[Illustration: Front dust jacket cover]
The Haciendas of Mexico
[Frontispiece: Hacienda de Mediñero. Jalisco: residence. One-room
school was located in right wing of residence.]
+The Haciendas of Mexico+
+An Artist's Record+
PAUL ALEXANDER BARTLETT
Foreword by James A. Michener
Introduction by Gisela von Wobeser
UNIVERSITY PRESS OF COLORADO
Copyright © 1990 by the University Press of Colorado, Niwot, CO 80544
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
First Edition
The University Press of Colorado is a cooperative publishing enterprise
supported, in part, by Adams State College, Colorado State University,
Fort Lewis College, Mesa State College, Metropolitan State College,
University of Colorado, University of Northern Colorado, University of
Southern Colorado, and Western State College.
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
the American National Standard for Information Sciences--Permanence of
Paper for Printed Library Materials.
ANSI Z39.48-1984
+Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data+
Bartlett, Paul Alexander.
The haciendas of Mexico: an artist's record/Paul Alexander Bartlett;
foreword by James A. Michener, Introduction by Gisela von
Wobeser.--1st ed. p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 0-807801-205-x (alk. paper)
1. Bartlett, Paul Alexander. 2. Haciendas in art. 3.
Haciendas--Mexico--Pictorial works. I. Title.
N6537.B2264A4 1989 728.8'0972--dc20 89-24922
Manufactured in the United States of America
***************
+2015 PROJECT GUTENBERG EDITION+
_The Haciendas of Mexico: An Artist's Record_, a copyrighted work,
originally published by the University Press of Colorado, is now
out-of-print. The University Press of Colorado has released all rights
to the book to the author's literary executor, Steven James Bartlett,
who has decided to make the book available as an open access
publication, freely available to readers through Project Gutenberg
under the terms of the Creative Commons
Attribution-Noncommercial-NoDerivs license, which allows anyone to
distribute this work without changes to its content, provided that both
the author and the original URL from which this work was obtained are
mentioned, that the contents of this work are not used for commercial
purposes or profit, and that this work will not be used without the
copyright holder's written permission in derivative works (i.e., you
may not alter, transform, or build upon this work without such
permission). The full legal statement of this license may be found at:
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/legalcode
[Illustration: Creative Commons logo]
_Dedicated to my son, Steven,
who was my compañero on many hacienda trips.
This book would not exist without his help._
[Illustration: Hacienda de Colonia Campo. Chihuahua: residence.]
+Contents+
List of Illustrations
List of Photographs
Foreword
_by James A. Michener_
Preface
Introduction
_by Gisela von Wobeser_
Map
I. The Hacienda System
II. Through the Eyes of Hacienda Visitors
III. Hacienda Life
IV. Fiestas
V. Education
VI. The Revolution
VII. Mexico Since the Revolution
Bibliography
+Illustrations+
Hacienda de Mediñero, Jalisco: residence. One-room school was located
in right wing of residence.
Hacienda de Colonia Campo, Chihuahua: residence.
Hacienda de Buena Vista, Jalisco: well-preserved residence and patio.
Hacienda de San Felipe, Oaxaca: 19th-century residence, patio fountain.
Hacienda de Encero, Veracruz: church, 1799.
Hacienda de Bledos, San Luis Potosí: map of the hacienda.
Hacienda de Cedra, Jalisco: ornamental entry to 18th-century chapel;
door and gate of mesquite. Orange trees shade patio.
Hacienda de Endo, Sonora: residence, stable below.
Hacienda de Valenciana, Guanajuato: patio fountain.
Hacienda de Valenciana, Guanajuato: figure on 1788 church wall.
Hacienda de Holactún, Yucatán: chapel and residence.
Hacienda de San José, D.F.: churrigueresque-style residence and chapel
with blue and white tiled dome.
Hacienda El Pópulo, Puebla: residence with tiled façade.
Hacienda de Santana, Hildago: residence and chapel.
Hacienda de Teya, Yucatán: residence, 1700.
Hacienda de Leoncito, Guanajuato: 16th-century chapel.
Hacienda de San José, D.F.: rococo façade of residence.
Hacienda de Bledos, San Luis Potosí: coat-of-arms.
Hacienda de Calderón, Guanajuato: bronze bell on residence, 1838.
Hacienda de Ciénega de Mata, Jalisco: 16th-century church
Hacienda de Cabezón, Jalisco: chapel Virgin; her elaborate wardrobe
valued at $50,000.
Hacienda de Cabezón, Jalisco: capital, front of residence, 1800;
building designed by architect Eduardo Tresguerras.
Hacienda de Cuisillos, Jalisco: late 17th-century church in rose
stucco. A famous Jesuit hacienda.
Hacienda de Cuisillos, Jalisco: floor plan of residence.
Hacienda de Cuisillos, Jalisco: handpainted wall fresco in bedroom of
ruined residence.
Hacienda de Cuisillos, Jalisco: mural, one of fourteen panels on
veranda wall of residence.
Hacienda de Xcanatún, Yucatán: one of a series of gold wall motifs
around chapel walls.
Hacienda de San José Huejotzingo, Puebla: florentine armor in residence.
Hacienda de San José Huejotzingo, Puebla: pistol and brand of hacienda.
Hacienda de San José Huejotzingo, Puebla: 16th-century stone bas
relief, 3 feet x 5 feet, unearthed in garden.
Hacienda de San Francisco, Jalisco: residence.
Hacienda de Sodzil, Yucatán: narrow-gauge railway passenger car drawn
by mule or horse.
Hacienda de Dolores Noriatenco, Puebla: century-old carriage.
Hacienda cattle brands, state of Jalisco.
Hacienda de Cedra, Jalisco: stone cross to one side of hacienda chapel,
8 feet tall.
Hacienda de Tabi, Yucatán: early 18th-century church.
Hacienda de Altillo, Coyoacán, D.F.: pastel of St. Andrew.
Hacienda de Zapotitán, Jalisco: remains of 1750 residence and mirador,
white stuccoed masonry.
Hacienda de Dolores Noriatenco, Puebla: polychrome wood statue, 16th
century, 5 feet tall.
Hacienda San Ignacio, Yucatán: 18th century brass sacristy
implements--handbell and Bible holder.
Hacienda San Ignacio, Yucatán: brass ecclesiastical candle holder.
Hacienda de Castamay, Campeche: _cepo_ (stocks), made of mahogany.
Hacienda de Castamay, Campeche: chapel stairway.
Hacienda Corralitos, Corralitos, Chihuahua: one-million-acre cattle and
mining hacienda, 1750. Adobe residence, 1886, surrounded by
cottonwoods.
Hacienda de Bellavista, Jalisco: sugar refinery silo.
Hacienda de Sodzil, Yucatán: bronze weathervane on residence.
Hacienda de Puerto de Nieto, Guanajuato: stone residence and chapel.
Hacienda de Puerto de Nieto, Guanajuato: gate.
Hacienda de Puerto de Nieto, Guanajuato: church.
Hacienda de Aurora, Jalisco: commemorative bridge column dated 1750.
Hacienda de los Morales, D.F.: patio fountain, 1643.
Hacienda de Xala, Hidalgo: residence and chapel, 1785.
Hacienda Pixoy, Yucatán: brick-adobe residence and storage rooms. 18th
century, eleven rooms.
Hacienda de los Ricos, Guanajuato: residence.
Hacienda de los Ricos, Guanajuato: bullring entry door.
Hacienda de Yaxche, Yucatán: Virgin, 14 inches high, 17th century.
Hacienda de San Antonio, Colima: 17th-century chapel and terminus of
aqueduct.
Hacienda de Jajalpa, D.F.: pink stucco sixteen-room, red-tiled
19th-century residence and chapel.
Hacienda San Cayetano, Nayarit: one of a pair of pink ceramic lions at
entry to residence.
Hacienda de Guarache, Michoacán: residence and chapel. Now a
government school.
Hacienda de Petaca, Guanajuato: residence.
Hacienda de Juana Guerra, Amado Nervo, Durango: millstone.
Hacienda San Cayetano de Valencia, Guanajuato: church, 1788.
Hacienda de Juana Guerra, Amado Nervo, Durango: baroque church.
Hacienda de la Venta del Astillero, Jalisco: 18th-century stone and
brick residence and chapel, 220 feet long.
Hacienda la Gavia, Estado de México: wood figure, 5 feet tall.
Hacienda de Cocoyoc, Morelos: 16th-century chapel.
Hacienda de Tikuch, Yucatán: rear view, stairway to second floor
residential area
Hacienda de Chinameca, Morelos: residence and chapel. Emiliano Zapata
assassinated here, 1919.
Hacienda de Canutillo, Durango: Pancho Villa buried here July 23, 1923.
Hacienda de la Erre, Guanajuato: 1673. Father Miguel Hidalgo began his
march from this church.
Hacienda de Pueblilla, Zempoala, Hidalgo: chapel tower, 1860.
Hacienda de Tepa-Chica, Hidalgo: chapel, 1864.
Hacienda la Gavia, Estado de México: carved figure on library door.
Hacienda de Arenillas, Puebla: chapel gateway.
Hacienda Manga de Clavo, Veracruz: owned by Santa Anna. Rendering from
an 1868 bank bond; hacienda destroyed.
Hacienda de Esperanza, D.F.: residence. Cattle stalls on ground floor.
Hacienda de Águilar, Oaxaca: bas relief, 3 feet x 5 feet, front wall of
residence.
Hacienda de Sodzil, Yucatán: 19th-century residence.
Hacienda de los Molinos, Tlaxcala: 16th-century chapel. Cholula
pyramid in the distance.
Hacienda Quinta Carolina, Chihuahua: residence of more than fifty
rooms, 1892. Abandoned as of 1981.
Hacienda de Caleturia, Puebla: silver door knocker.
Hacienda de Chichén Itza, Yucatán: church.
Hacienda de Valenciana, Guanajuato: residence.
Hacienda cattle brands from various states in Mexico appear at the
beginning of each chapter.
+Photographs+
Hacienda Castillo, Jalisco: 18th-century landscape view typical of many
haciendas.
Hacienda de Buena Vista, Jalisco: well-preserved residence and patio.
Hacienda de San Felipe, Oaxaca: 19th-century residence, patio fountain.
Hacienda Uxmal, Yucatán: main gate.
Hacienda de Valenciana, Guanajuato.
Hacienda Petaca, Guanajuato: patio side of main residence.
Hacienda de Puerto de Nieto, Guanajuato: 17th-century defense tower.
Note bullet holes.
Hacienda de Barrera, Guanajuato: residence.
Hacienda de Cañedo, Jalisco: 19th-century church.
Hacienda Yaxcopoíl, Yucatán: residence. Note narrow-gauge rail-road
car.
Hacienda de los Morales, D.F.: spinning wheel in residence patio.
Hacienda de Blanca, Oaxaca: patio.
Hacienda de Xotla, Puebla: residence patio and oven.
Hacienda Zapotitán, Jalisco: map on veranda of residence.
Hacienda de Buena Vista, Jalisco: 18th-century aqueduct.
Hacienda de Castamay, Campeche: 18th-century church
Hacienda de Dolores Noriatenco, Puebla: saddle belonging to former
President Ávila Camacho decorated with silver.
Hacienda de Yocotepec, Hidalgo: church and stone cross.
Hacienda de Tenache, Oaxaca: twin bells on roof of residence.
Hacienda la Calera, Jalisco: second residence on the property, 1890.
Hacienda de Tamanche, Yucatán: 17th-century colonial residence and
remains of sugar refinery chimney.
Hacienda de San Antonio, Guanajuato: 18th-century chapel ruin.
Hacienda Aguilera, Oaxaca: former 19th-century hacienda residence, now
university building.
Hacienda de Matanzas, Jalisco: chapel and residence, chapel date 1750.
Hacienda los Molinos, Puebla: fortified wall and stairway to tower of
16th-century residence.
Hacienda de Matanzas, Jalisco: 18th-century chapel, residence,
Hacienda Quinta Carolina, Chihuahua: main residence.
Hacienda Mendocina, Puebla: 18th-century guest home on island in small
man-made lake.
+Foreword+
+_James A. Michener_+
Distinguished Visiting Professor, University of Miami
I first became aware of the high artistic merit of Paul Bartlett's work
on the classic haciendas of Old Mexico when I came upon an exhibition
in Texas in 1968. His drawings, sketches, and photographs evoked so
effectively the historic buildings I had known when working in Mexico
that I wrote to the architect-artist to inform him of my pleasure.
Subsequently, I saw examples of his devotion to the great haciendas
with their strong Mexican-Spanish coloration, and always I enjoyed his
reminders of what life in colonial Mexico must have been like for the
favored classes.
It is rewarding to renew my acquaintance with this remarkable body of
work, for it is a reassuring example of what a lifetime of scholarship
can accomplish.
+Preface+
The haciendas of Mexico have a special appeal for me. They represent a
way of life that is now gone--some would say fortunately, since it was
often a burdensome and cruel way of life for the peasant workers, a way
of life that eventually motivated a revolution and the dissolution of
the majority of hacienda landholdings.
Many haciendas can be reached only with difficulty by horse or by foot,
by boat or motorcycle or jeep. Their isolation from the culture of
Europe, three hundred years ago, impresses the mind with its severity.
In their isolation, these estates recall the brave attempts of hacienda
families to re-establish cultivated patterns of living in the New
World, with fine china and crystal, grand pianos and chapel organs,
ornate furnishings, paintings, and tapestries.
For my project, I received no financial rewards. Hence, I made
repeated trips to Mexico, each funded by the modest savings accumulated
in the United States between visits, with the hacienda project ever in
mind.
My wife, Elizabeth encouraged my efforts. She was my mainstay, my
constant friend and faithful companion. Our son, Steven, was born in
Mexico and was raised in a world punctuated by hacienda visits; he was
my _compañero_ on many hacienda trips. The three of us usually
returned to Mexico to stay for a year or two at a time.
To find out where haciendas were located in a particular area, I turned
to local government officials, owners of village stores, the postman,
or the peasant who delivered charcoal on his burro. Mostly, I found
the haciendas on random trips, when their archways and rooftops
appeared in the distance.
In 1941, when I began this project, few studies of the Mexican hacienda
had been made. Only a handful of scholars had visited individual
haciendas, and had gained first-hand familiarity with a limited number
of them. To this day, with the possible exception of my own work, this
is still true. And it is certain to remain true, since many of the
haciendas I visited no longer exist. My own interest in that heritage
was to re-create the special aura that my visits to more than three
hundred haciendas had created. As an artist I felt an enduring
affinity with a time that is no more, a heritage and tradition that may
be recaptured only, I think, through the medium of art.
This, then, is an attempt to survey the story of the haciendas. It is
not a treatise about their economic structure, their political
influence, or their historical importance in the establishment of New
Spain. Despite the meager records relating to the many individual
haciendas, there are excellent studies of regional haciendas in Mexico.
The reader will find references to them in the Bibliography.
The text was written to accompany a selection of my hacienda
illustrations, including descriptions of hacienda life based on
information received from personal contacts with hacienda families and
caretakers who could still recall the old days. My impressions and
commentary are offered to enable the reader to leave the twentieth
century for a while and return to a period when the freshly colonized
American continent witnessed the birth, the spread, and eventually the
death of a unique way of life.
Finally, I wish to acknowledge my thanks to the many who helped my
hacienda project to develop and grow through its many stages; among
them: historians Frank Tannenbaum of Columbia University and Silvio
Zavala of Mexico City; authors Ralph Roeder, Stuart Chase, and Russell
Kirk; artist Roberto Montenegro; art directors Reginald Poland of the
Atlanta Art Association, Herbert Friedmann of the Los Angeles County
Museum, Donald Goodall of the University of Texas Art Gallery in
Austin, the Reverend J. Pociask, S.J. of the DeSaisset Gallery at the
University of Santa Clara, and Stella Benson of the Latin American
library collections at the University of Texas in Austin; and art
patron Huntington Hartford. I am especially grateful to my son,
Steven, without whose help this book would have remained an unfinished
project. I am also indebted to Dr. Fae Batten for her magnanimous
effort, patience, and skill in preparing my photos for this book, and
to Lowell Waxman, head librarian of the Claremont Branch of the San
Diego Libraries for his tireless assistance in the department of
references. In addition, I am thankful for the good friends and
associates it has been my fortune to come across on the long journey
over the years.
[Illustration: Hacienda Castillo, Jalisco: 18th-century landscape view
typical of many haciendas.]
This book contains reproductions of a selected number of illustrations
and photographs, drawn from a collection of more than 300 original
pen-and-ink illustrations and several hundred photographs, which now
form part of the Benson Latin American Collection of the University of
Texas in Austin. A collection of hacienda photographs, illustrations,
and other materials is also maintained by the Western History Research
Center of the University of Wyoming in Laramie.
[Illustration: Hacienda de Buena Vista, Jalisco: well-preserved
residence and patio.]
+Introduction+
+_Gisela von Wobeser_+
Professor of History, Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas
Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, México, D.F.
Translated from the Spanish by
Steven J. Bartlett
Senior Research Professor, Oregon State University
The lifework of artist Paul Alexander Bartlett to retrieve the past of
the Mexican hacienda has made this book possible. This volume contains
a selection of his original pen-and-ink illustrations and photographs,
realized over a period of some forty years, of more than three hundred
haciendas.
Bartlett began his record during the 1940s. He made a series of visits
to Mexico to sketch and photograph the hacienda buildings that had
survived the Agrarian Reform. Many haciendas were inaccessibly
located, at considerable distances from population centers. He
traveled hundreds of miles on foot, on muleback, by train and by boat,
climbed hills, and descended into canyons to find them.
The record that Bartlett has made represents an important chapter in
Mexican history. Because the majority of hacienda structures have been
subjected to severe and progressive deterioration, his study, in many
cases, is the only trace that remains of the physical appearance of
individual haciendas. His collection of illustrations and photographs
is now in the custody of two institutions, the University of Texas at
Austin, in the Benson Latin American Collection, and the University of
Wyoming in Laramie, in the Western History Research Center [Now the
American Heritage Center]. These two archives will be useful to
scholars interested in the physical structure of the haciendas, their
evolution and history, their economy, as well as in comparative
studies. At the same time, this collection of materials makes it
possible to study the characteristics of different types of haciendas.
Above all, the contents of the two archives form an extremely valuable
resource for the history of art and architecture.
[Illustration: Hacienda de San Felipe, Oaxaca: 19th-century residence,
patio fountain.]
[Illustration: Hacienda de Encero, Veracruz: church, 1799.]
When Bartlett began his travels through the Mexican backcountry, the
producing haciendas had largely disappeared. What he found were often
remnants of an earlier existence during the Porfiriato, the period
between 1877 and 1911. Many of the buildings he saw dated from this
epoch, along with their interior decorations, water and irrigation
systems, machinery, and farming tools. In addition to these haciendas,
he also found vestiges of the first half of the nineteenth century and
of the colonial era. These were mainly hacienda buildings, some of
which had been rebuilt during the Porfiriato.
The disintegration of the haciendas began as a result of the Mexican
Revolution, and it ended with the redistribution of their land during
the Agrarian Reform. During the 1930s and 1940s, huge rural estates
were fragmented and converted into _ejidos_ or _minifundios_. _Ejidos_
are tracts of land that are granted as communal property to rural
towns. They are worked by members of the community, who benefit from
the land's yield. Ejidal properties cannot be sold or transferred.
The _minifundios_ are small private pieces of property, amounting on
the average to 100 hectares but varying according to the region of the
country and type of soil. Between 1934 and 1940, approximately
17,900,000 hectares (44,230,900 acres) were redistributed, representing
close to half of all tillable land. This repartitioning of the land
has continued into the present, though its pace has been much slower.
As hacienda property was broken up, the hacienda owners, the
_hacendados_, were left in possession of the hacienda buildings and the
immediate land around them, the size of which was restricted by the
limits that were set for these small properties. This meant that
immense haciendas were reduced to very tiny ranches. Along with their
land, the hacendados lost access to water, they lost their means of
irrigation, machinery, and livestock.
Because of these measures, the hacienda system was annihilated. For
the majority of the hacendados, the few acres left them turned out to
be unproductive land, and their hardships were magnified by the
instability and the violence that prevailed in the country. As a
result, many hacienda buildings were abandoned or were destined for new
purposes.
Only a few of the ex-haciendas remained in production. Some landowners
took advantage of the limited property left to them to plant lucrative,
high-yielding crops, while others augmented the size of their
cultivated land by leasing adjoining land or by purchasing it under
assumed names.
[Illustration: Hacienda de Bledos, San Luis Potosí: map of the
hacienda.]
When Bartlett began his hacienda visits in the 1940s, he found many of
the hacienda buildings in ruins, exposed to the ravages of time and
vandalism. Buildings had been converted into chicken coops, pigsties,
public apartments, and machine shops. Others served as sources for
construction materials, from which were scavenged rocks, bricks, beams,
and tiles for the habitations of the local population. In some cases
the destruction was total: All the hacienda's structures were removed,
and only the name of the place alluded to the fact that an hacienda had
ever existed there.
At other haciendas, buildings were adapted to new uses. They were
transformed into hotels, resorts, government buildings, barracks,
hospitals, restaurants, and schools. The exterior of the buildings
were generally left intact; interiors were completely changed.
[Illustration: Hacienda de Cedra, Jalisco: ornamental entry to
18th-century chapel; door and gate of mesquite. Orange trees shade
patio.]
[Illustration: Hacienda de Endo, Sonora: residence, stable below.]
The best-preserved hacienda buildings were those that continued to
function as country properties or vacation homes. In these, Bartlett
often found furnishings and utensils from the epoch of Don Porfirio,
surrounded by the old traditions of Mexican country life.
As an artist, Bartlett's attention was drawn foremost to the hacienda
buildings themselves and to the works of art that they housed. The
majority of his illustrations and photographs therefore depict the main
group of hacienda buildings or certain buildings--for example, the main
residence, the church, the patios, and work buildings. However, among
his rich materials, one can also find a testimony to hacienda work and
life: machinery, irrigation devices and structures, farm implements,
mining equipment, warehouses, barns, corrals, and carriages, among
others.
The history of the hacienda spans three centuries. The first haciendas
appeared in New Spain toward the beginning of the seventeenth century,
when demand for agricultural products increased and the prehispanic
supply system crumbled. Farming received an impetus at the hands of
Spaniards, and the small farms and livestock ranches, which dated from
the sixteenth century, expanded their landholdings. Many new sources
of water were tapped, and a resident labor force was developed. These
steps encouraged production and supplied the regional as well as the
continually growing metropolitan markets.
The increase in hacienda production and in the number of hacienda
workers made it necessary to expand the sixteenth-century facilities,
which, with the exception of those of the sugar plantations, had been
very modest. In this way, a large number of buildings were
constructed, buildings that were to be preserved as the core of many
haciendas until the Porfiriato.
There were three principal types of haciendas. Grain haciendas were
the most important because they were dedicated to the cultivation of
the subsistence crops corn and wheat. In addition, beans, barley, lima
beans, chiles, and other crops were planted. Grain haciendas were
established mainly in the vicinity of the urban centers, which they
supplied. The important areas of grain cultivation were Puebla,
Atlixco, Toluca, Guadalajara, Oaxaca, and Michoacán. Livestock
haciendas occupied a second level of importance. They raised cattle
and horses, as well as goats and sheep. This type of hacienda tended
to be located in more remote areas, in an attempt to prevent the
livestock from invading cultivated fields. Sugar haciendas were
located in tropical regions, where they could count on sufficient water
for the cultivation of sugarcane. The most important sugar regions
were Veracruz, Cuernavaca, Cuautla, and Michoacán.
Throughout the seventeenth century the haciendas grew in significance.
They held much of the land and water resources, expanded their labor
force, intensified their control over the market, and consolidated
their territorial rights in accordance with _composiciones de tierras_.
(The phrase _composiciones de tierras_ belongs to the legal terminology
of the time. It relates to a legal mechanism that was instituted by
the Spanish Crown during the first half of the sixteenth century but
which was applied mainly during the seventeenth century. It made it
possible to legalize properties whose titles were not in order.) They
sought to make improvements by constructing, for example, buildings,
irrigation systems, roads, granaries, and shelters for livestock.
Together, these made it possible to increase agricultural yields
substantially. It was not an easy process, often involving transfers
of hacienda property, severe indebtedness of their owners, and great
difficulties in production.
Hacienda expansion proceeded throughout the following two centuries.
Huge tracts of uncultivated land were transformed into farmland and
impressive water distribution systems opened up new areas to
irrigation. The population, constantly growing, demanded an ever
greater quantity of food. Much land that had been devoted to the
raising of livestock was turned over to cultivation, and the stock were
gradually displaced until livestock haciendas came to be located mainly
in the north of the country. However, this was not a period of
unimpeded progress: there were severe periods of crisis, sharp
fluctuations in production, a lack of continuity in the transmission of
property, and frequent bankruptcies. Hacienda properties tended to be
deeply mortgaged to ecclesiastical institutions and to individual
lenders.
[Illustration: Hacienda Uxmal, Yucatán: main gate.]
When dictator Porfirio Díaz assumed power in 1877, a boom period for
the hacienda began. Historical circumstances were favorable, and the
government offered all manner of facilities to the livestock and farm
impresarios. The substantial increase in the country's population, as
well as the strengthening international economy, created a great demand
for farm and livestock products. The consumption of goods from the
tropics, such as coffee, cacao, sugar, tobacco, and vanilla, grew
considerably during this time both in Europe and in the United States.
The same thing happened with certain basic materials, among them
_henequén_, rubber, chicle, and _ixtle_. (_Ixtle_ or _istle_ is the
name given to the hard fibers that are extracted from different plants
of the genus agave, of which the most important are the _maguey_ and
the _lechuguilla_. They are raised mainly in northern Mexico.)
As a result of laws that secularized communal land and set aside fallow
land, huge areas of cultivation and land suitable for farming were
placed at the disposition of commercial agriculture. Supporting
capital for the most part came from foreign sources--from the United
States, France, and England. Labor came from the impoverished
peasants, from town workers, and from indigenous groups, among them the
Mayas and the Tarahumaras.
Large landed estates appeared and a powerful class of hacienda owners
arose. It was during this period that it was possible to overcome some
of the endemic problems that had beset the hacienda since its birth:
instability, indebtedness, lack of capital, and scarce revenues.
During the Porfiriato, the majority of the haciendas were highly
productive and provided their owners with plentiful earnings. Yet, at
the same time there were haciendas that had to face financial problems
and fluctuations in production.
Frequently, hacendados participated in other areas of business, such as
finance, commerce, and mining. Their privileged economic position
permitted them to furnish their rural properties with great luxury and
to sustain a life of affluence. Bartlett found hacienda residences
with twenty bedrooms, salons for dancing, Japanese gardens, billiard
rooms and music rooms, swimming pools, bullrings, and palisades.
Bearing witness to the interior splendor of these mansions, there was
fine furniture from Europe, carpeting from Persia, velvet draperies,
chandeliers of cut crystal, and valuable oil paintings. There were
haciendas that possessed chapels that rivaled the provincial churches
in size, architecture, and decor. Of course not all haciendas were
this elegant: most had much more rustic appointments; many were in
decline, poorly maintained, furnished with the very barest minimum.
Bartlett captured and transmits to us today through his art the grand
cultural richness that enfolds the hacienda, its diversity according to
its moment in time, its location, and its type of production, and he
accompanies these with a portrayal of hacienda life, customs, and its
inherent style of thought. He is one of the pioneers in his field of
study.
[Illustration: Map of Mexico and its states]
+Sonora+
1. Hacienda de Endo
+Chihuahua+
2. Hacienda de Colonia Campo
3. Hacienda Corralitos
4. Hacienda Quinta Carolina
+Durango+
5. Hacienda de Juana Guerra
6. Hacienda de Canutillo
+Nayarit+
7. Hacienda San Cayetano
+San Luis Potosí+
8. Hacienda de Castamay
+Guanajuato+
9. Hacienda de Valenciana
10. Hacienda de Leoncito
11. Hacienda de Calderón
12. Hacienda de Puerto de Nieto
13. Hacienda de los Ricos
14. Hacienda San Cayetano de Valencia
15. Hacienda de Petaca
16. Hacienda de la Erre
+Jalisco+
17. Hacienda de Medinero
18. Hacienda de Cedra
19. Hacienda de Ciénega de Mata
20. Hacienda de Cabezón
21. Hacienda de Cuisillos
22. Hacienda de Zapotitán
23. Hacienda de Bellavista
24. Hacienda de Aurora
25. Hacienda de la Venta del Astillero
+Hidalgo+
26. Hacienda de Santana
27. Hacienda de Xala
28. Hacienda de Pueblilla
29. Hacienda de Tepa-Chica
+Michoacán+
30. Hacienda de Guarache
+Colima+
31. Hacienda de San Antonio
+State of México+
32. Hacienda de San José
33. Hacienda de Altillo
34. Hacienda de los Morales
35. Hacienda de Jajalpa
36. Hacienda la Gavia
37. Hacienda de Esperanza
+Morelos+
38. Hacienda de Cocoyoc
39. Hacienda de Chinameca
+Tlaxcala+
40. Hacienda de los Molinos
+Puebla+
41. Hacienda de Pópulo
42. Hacienda de San José Huejotzingo
43. Hacienda de Dolores Noriatenco
44. Hacienda de Arenillas
45. Hacienda de Caleturia
+Veracruz+
46. Hacienda de Encero
47. Hacienda Manga de Clavo
+Oaxaca+
48. Hacienda de Águilar
+Campeche+
49. Hacienda de Castamay
+Yucatán+
50. Hacienda de Holactún
51. Hacienda de Teya
52. Hacienda de Xcanatun
53. Hacienda de Sodzil
54. Hacienda de Tabi
55. Hacienda San Ignacio
56. Hacienda Pixoy
57. Hacienda Yaxche
58. Hacienda de Tikuch
59. Hacienda de Chichén Itza
I. The Hacienda System
[Illustration: Hacienda cattle brand]
Forty years ago, traveling by train in Mexico, I saw, in remote areas,
what appeared to be miniature villages. I made sketches of them from
the train and later visited some of the sites and learned they were
ancient haciendas. Over the years since then, I have visited 330
haciendas and made the first art record of these estates. I traveled
on horseback, on foot, by bus, train, car, truck, motorbike, and
mule-drawn, narrow-gauge railway. I saw that haciendas had become mere
place-names as they disintegrated or were bulldozed.
Walk into a handsome mansion and you find twenty or thirty empty rooms.
To escape the revolution, the owner fled years earlier. Earthquakes,
weather, and abandonment have riddled walls and floors. The residence
stands roofless, windowless, doorless--constructed of stone, brick and
adobe, or a combination of these. Church and chapel exist at every
hacienda and they are still used by neighbors and peasants who may
occupy the manor house. There are dates on bell skirts, on walls or
beams of a storage bodega, on escutcheons, on archways; often they are
carved in the mesquite floor of a chapel or church.
[Illustration: Hacienda de Valenciana, Guanajuato: patio fountain.]
In the tropics, flame trees, bougainvillea, red-orange galeanas,
lavender jacaranda, and yellow primavera flower among ruins. In
northern areas, pine, tall eucalypti, mesquite, cedar, pepper, and
chinaberry remain.
I sketched under the tropic sun, in corrals, in a bullring, under an
Indian laurel; I poked through empty rooms.
As I sketched, burro trains passed, their sacks loaded with charcoal or
corn; goat bells tapped as a herd grazed; ox teams hauled carts with
wooden wheels; blackbirds crowded a treetop; a cowboy tipped his hat.
There was always courtesy. I drank _pulque_ from a communal gourd; I
shared pineapple grown in Tecomán; I was entertained at town houses of
hacendados. On the estates there was silence from the days of the
viceroys, the silence of padres, the silence of abandonment.
[Illustration: Hacienda cattle brand]
In the sixteenth century, following the Spanish invasion of Mexico
between the years 1519 and 1521, the Spanish Crown granted enormous
land areas to the conquerors and adventurers who came to the New World.
Since this property belonged to the natives, the grants amounted to
usurpation. Scattered throughout Mexico, from Yucatán to Sonora, the
extensive holdings frequently included towns and villages. These
grants of land were the origin of the haciendas, the rural estates.
During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, Spanish immigrants
sometimes passed themselves off as noblemen--camouflaging criminal or
poverty-stricken backgrounds. Others, with a sack of cash or a pair of
brawny shoulders, used the invasion as an opportunity to bluff their
way and claim land and lives through the power of the sword. They
remembered that dropping quicksilver into a mule's ear made the animal
trot faster. Wealthy immigrants were able to purchase titles, and this
arrangement was encouraged by the Crown since it benefited the treasury.
The hacendado (or his representative) employed or coerced native
workers to build a residence, church or chapel, storage buildings,
mills, dams, aqueducts, fences, and roads. He paid lip service to the
Crown and whenever possible circumvented legalities. It was
advantageous to sidestep the Crown since a letter or document took half
a year to reach Spain. The employer was unable to communicate with the
people who spoke Otomi, Coro, or Chichiméc. He was thwarted by new
diseases, strange customs, tropical climate, and crop problems. Unlike
the countries of Europe, Mexico was a corn culture, not a wheat
culture. During his first years he learned that grain did better when
planted in the most primitive manner, by stick and foot.
[Illustration: Hacienda de Valenciana, Guanajuato: figure on 1788
church wall.]
[Illustration: Hacienda de Holactún, Yucatán: chapel and residence.
[Illustration: Hacienda de San José, D.F.: churrigueresque-style
residence and chapel with blue and white tiled dome.]
[Illustration: Hacienda de Valenciana, Guanajuato.]
[Illustration: Hacienda Petaca. Guanajuato: patio side of main
residence.]
[Illustration: Hacienda El Pópulo, Puebla: residence with tiled façade.]
[Illustration: Hacienda de Santana. Hildago: residence and chapel.]
[Illustration: Hacienda de Teya, Yucatán: residence. 1700.]
[Illustration: Hacienda de Leoncito, Guanajuato: 16th-century chapel.]
[Illustration: Hacienda de San José, D.F.: rococo façade of residence.]
As rapidly as possible, the landowner, the _hacendado_, added to his
holdings, buying or usurping acreage. An hacienda might consist of
several thousand or several million acres. The terrain might be
mountainous, semi-desert, coastal strips, forest or jungle, or a
combination of topographical zones. There were cattle haciendas, sheep
haciendas, mining haciendas, pulque/tequila haciendas; others produced
henequén, grew coffee, sugarcane, corn, wheat. A few bred bulls for
the bullring.
During the first century of the occupation, Fray Bartolomé de Las
Casas, friend of the Indians, objected to the atrocities committed by
the Spanish. Alfonso de Zorita, writing his "Brevíssima Relación,"
exposed Indian mistreatment. Burnouf, French agronomist, wrote Emperor
Maximilian that the whip of the _mayordomo_ (the hacendado's
administrator) was destroying many lives. Regardless of objections
through the years, the hacienda system prospered.
Counts, countesses, dukes and duchesses, crude invasionists, wealthy
men, and religious orders owned estates. Some of the famous hacendados
were Hernán Cortéz, Porfirio Díaz, Martín Ruiz de Zavala, General Santa
Anna, and Pancho Villa (who was given his hacienda as a political
bribe). Famous families owned estates: Terrazas, Rosa, Amor, Jaral,
Ibarra, Echeverría, and Regla.
From the seventeenth to the nineteenth century, hacienda architecture
varied: Where generation after generation owned the hacienda, in
families of great wealth, façades were gothic, churrigueresque,
plateresque, Islamic, baroque, rococo. The most widespread
architectural style derived from the Roman. Most residences had their
living quarters around an _atrium_, or patio. Grilled windows and
massive wooden doors and shutters were common. Thousands of work-hours
went into the carvings and embellishments--in gray, pink, or yellowish
limestone. _Hornacinas_ (niches) peppered a church or chapel façade.
[Illustration: Hacienda de Bledos, San Luis Potosí: coat-of-arms.]
[Illustration: Hacienda de Puerto de Nieto, Guanajuato: 17th-century
defense tower. Note bullet holes.]
Each niche contained a saint or religious figure: It was tapestry in
stone.
In the states of Puebla and Oaxaca, tiled façades ornamented the
hacienda residences and lofty walls surrounded them. Church and chapel
domes were also tiled. In the Sierras, haciendas were often built of
logs and planed wood--rustic, two-story buildings with outside
stairways. In the tropics, the usual residence was one story with
ample verandas and deep-set doors and windows. Most buildings were
roofed in cone-shaped, interlocking, or flat tiles.
The majority of hacienda structures were skillfully mortared in stone
block _cantera_ (limestone) by rule-of-thumb. Professional architects
like Francisco Eduardo de Tresguerras were seldom available. Instead,
artisans were employed who used various styles learned from early
ecclesiastical buildings.
Bitter rivalries between estates were part of the scene. Owners were
on the alert for a bankrupt hacienda that could be purchased at a very
low price. If extending landholdings meant violating the rights of a
village or of an individual farmer or rancher, those rights were
brushed aside, or contested legally.
[Illustration: Hacienda de Barrera, Guanajuato: residence.]
To bolster his stature, the hacendado placed a baronial device on the
façade of his residence or church: A coat-of-arms elevated his status.
He also respected his skin, and against the threat of _la intrusa_ (the
intruder) he installed gun slots, grilled windows, studded doors, and
armed his retainers. _La intrusa_ was his Old World enemy. Now and
then he raised a private army to repel difficult natives, belligerent
hacendados, or revolutionaries. Thick-walled, ponderous buildings
reflected his philosophy. They indicated his loneliness and his fear
of death as well.
As life became less threatening in the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries, as roads improved and travel became safer and more
comfortable, hacienda owners erected open structures: Residences
appeared with multiple arches across the front, and tiled verandas led
to the outdoors. Two-story homes, with balconies on the second floor
became common. Eucalypti, jacaranda, chirimoya, and columnar cypress
shaded a complex of buildings: church, residence, _bodega_. In the
north country, a line of cottonwoods led to the gracious house, which
was stuccoed pink or pale yellow. Farther south, a grove of palms
graced the setting.
As time passed, viceroys, churchmen, lawyers, and teachers became more
and more aware of the language barriers that existed throughout the
country and that impeded progress. The Catholics, through their
_colegios_ (ecclesiastical schools) attempted to upgrade life. There
were no public schools.
Among the ecclesiastical orders, the Jesuits were major hacienda
owners. Their design-for-living began at 4:00 A.M. and ended at 7:00
P.M. At the most famous Jesuit hacienda, Santa Lucía, near Mexico
City, slaves were purchased, bred, sold, or retained for work on the
estate. There were no fiestas at Santa Lucía. For almost two hundred
years the hacienda functioned to support the ecclesiastical schools of
the order. The Colegio Máximo, in Mexico City, was the principal
beneficiary. Until June 25, 1767, when all Jesuits were deported from
Mexico, the estate prospered, selling wheat, corn, textiles, cattle,
sheep, and slaves. Its economic influence extended as far as
Guadalajara, Zapotlán, and Colima.
Schooling at the hacienda was largely disregarded. There were sixty
foreign dialects to contend with. There were no dictionaries, no
language bridges for the Zapotec, Coro, Méxica, and Nahuatl people. On
the estates a priest or teacher, one who knew a little Latin, gave
lessons in Spanish, arithmetic, Latin, and the catechism. Scholarly
priests began linguistic studies of some tribes; they edited
dictionaries, but these were never circulated. Some of their work has
yet to be published.
_Machismo_ was more meaningful to the average estate than education.
The blacksmith from Barcelona, who now owned ninety thousand acres, was
eager for compliant women. Sex life, for the invaders, for the
colonist, was freer than in Europe. Since the men did not speak the
Indian dialects, sex was a body language. Some were promiscuous and
guilty of perversion. Priests and nuns were shocked by their animality
and attempted to control their countrymen. Since most haciendas were
remote and few women accompanied the settlers, isolation and power
granted license.
The kindly man, the gentile man, looked for other ways to overcome
loneliness, isolation, homesickness. Some, preferring the familiar
life, returned to their homeland. By 1910, thousands of estates were
scattered across the country. Mansions were located in the midst of
maguey and henequén fields or were situated in lush valleys. Some
faced the ocean; some were lost in acres of corn; miles of range
country surrounded others; there were desert haciendas with the nearest
neighbor fifty miles away; there were rain forest haciendas, mahogany
haciendas. Many were regional landmarks.
[Illustration: Hacienda de Calderón, Guanajuato: bronze bell on
residence, 1838.]
Haciendas became an embodiment of time. They seemed to defy time,
offering the illusion that a family could live there indefinitely.
+II. Through the Eyes of Hacienda Visitors+
[Illustration: Hacienda cattle brand]
Through the years there were notable visitors to the haciendas who have
left us their impressions: Bishop Landa, Father Alonso Ponce, Gemelli
Gareri, Samuel de Champlain, John Chilton, Mora y Escobar, Sieur Bully,
Fathers Balalenque and Acosta, Thomas Gage ("clerical spy"), Don
Ernesto de Icaza, Emperor Iturbide, Emperor Maximilian I, Baron von
Humboldt, Madame Calderón de la Barca, James Stephens, and Frederick
Catherwood, among others.
[Illustration: Hacienda cattle brand]
One of the most famous haciendas, in the state of Jalisco, is Ciénega
de Mata, legalized by the Crown in 1697. Owned by the Rincón Gallardo
family, it was a tract of eighty-seven estancias (ranches). According
to Alfonso Rincón Gallardo, reminiscing about his father's estate, the
residence was built during the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth
centuries. It is a two-story building with twenty rooms and spans or
arches across the front. The church is gray limestone, like the
residence, with a baroque façade. An elaborate coat-of-arms
embellishes the entry. Sculptured pink stone _cantera_ saints and
angels fill various niches. The octagonal dome and tower are richly
carved.
[Illustration: Hacienda de Ciénega de Mata, Jalisco: 16th-century
church.]
Gallardo appreciated the life at Ciénega, the brandings, the roundups,
sheep pasturing, shearings, and weanings. "I liked to ride with the
cowboys," he wrote, "those extraordinary horsemen, pleasant companions,
tanned by sun and wind, simple in tastes, frank, never tiring--the
classic men of the great haciendas."
Recalling his life he tells us:
Every morning after breakfast, all of us--my father dressed in his
charro outfit; my mother attired English style--would set out on
horseback, riding about the hacienda's vast fields of corn and
barley. After the midday meal, back at the house, we walked about
the stables, the granaries, and over a small hill that lay nearby;
and sometimes we played fronton or went out riding again. At
night, after supper, we read or played games. In this tranquil,
pleasant manner, life went on, broken only by the annual festival,
an event celebrated on a grand scale with parades, banquets, horse
races, cockfights, boxing matches, and, in the evening, a fantastic
display of fireworks.
[Illustration: Hacienda cattle brand]
Brantz Mayer, secretary of the United States Legation in Mexico during
1841 and 1842, enjoyed a horseback visit to the Hacienda de San
Nicolás, near Tetécala, in the state of Mexico. He admired the white
buildings and the neatness of the estate: "The sugarcane fields were in
capital order, the roads smooth, the fences maintained; cattle were
under the care of herdsmen."
[Illustration: Hacienda de Cabezón, Jalisco: chapel Virgin; her
elaborate wardrobe valued at $50,000.]