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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 December 2015
In May 1866, almost twenty years after the outbreak of the Maya rebellion of 1847, the juez de paz of Tekax in the Puuc or Sierra region of southern Yucatán recorded the testimony of a Maya peasant by the name of Herculano Balam. Herculano, along with his father and his cousin, had been picked up by local authorities for questioning following a lengthy absence from their home village of Cantamayec in the district of Sotuta. The three prisoners had been detained because they were suspected of being spies sent by the Maya rebels of Chan Santa Cruz to persuade local Maya to join them in their continuing struggle against the creole government of Yucatán. Herculano’s statement does not shed much light on whether or not he and his companions were, in fact, “spies.” Nonetheless, his testimony is extremely important for it contains rare evidence of contact between the Maya rebels of Chan Santa Cruz, the pacíficos del sur, and the peasants of central Yucatán. At the same time, Herculano’s travels provoke interesting questions about the interaction between peasants and guerrillas, and the relationship of individuals to communities, which lead us, in turn, to the nature of peasant politics in the aftermath of the rebellion.
Research for this paper was conducted while the author was a postdoctoral research fellow at The University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Special thanks to Tim Anna, Christon Archer, Jennifer Brown, Luz María Hernandez, Herman Konrad, Terry Rugeley, Paul Sullivan, and Mike Angel for encouragement and advice.
1 Archivo General del Estado de Yucatán (henceforth known as AGEY), Poder Ejecutivo, Ramo de Gobernación, Caja 155 (new series), Subprefectura de Tekax, Cirilo Montes de Oca to the Imperial Commissioner, May 2, 1866.
2 The Puuc hills were an inverted v-shaped range of very low elevation stretching from southeast of Campeche to southwest of Peto. The pueblos of the partido of Tekax were located along the northeastern base of the hills.
3 Moisés González Navarro summarizes the divisions among the Maya after the treaty of 1853 in the following words: “By the end of 1853, the indigenous population was divided into three main groups: 1) in the south, independent, but pacified; 2) in the east, independent and still rebellious; 3) the remaining majority, dependent and loyal.” Raza y tierra: la guerra de castas y el henequén (Mexico City: El Colegio de México, 1970), p. 99.
4 For a comprehensive review of the historiography of nineteenth-century Yucatán, see Joseph, Gilbert, Rediscovering the Past at Mexico’s Periphery (Alabama: Alabama University Press, 1986)Google Scholar. For references to the pacíficos in the classic works on the Caste War see Howard Cline, “The War of the Castes and Its Consequences,” in Related Studies in Nineteenth Century Yucatecan Social History, pt. 2b, Microfilm Collection of Manuscripts on Middle American Cultural Anthropology, no. 32 (University of Chicago Library, 1950), 165–170; and Reed, Nelson, The Caste War of Yucatán (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1964), pp. 159–160 Google Scholar. The best study to date on the pacíficos is that by Dumond, Don, “Independent Maya of the Late Nineteenth Century,” in Anthropology and History in Yucatán, Jones, Grant D., ed (Austin and London: University of Texas Press, 1977), p. 109 Google Scholar. For a preliminary discussion of the economic relationship between the pacífico zone and the partido of Tekax, see Carlos Bojórquez Urzáiz, “Estructura agraria y maíz a partir de la Guerra de Castas,” Revista de la Universidad de Yucatán 20:120 (1978) 15–35
5 For a concise summary of the important theoretical debate concerning the role of peasants in social revolution see Mallon, Florencia, Peasant and Nation: the Making of Postcolonial Mexico and Peru (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995), p. 64.Google Scholar The emergence of guerrilla insurgencies, in Central America in recent decades has given fresh impetus to a new group of scholars, primarily anthropologists, who address the thorny question of peasant motivation and sympathies. In Between Two Armies in the Ixil Towns of Guatemala (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993). David Stoll examines the relationship between peasants, guerrillas, and the army in contemporary Guatemala, concluding that peasants in the Ixil region accepted the protection of the army and cultivated a cautious neutrality in order to survive “between two fires.” For an entirely different perspective, see Manz, Beatriz, Refugees of a Hidden War: the Aftermath of Counterinsurgency in Guatemala (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1988)Google Scholar, which gives full weight to the effects of counter-insurgency on the limited range of choices peasants have under such conditions. Finally, Timothy Wickham Crowley discusses the use of terror on civilian populations by both state and guerrilla forces in “Terror and Guerrilla Warfare in Latin America,” Comparative Studies in Society and History 32:2 (1990), 201–237. While these recent studies are important contributions to an understanding of current issues, this paper argues that the relationship of Herculano Balam to the rebels and pacíficos of southern Yucatán is substantially more ambiguous in that there existed a viable third force (the pacíficos) which gave Balam another region from which to seek refuge. Moreover, as the testimony of Herculano illustrates, he seems to have moved relatively freely among all of the contesting groups in the conflict.
6 Clifford, James, The Predicament of Culture (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988), pp. 9–10.Google Scholar
7 Studies of guerrilla warfare and peasants range from classics such as Eric Wolf’s Peasant Wars of the Twentieth Century (New York: Harper, 1969) to Ranajit Guha’s Elementary Aspects of Peasant Insurgency in Colonial India (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1983).
8 Creole troops had managed to contain the rebellious Maya within a large area of southeastern Yucatán, but had not yet been able to cut off the flow of arms and ammunition to the rebels from the British colony of Belize.
9 Rodríguez Losa, Salvador, Geografía política de Yucatán. División territorial, gobierno de los pueblos y población, 1821–1900 (Mérida: Ediciones de las Universidad Autónoma de Yucatán, 1989), pp. 192, 208.Google Scholar
10 AGEY, Poder Ejecutivo, Gobernación, Caja 76, “Instrucciones para que las comisiones eccjesiasticas se sujeten en los convenios que pueden celebrar en nombre del Gobierno con los sublevados, siempre que se reduscan a su obediencia, como únicas que puede concederles,” Mérida, February 4, 1850.
11 In a directive issued June 1, 1852, the government reinstated the head tax for indígenas presentados on the grounds that it was not fair to exempt former rebels, while taxing those who had always been loyal supporters of the cause of “civilization.” Ancona, Eligio, Colección de leyes, decretos, ordenes y demás disposiciones de tendencia general, expedidas por el poder legislative del estado de Yucatán, Vol. I (Mérida: Imprenta de “El Eco del Comercio,” 1882), p. 146.Google Scholar
12 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 87, Jefatura Política de Tekax, Francisco Galera to Governor Barbachano, February 3, 1852. The jefe político claimed that he was unable to draft sufficient numbers of hidalgos to serve as auxiliaries to the regular troops, because most of the indigenous residents of Tekax were employed as criados by the landowners of the district.
13 Some local officials did not agree with the reinstatement of the head tax, fearing that “the peasants would be so angry they would go off again and live among their own people in the rebel camps.” AGEY, Poder Ejecutivo, Gobernación, Caja 87, Jefatura Política de Peto, Felipe Rosado to Governor Barbachano, October 8, 1852.
14 Rómulo Díaz de la Vega to the Ministro de Guerra, “Informe sobre la situaction que guarda la guerra,” May 6, 1851, as quoted in Reina, Leticia, Las rebeliones campesinas en México (1819–1906) 4th ed. (Mexico City: Siglo Veintiuno, 1988), p. 379.Google Scholar
15 AGEY, Ramo de Iglesia, Caja 91, Canuto Vela to Governor Barbachano, July 27, 1852.
16 AGEY, Poder Ejecutivo, Gobernación, Caja 87, Jefatura Política de Tekax, Francisco Galera to Governor Barbachano, January 14, 1852.
17 AGEY, Poder Ejecutivo, Gobernación, Caja 88, López de Llergo to Governor Barbachano, April 24, 1852. The identification of May as leader of these settlements is contradicted by other evidence. In a statement given to the Campechano newspaper, El Espíritu Público, in 1867, Pablo Encalada explained that when he and his family arrived in Lochhá in 1850/51 the jefe of all the rebel bands in that area was José María Cocom, who maintained his headquarters in the village of Macanche. Pablo Encalada, “Declaración,” El Espíritu Público, 8:22, September 24, 1867. At the time of his assassination in 1858, Cocom was identified by Father Juan Ascención Tzuc as “one of the only remaining able and intelligent leaders among the southerners.” Archivo de la Mitra, University of Texas at Arlington Microfilms, Microfilm Roll 110, Decretos y Oficios, Pbro. Juan Asunción Tzuc to Bishop Guerra, Iturbide, April 26, 1858.
18 This was not the first time that the British had acted as mediators between the rebels and the government of Yucatán. Before his death, Jacinto Pat had approached the British colonial authorities in Belize to arrange the November 1848 meeting between Superintendent Charles Fancourt and Venancio Pec and Florentino Chan at the Bahía de la Ascensión. At that time the British considered the demands of the rebels excessive—they wanted recognition of their sovereignty over all the territory between Bacalar and the Gulf of Mexico, under a British protectorate. The negotiations only succeeded in further angering the Yucatecan government about the involvement of the British in arms sales to the rebels. AGEY, Poder Ejecutivo, Gobernación, Caja 75, Superintendent Fancourt to Governor Barbachano, December 10, 1849.
19 According to Don Dumond, “the impression conveyed by the list of leaders on whose behalf Tzuc signed the treaty of 1853 is that of relatively independent caudillos, each with his own personal following, who had coalesced into an ephemeral union. It is certain that at least three of the ten were residents of the area around Mesapich and Lochhá.” Don Dumond, “Independent Maya of the Late Nineteenth Century” in Anthropology and History in Yucatán, p. 109.
20 Three of their leaders were connected with villages in the partido of Tekax, one was from Tahdziú in the partido of Peto, while Cocom was associated with Iturbide in the partido of Hopelchén; see Leticia Reina, Las rebeliones campesinas, pp. 402–404.
21 “Instrucciones privadas para la seducción de los sublevados,” Mérida. July 12, 1853. Biblioteca Crescencio Carrillo y Ancona, Mss. Collection, no. 349.
22 “Gregorio Cantón and Eduardo López to Governor Díaz de la Vega,” Belize, September 17, 1853. Biblioteca Crescencio Carrillo y Ancona, Mss. Collection, no. 349.
23 The number of rebels still attached to Chan Santa Cruz in the 1850s has been variously estimated from thirty to forty thousand, while the population of the pacífico communities numbered around twelve thousand. Approximately fourteen thousand refugees, both creole Yucatecans and Maya, ended up in Belize where they settled in areas that had previously been sparsely occupied. AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 100, Milicia, General Pedro de Ampudia to the Ministro de la Guerra y Marina de México, February 24, 1855.
24 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 115, Milicia, Peto, Colonel Juan María Novelo to General Cadenas, April 17, 1858.
25 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 93, Jefatura Política of Peto, Felipe Rosado to the Governor, November 26, 1853.
26 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 109, Jefatura Política de Tekax, José María Avila to Governor Barrera, March 21, 1857.
27 AGEY, Gobernación, Milica, Caja 100, General Ampudia to the Ministro de la Guerra y Marina, February 9, 1855.
28 Ancona, Eligio, Historia de Yucatán desde la época más remota hasta nuestros días, vol. 4 (Mérida: Imprenta de “El Peninsular,” 1905), p. 349.Google Scholar
29 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 100, Peto, Comandante en Jefe de la Linea del Sur, Juan María Novelo to Governor Ampudia, March 31, 1855.
30 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 109, Jefatura Política de Tekax, José María Avila to Governor Barrera, September 17, 1857.
31 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 111, Comandancia Militar, José Cadenas to the Governor, October 13, 1857.
32 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 108, Milicia 2, Cuartel de Peto, José Tiburcio Briceño to Colonel Juan María Novelo, September 19, 1857.
33 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 108, Milicia 2, Colonel Novelo to General Cadenas, September 19, 1857.
34 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 108, Milicia 2, Colonel Novelo to General Cadenas, September 19, 1857. Reply in the margin from Governor Barrera, September 23, 1857.
35 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 155, Subprefectura de Tekax, Cirilo Montes de Oca to the Imperial Commissioner, May 2, 1866; a copy of the original document is in Caja 160, Gobernación, May 3, 1866. The copy includes the statement by Pablo Camal which is missing from the original document.
36 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 108, Milicia, Comandante en Jefe de la Brigada Novelo, Juan María Novelo to Governor Pantaleón Barrera, April 10, 1857; AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 115, Milicia, Comandancia militar de Tekax, Juan Ortoll to Governor Liborio Irigoyen, October 8, 1858.
37 Paul Sullivan offers an interesting interpretation of the Maya concept of open and closed roads as a metaphor for communication, freedom of movement, and the contrasting behavior required in times of peace and war. Sullivan, Paul, Unfinished Conversations (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1989), pp. 165–173.Google Scholar
38 AGEY, Gobernación, 100, Prefectura Política de Izamal, José Castillo to Governor Ampudia, April 24, 1855.
39 After the rebellion, “Indios puros” were forbidden to join the army or the militia, so Pablo Viz’s son would have had to adopt a Spanish surname in order to be conscripted—another interesting case of the inventive nature of identity. Devotion to the Virgin of Izamal was an important practice among devout Catholics. Izamal was therefore an important pilgrimage center for Maya and creole believers.
40 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 101, Prefectura del distrito de Tekax, Gumersindo Ruiz to Governor Díaz, April 14, 1855.
41 Tzuc’s correspondence with Bishop Guerra covers a span of six years and reveals much about the relationship of the Church with the pacíficos. University of Texas at Arlington Microfilms, Archivo de la Mitra, Microfilm Rolls 110 and 130, Decretos y Oficios.
42 University of Texas at Arlington Microfilms, Archivo de la Mitra, Microfilm Roll 168, Documentos de Sacerdotes Fallecidos, Juan Ascensión Tzuc.
43 Tzuc was the only priest with a Maya surname who became involved with the pacíficos. In a letter to Bishop Guerra, April 26, 1858, Tzuc reported that a priest by the name of Mariano Cruz was also celebrating marriages in Mesapich, apparently “without faculties,” that is, he did not have the proper license from the diocese to administer the sacraments in Yucatán. Archivo de la Mitra, Microfilm Roll 110, Dzibalchén, April 26, 1858.
44 Archivo de la Mitra, Microfilm Roll 110, Decretos y Oficios, Pbo. Juan Ascensión Tzuc to Bishop Guerra, Iturbide, April 26, 1858.
45 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 108, Milicia 2, Cuartel de Peto, José Tiburcio de Briceño to Governor Barrera, September 18, 1857.
46 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 115, Milicia, Comisión del gobierno de Campeche at Mesapich, July 29, 1858.
47 AGE Y, Gobernación, Caja 116, Milicia, Mariano Quijano to Pablo García, Governor of Campeche, August 7, 1858.
48 Barbachano, Tomás Aznar and Carbó, Juan, Memoria sobre la conveniencia, utilidad y necesidad de erigir constitucionalmente en estado de la confederación mexicana el antiguo distrito de Campeche (Mexico City: Imprenta de Ignacio Cumplido, 1861).Google Scholar
49 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 133, Jusgado Civil, Padrón general del partido de Tekax, 1862. Total population of the pacífico villages in 1862 was reportedly between fourteen and fifteen thousand.
50 Dumond, “Independent Maya,” p. 109.
51 AGEY, Gobernación, Caja 131, Jefatura Política de Peto, Nazario Novelo to the Governor, November 17, 1862.
52 Pablo Encalada, “Declaración,” El Espíritu Público, Periódico semioficial del gobierno del estado de Campeche, 8:22, September 24, 1867. University of Texas at Arlington Microfilms, Yucatán Collection.
53 Dumond, “Independent Maya,” pp. 115–116.
54 Levi, Carlo, Christ Stopped at Eboli, translated from the Italian by Frenaye, Frances, (New York: Farrar, Straus, and Co., 1963), p. 76.Google Scholar
55 Several recent studies on the participation of Latin America peasants in state formation in the nineteenth century indicate that the image of passive, inherently “traditionalist” peasantries is undergoing major revision. See especially Mallon, Florencia, Peasant and Nation and Guardino, Peter, Peasants, Politics, and the Formation of Mexico’s National State (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996)Google Scholar. For a new interpretation of indigenous participation in the wars of independence in New Spain, see Christen Archer, “Rebellion in the Rebellion of New Spain: the Indian Insurgents of Mezcala Island on the Lake Chapala Front, 1812–1816,” in The Colonial Pax and Native Resistance in New Spain, Schroeder, Susan, ed. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska, forthcoming).Google Scholar
56 Rugeley, Terry, Yucatán’s Maya Peasantry and the Origins of the Caste War (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1996), pp. 148–180.Google Scholar
