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Rock of Bernal, Sacred Places and Chapels of Otomí - Chichimeca Lineage, Queretaro's Semi-desert

Property names are listed in the language in which they have been submitted by the State Party.

Mexico (Latin America and the Caribbean)
Date of Submission: 01/08/2006
Criteria: (iii)(iv)(v)(vii)(viii)
Category: Mixed
State, Province or Region:

State of Querétaro de Arteaga

Municipalitis of Tolimán, Ezequiel Montes, Cadereyta and Colón.
Coordinates: N 20°44'50" W 99°58'2.90"
Ref.: 5074

Description

The nominated place is a cultural landscape, defined as a territory that, without losing its topographical and ecological natural characteristics, it has been marked by the distinctive stamp of the human intervention, not only in the plane of the tangible objects, but also and mainly in the environment of the symbolic way, being configured as well as a culturally built territory. Ar hai, is used in ñhañha -speaking to refer indistinctly to the earth that is cultivated, to the land that is possessed, to the territory or place where a town settles down and to the region where they are to each other different related towns. This territory is also the space of the economic, social and cultural reproduction of the communities who occupy this region of Queretaro.

These are the main elements that characterize this cultural landscape:

  • The symbolic triangle formed by the hills of El Zamorano and El Fronton, in the axis east-west, and the rock of Bernal in the south end of the mentioned territory.
  • The pilgrimage routes that go to El Fronton and to El Zamorano and the ritual ascent of diverse groups to the rock of Bernal, around the Santa Cruz's celebrations.
  • The stateliness and the natural attractiveness of the great monolith of Bernal, impressive geologic formation that occupied the attention of the residents of the territory from pre-Hispanic era up to the present time, represents a place of enormous symbolic value for the indigenous communities of their surroundings, as well as inspiration for writers, plastic and naturalistic artists.
  • The fusion among the fighting, unbroken and itinerant memory of the tribes chichimeca, and the language and traditions otomí or ñhañha that represent one of the older and more numerous ethno linguistic groups of Mesoamerica.
  • The presence of dozens of lineage chapels, calls also t'ulo nijö dega södi (commonly called literally "small churches for praying" or oratorical chapels), that constitute the ritual space in that the ancestors are venerated, and in which the parentages groups are structured.
  • The preservation of a diverse natural environment, inside the semi deserted region constituted by groups of hills that are part of the Queretaro Sierra Gorda western slope, favored by the scarce population density and by the respectful relationship that the indigenous communities settle down with a territory in which have survived per centuries, in spite of their aridity, and that they assume as the inheritance of their ancestors.

The sacred mounts

The most visible symbolic marks in this cultural landscape are the three elevations that we have mentioned previously: The rock of Bernal; El Zamorano and the hill of El Fronton, without stopping to consider other hills that also have symbolic importance and ritual for some communities of the area, as the hill of El Canton, El Calvario and El Boludo.

The hill of El Fronton and the pine forest of El Zamorano constitute, in the villagers' myths, the places of origin of San Pablo and San Miguel's communities, respectively, which in turn, represent centers of articulation of diverse neighborhoods and populations of smaller magnitude. In these two hills that flank the territory conformed by San Pedro, San Pablo and San Miguel Tolimán, is settled down the symbolic elements of the cult to the previous chichimecos that constitute for San Pablo's natives and San Miguel, the distinctive component of their origins in front of the village of San Pedro that was the seat of the first convent and the first foundation otomí in the XVI century, in lathe of which San Miguelito and San Pablo were constituted, as chichimeca congregations subject to San Pedro.

In turn, those two mounts, El Fronton and El Zamorano, were consecrated for the population ñhañha of the region, that believes in the miraculous appearance of two images: "The Holy Cross" that appeared near the community of Maguey Manso, at San Miguel's north, and that is taken year with year to the hill of El Zamorano; and "El Divino Salvador", appeared, according to the legends, exactly in the hill of the Fronton. Both images have similar characteristics, because they are constituted by a wooden cross in whose center Jesus' face is inserted; these constitute the banner of the most important pilgrimages in the region that have for destiny to the hills that we have mentioned.

The pilgrimage routes

The miraculous crosses that we have mentioned, incorporate to their adoration diverse communities that participate in the pilgrimages that are presided by them. It is the case of El Divino Salvador that gather a group of communities of the semi-desert that participates in the ascent to the hill of the Fronton, parallel to the pilgrimage that other communities carry out to El Zamorano, in the symbolic mark of the Santa Cruz's celebrations, between the last days of April and the first week of May.

These pilgrimages remit the cult to the chichimeca's ancestors, or the "mecos grandfathers" that the otomí people of the region consider the founders of their towns; and that remember them with pride and devotion, going year by year to the hills where they magically inhabit and where they proceed.

In this cosmogony, that divides the territory in an oriental portion, presided by El Fronton, and a western, whose symbolic elements are El Zamorano and the great monolith of Bernal, that represents the entrance door to the territory, common reference, origin of the water, element that points out the principle and the end of the times and whose cross protects the towns of the region.

The rock of Bernal

This enormous rock constitutes the setting element between the indigenous communities of the region and the encounter point with the mestizo society that erected the village of Bernal placed on the valleys and more fertile plains, toward the south and the occident of this axial point of the territory.

The rock of Bernal is a intrusive igneous formation, technically well-known as 'tonalita' that was exposed at a time, by way of a great monolith, by virtue of long processes of natural elements and erosion, which underlies in tuneless form to a sequence riolitic volcanic of tertiary age. With a height 288 meters from their base to the peak, it is considered the third higher monolith of the world, reason for which is not difficult to understand its place like significant landmark in the regional landscape, as evidence of that which is the great quantity of archaeological materials associated with this rock formation, and that they are dated at least of the first years of our era.

The physical and aesthetic characteristics of this rock, unique in the country, grant him a considerable attractiveness, even for the villagers, as for the growing number of visitors that arrive to the place.

The chichimeca memory

Although the indigenous communities of the area speak the otomí or ñhañha at the moment, they have an chichimeca antecedent that distinguishes them and gives them a special bond with the territory: Contrary to the otomí s that later arrived and that they accepted since the beginning the Spanish domain, their ancestors mecos (chichimeca mythic grandfathers) were already here for many centuries and they resisted to the conquest.

Chichimeca is a generic term that was used by the Meso-American nahuas to refer to the tribes semi-nomadic located toward the north of the old Mexico, in the territory that some anthropologists and archaeologists have denominated "aridoamérica" that its extended through the north center of Mexico, from the northern riverbanks of the rivers Lerma and San Juan, covering most of the territory of Querétaro, toward the extensive territory of the desert of Chihuahua.

The territory that corresponds now to the state of Querétaro was inhabited mainly for ethnic groups named "pames" and "jonaces", tribes that settled down in dispersed homesteads and whose subsistence was based mainly in the gathering of wild products and in some activities of incipient agriculture and smaller handling of species. These groups moved in a border territory where they interact with agricultural towns of Meso-American tradition.

The otomí prevalence on this territory has its origins in the XVI century, with the colonization movements and foundation of towns that undertook the otomíes after the fall of Mexico-Tenochtitlan city, in 1521, in the territory recognized by the mexicas like 'Chichimecapan', referring in way to the vast northern extensions in which the diverse nomadic groups denominated chichimecas moved.

In front of the combined advance of Spaniards and otomíes on their territories, the chichimeca tribes resisted and decided to unite to face the Spaniards and their Indian allies, beginning in this way the called cihichimeca war that must be prolonged until final of the XVI century. This confrontation was the beginning of a progressive process of displacement, assimilation, miscegenation and reduction in missions of population's pame and jonaz nuclei that accepted to congregate, they learned to the otomí language that adopted the Catholicism and accepted to be held to the laws of the conquerors.

In this way, the population of otomí-speaking that lives at this time in the Queretaro semi-desert was constituted starting from the jonaces groups and pames that mixed with the settled otomíes and adopted her language; so it is an amalgam between otomí people and 'otomized' chichimecas.

In these villages, the memory, captured in diverse cosmogony myths, legends and stories, recognizes a chichimeca origin visibly up to the grade that in diverse communities Tolimán exist an explicit adoration for ‘mecos grandfathers ' whose souls remain in the summit of the hills.

The lineage chapels

A cultural manifestation of the otomí towns that jumps visible for its singularity, is the presence of chapels or familiar character oratories that appear as a ritual space integrated in the domestic environment whose construction responds to certain typical constructive rules and that they constitute the base of diverse ritual activities, unaware to the public Catholic cult, related with the veneration of the ancestors, the symbolism of the death, and the family and territorial organization of the communities in a way a another.

The peculiarity of these constructions, their inclusion in the landscape of diverse towns of the highland and of the mountain of the center of Mexico, their relevance in front of other buildings of common and domestic use, their distribution in an disperse outline of establishment, and their considerable number, in comparison with other religious constructions of more size and pretense, make of these chapels an oratory element that marks the print of the otomí presence from the colonial period up to our days.

The lineage praying chapels constitute a common element in diverse otomí communities that are distributed in the center of Mexico, on a fringe that extends for the northern slope of the neo volcanic axis, from the Sierra Madre Oriental, in the meeting area of the states of Puebla Hidalgo and Veracruz, up to the east of Michoacan, including territories of the states of Mexico, Tlaxcala, Querétaro and Guanajuato.

In the municipality of Toliman and some other ñhañha communities of the Queretaro semi-desert, those 'vaults' or 'oratorical chapels' (nijo dega sodi, as they are called in San Miguel Toliman) continue having validity like cult spaces to those 'grandfathers of before', the xita, the ancestors (boxita or bonuxitá) founders of the 'descendant' (mení dega dada, or the father's descendant).

The ñhañha chapels constitutes a structured group of constructions and ritual objects defined for two basic elements that compose it: The chapel, or nijö dega södi, and their exterior, conformed by a small atrium, in which a niche rises, well-known as hermitage or 'calvarito' (Calvary or little Calvaries) (jo'), in which the crosses of the ancestors are placed. In Toliman, calvaries can also be found or eccentric hermitages that are located in isolated places, in the lot of the house or near the chapel.

The chapel is placed inside the domestic space, being part of the house, (ar ngú) but it defines a territorial environment and the relationship beyond the house, beyond the domestic unit (ar mengú), in which a patriarch lineage is articulated receives the name of ya meni In this way, the domestic units (mengú) are identified in a kin that independently of their imperfections finds in the familiar chapel their basic element of cohesion and existence.

The chapel represents the space of the foundation of the family group, place in which the ownership and the right to participate in the rites and the care of the chapel maintains a group of families agglutinated in a common ancestor's lathe, be this way east of mythical order and to the kin integrated to the community (ar hniní).

The proposed place includes one hundred ninety family chapels or vaults that give him a characteristic stamp to the landscape of the otomí-chichimeca towns of the region, and even to some mestizo populations that conserve these constructions built in the past by the indigenous population. In accordance with historical testimonies and with the architectural analysis we can establish that most of these constructions date of the XVlll and XIX centuries, although some of later date exists or that they were modified in some moment of the XX century.

The chapels are generally of a single rectangular space, compound ship for two modules. The walls are built with masonry; the space is covered with edge vaults or half-canyon they have unique access that can be located in front of the altar or offering table (following the longitudinal axis), or in a lateral way (perpendicular to the longitudinal axis).

So that the main ritual activities of each chapel rotate around the family cult, the architectural scale is reduced, giving space to a few people in its interior in a space of intimacy and withdrawal, allowing the concentration of a bigger number of people in the external atrium. The space conception of the chapels, according to the form of its covers and the natural light control, evokes in a subtle way the environmental quality of the caves or natural grottos that served for shelter to the nomadic groups that gave place to the chichimeca tribes in those that the villagers recognize their ancestors.

The altar or offering table is composed of several staggered bodies, of plastered colorful masonry, conforming niches that could receive Catholic images, crossings, exvotos and offerings. Some altars are more elaborated, presenting columns and molded cornices, or a niche in the final head wall.

In many cases, in the lateral walls of the interior of the chapel we find low walls or benches so that the users knee to pray and to carry out their rituals. The vaults, they can have circular openings in the superior part, finished off by a tiny "linternilla" (small cupola) that allows the ventilation and the illumination.

It is also important, the abundant multi chromatic paintings in the interior walls and vaults of the chapels. These paintings use a "fresco" technique of painting, with preliminary fine carved lines ("esgrafiados"). In these murals we find evocative chichimeca and conquerors images, Catholic icons, angels, animals, fantastic beings, floral ornamentation, moons, suns, stars, churches and interpretations of architectural elements used in the temples, as wall base paintings design, pilasters, altarpieces and lockets. These paintings reflect a special sensibility and they grant to the space a peculiar discursive intensity as the symbiosis and the encounter of two worlds: the native and the European.

The patio or atrium is in a rectangular or square way, defined by walls of stone masonry, with one or two accesses that don't have a defined location. In some cases, these patios usually cover with perishable materials, as reed, palm or "soyate" (local palm leaf), to avoid the Sun rays.

In some cases, and like a later architectural intervention, the access is of lateral form and the atrium is defined for a space with porticoes with arcades and covered with masonry vaults in two or more modules.

The calvaries or "calvaritos", also denominated "justice", they are small cubic constructions of one up to two meters high, that are composed of a niche finished off by a small masonry vault, occasionally finished off by a stone cross or wind flower in lime mortar; in their interior wooden crossings and offerings are placed the deceaseds.

Associated with the rituals processes of the otomí-chichimeca towns, in the main parties of some towns it's usually erected in the atrium of the Church or of certain important chapels, a well-known ceremonial construction of perishable materials as chimal (of chimalli that means 'shield' in náhuatl language), consistent in kind of a cover or railing of great height structured with reed sticks and sustained in long pine trunks, which is decorated profusely with sotol leaves (maguey leaves) that give to the structure a special shine and with which evocative figures of flowers are elaborated, wheels, crossings and chalices, supplementing the decoration with breads, tortillas, fruits and occasionally, bills (dollars especially), as a modern offering and abundance sign.

According to the composition of the main facade, we can distinguish five types of chapels with similar characteristics and pattern that repeats in most of the types.:a)  Vaults exposed, b) With Imafronts, c) regular form, d) With lateral entrance, f) With portico.

The natural environment

The nominated property constitutes as example considerably well conserved of the flora and the fauna of the Queretaro semi-desert, region whose characteristic of aridity and scarce pluvial precipitation are originated in the shade of drought that the Sierra Madre Oriental projects in his interior slope. However, in the biggest elevations, like it is the case of the hill of the Zamorano, we find forest vegetation of coniferous, making an interesting contrast with the dry atmosphere of the plains and the group of hills of smaller altitude.

In this territory, composed by wide plains interrupted by rocky elevations of volcanic origin, the agricultural development of activities has been scarce, being limited to the riverbanks of the streams, in those that are practiced some storm cultivations. So the intervention of the human groups in the territory has impacted in very scarce measure on the natural environment that conserves great part of its integrity and its balance.

In this rustic territory, the otomi-chichimeca communities have adapted and subsisted in the last centuries, by means of the combination of the agriculture with gathering activities that continue being part of the tradition and of the sustenance of these towns, same that also appeal to survive the extraction of non metallic minerals, as the lime and the marble, to the elaboration of crafts and the salaried work, being bordered from a growing way to emigrate to the cities or the United States, in search of the sustenance and the progress of their families.

In what concerns to the pine forest of El Zamorano that is located in the limits between Queretaro and Guanajuato, it is a Protected Natural Area, with near 14 thousand hectares, considered inside the high-priority regions for the conservation settled down by the CONABIO in 1999. It is also a reservation of importance for the conservation of the birds, in accordance with the approaches of the International Council for the preservation of the Ave (CIPAMEX), the Mexican Fund for the Conservation of the Nature B.C. (FMCN) and the National Commission for the Use and handling of the Biodiversity (CONABIO), given the variety, abundance and season patterns of the species that there have registered. It is an area whose physical and biotic characteristics have particular importance from the point of view of the biodiversity and eco-system wealth then, besides having a favorable significant functional ecological integrity to take conservation activities.

Justification for Outstanding Universal Value

Satements of authenticity and/or integrity

Conception. The urban establishments respond to the indigenous Otomí-chichirneca pattern that is distinguished for the dispersion that is ordered by means of lineage neighborhoods in narrow relationship with the natural elements.

Materials. The constructive systems and materials are characteristically originals, and they respond to the types of naturals soles of the region and the semi-desert climate; the lineage chapels are built with walls of calcareous stone inserted with tepetate rubble, revoked with lime, and in many occasions they have painting mural in interior; the floor is made of brick inside the family property, covered with vault.

Execution. The harmonic lines in the constructions as well as the graphic design, the disproportions and aesthetic variants of topics in the figurative representations of the parietal paintings denote the indigenous manpower.

Environment. This area has physical and biotic characteristics and particularly important from the point of view of the biodiversity, eco- system wealth and specific comparatively bigger with the rest of the country, in spite of having a significant functional ecological integrity that is favorable to take I finish conservation activities.

Comparison with other similar properties

A. inside the indigenous areas of the State of Queretaro is the area Otomí located belonging to the municipality of Amealco where are also Chapels of Lineage; nevertheless, the architectural composition of this chapels, responds to a half climatic and natural different to the one of the half-deserted one, generating constructive systems, materials and cover forms that adapt to the humidity, rain and low temperatures of that region. In this chapels the covers from therefore, are two waters, the calvary is always exempt from the thatched top and in axis with the access, always finished off with a cross in those that crossings of souls are not placed.

B. Comparing this place with a cultural landscape already inscribed in the list of the World Patrimony we find similarity with "The sacred places and routes of pilgrimage of the Mounts Kii" in Japan since share the sacralización of diverse natural elements, monuments with use ritual and pilgrimage routes that unite them, surrounded by natural elements of great wealth, recognizing a likeness in the ritual dynamics among built and natural elements.