abuso de Autoridad, Jamiltepec.

⁸⁴ The outcome of the murder case is unknown. Ibid.

⁸⁵ See Medina, Martínez “Génesis,” pp. 88–158.Google Scholar

⁸⁶ Atristáin, , Notas, p. 12.Google Scholar See Ruiz Cervantes, Francisco José “El movimiento de la Soberanía en Oaxaca (1915–1920)” in Vázquez, Martínez, et al, La Revolución, pp. 225–308 Google Scholar and La Revolución en Oaxaca; and Paul Garner, La Revolución en provincia.

⁸⁷ AGEO, Mayo 1911–12, Sec. de Gobierno, Abuso de Autoridad, Jamiltepec.

⁸⁸ Both Sebastián Ortiz and Che Gómez were far stronger supporters of social justice than the ranchers of Pinotepa, see de la Cruz, Víctor “La rebelión de los juchitecos y uno de sus líderes: Che Gómez” in Histórias 17 (1987), 57–71 Google Scholar and Martínez Medina, “Genesis”; Martínez Medina, Héctor Gerardo “La gestión de don Benito Juárez Maza: la rebelión chegomista y otros conflictos políticos-militares, septiembre a diciembre de 1911” in Memoria del Congreso Internacional sobre la Revolución Mexicana (México, D.F.: Gobierno del Estado de San Luis Potosí, Instituto Nacional de Estudios Históricos de la Revolución Mexicana, 1991), pp. 261–298.Google Scholar Knight, Alan characterizes serrano rebellions as localist “movements deriving ultimately from resistance to centralizing pressure” of Porfirian politics and not “from a fundamental agrarian polarization,” The Mexican Revolution (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1990), pp. 306 Google Scholar ff. Knight briefly mentions Pinotepa on pp. 222–23.

⁸⁹ Stephen, , “The Creation and Re-creation of Ethnicity,” p. 34.Google Scholar

⁹⁰ Pastor, , Campesinos, pp. 447–453.Google Scholar

⁹¹ Pessar, Patricia “Unmasking the Politics of Religion: The Case of Brazilian Millenarianism,” Journal of Latin American Lore 7:2 (1981), 272–7.Google Scholar In his study of the 1891 Tomochic movement in Mexico, Paul Vanderwood also calls on us to listen to the people of Tomochic, placing their “actions within the context of their own reality as they must have envisioned it,” “None but the Justice of God: Tomochic, 1891–92” in Jaime, Rodríguez O., ed., Patterns of Contention in Mexican History (Wilmington: Scholarly Resources, 1992), pp. 236–7.Google Scholar

⁹² See Spores, , The Mixtee Kings, pp. 67–68,Google Scholar and Marcus, Joyce and Flannery, Kent V. “An Introduction to the Late Postclassic” in Marcus, and Flannery, , eds., The Cloud People Divergent Evolution of the Zapotee and Mixtee Civilizations (New York: Academic Press, 1983), p. 218.Google Scholar Likewise, studies on eighteenth-century rebellions in the Andean world demonstrate that indigenous peoples attached their hopes for political or economic change to “an idealized pre-Hispanic past,” see Serulnikov, Sergio “Disputed Images of Colonialism: Spanish Rule and Indian Subversion in Northern Potosi, 1777–1780” Hispanic American Historical Review 75:2 (1996), 193;Google Scholar also various articles in Stern, Resistance, Rebellion, and Consciousness.

⁹³ Victoria Reifler Bricker, however, points out there were no more Kings, Mayan after Independence, The Indian Christ, the Indian King (Austin: University of Texas, 1981), pp. 163 Google Scholar ff.

⁹⁴ Warren, , “Transforming Memories,” pp. 201–05;Google Scholar Pessar, , “Unmasking the Politics of Religion,” p. 273.Google Scholar I appreciate Steve Stern’s suggestions on this point. Although the Mixtee leader Domingo Ortiz played a fundamental role in the decision to revive the pre-Columbian empire, information on him is very limited and everything available is included here.

⁹⁵ See Ruiz Cervantes, La Revolución en Oaxaca; Garner, La Revolución en provincia; and Cruz, Leovigildo Vásquez, La Soberanía de Oaxaca en la Revolución (México, D.F.: 1959).Google Scholar