Two recent explosions at small fireworks workshops in the Ciénega region of Jalisco which claimed the lives of eight people have focused attention on this long-standing craft activity.

On the cusp of May, the hottest month of the Jalisco highlands, campesinos are making a last push to burn off their fields, mend toppled fences of rock, barbed wire and long-spined huisache branches, readying milpas (corn fields) for hand planting before mid-June rains arrive.

When Hernan Cortez, clanking and sweating and swearing in his heavy armor, aided by thousands of Indian allies, destroyed the Aztec capital of Tenochitlan on August 13, 1521, he shattered the entire Aztec Empire.

We got there early. In the corral behind Eustacio Ortiz’s tarpaper jacal, we stacked gunny sacks of chayote, wild camote, jicama, oranges, limones, peanuts, sugared candies.

Tuesday, December 12, Mexico celebrates the moment in 1531 that Jesus’ mother in the form of the dark-complected Virgin of Guadalupe is said to have appeared to Juan Diego, a recently baptized Mejica (Aztec) peon. 

Corn is about 80,000 years old and was being harvested in western Mexico 5,000 to 10,000 years ago. Corn has cast a metaphysical spell as ancient as the appearance of the first hunter-gatherers who explored Jalisco’s llanos, cerros and arroyos as they pushed south, deeper into Mesoamerica.