In the year of 1438 the Aztecs would rule over
Tepoztlan,
making it as one of its tributaries, a condition that ended in 1521
when the Spaniards, under the leadership of Hernán Cortés arrived
for the first time to these lands.
Beneath the protection of the weapons of the conqueror, the Dominican priests promptly started to preach and evangelize the indigenes, but also to destroy the images of the local deities, including the god Ometochlti-Tepoztécatl itself within their campaign, the worshipped god of pulque (a fermented beverage), fecundity and harvest.
Little by little, the newly arrived faith grabbed its own space within the hearts of the natives, thereafter great Catholic Churches were ercted and the first religious conversions were attained (whether with friendly or mean methods), whereas one of the most meaningful was that of the last king of Tepoztlan, who became christened on September the 8th of 1538.
Along their long stretched history, the people of
Tepoztlan
nurtured from the culture of the different nations that established
in their territory, a fact that has allowed them to cast their own
identity, which at the present still keeps them opposing the thrust
of modernity as well as reinforcing their costumes and traditions.
The present day
Tepoztlan welcomes the traveller
with the colonial monumentality of the former Dominican Convent
of La Natividad, but also with the stony countenance of the Pyramid
of Tepozteco, an emblematic indigene place of worship that stands
out for its bass relief inscriptions.
And if the visitor happens to be around the town on a Wednesday or on a Sunday, he would then be a witness to the tianguis, the legendary Pre-Hispanic rooted mixture of market and fair within which the most assorted kinds of products are sold, bought or swapped.
The lucky visitor will become a part of the entangled beehive that
invades the streets and will surely be driven by the tempting smell
of the quesadillas, the tamales of lard and the
atoles.
Surrounded by a frame of green mountains,
Tepoztlan
still clutches to its old traditions, rejecting any kind of modernity
excesses and cherishing its own essence, thus becoming into a community
which has a lot to sustain within these times where cultural standardisation
and global villages reign.