Cleansing Rites of Curanderismo Limpias Espirituales of Ancient Mesoamerican Shamans

CLEANSING RITES OF CURANDERISMO “Erika Buenaflor’s new book, Cleansing Rites of Curanderismo, is a major contribution to a body of knowledge that has remained unrecognized for too long. It is particularly important because it takes curanderismo from the esoteric to the practical world. It is a long anticipated addition to our understanding of curanderismo.” ANTONIO “TONY” ZAVALETA, RETIRED PROFESSOR OF ANTHROPOLOGY AND BORDER STUDIES AT THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS RIO GRANDE VALLEY AND COAUTHOR OF CURANDERO CONVERSATIONS “Accolades to Erika Buenaflor’s brilliant book Cleansing Rites of Curanderismo. This is a much-needed teaching and an important validation of this ancient sacred healing tradition, which must be widely used in tandem with allopathic medicine as an answer to our modern life maladies. As a practitioner myself, I highly recommend it.” ITZHAK BEERY, AUTHOR OF THE GIFT OF SHAMANISM, SHAMANIC TRANSFORMATIONS, AND SHAMANIC HEALING AND PUBLISHER OF SHAMANPORTAL.ORG “It is a pleasure to endorse Erika Buenaflor’s book Cleansing Rites of Curanderismo on energetic and spiritual limpias. This publication will allow my students to explore the history and different types of limpias practiced by a number of shamans/curanderos/as. Highly recommended.” ELISEO “CHEO” TORRES, PROFESSOR AND VICE PRESIDENT OF STUDENT AFFAIRS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF NEW MEXICO AND AUTHOR OF CURANDERISMO: THE ART OF TRADITIONAL MEDICINE WITHOUT BORDERS

CONTENTS Cover Image Title Page Epigraph An Introduction to Limpias and Curanderismo BOOK SECTIONS AND CHAPTERS WHAT IS CURANDERISMO? CURANDERISMO AND ITS ROOTS Part I. The Intersection of Experience and Research Chapter 1. Coming into Being: A Modern-Day Xicana Curandera MY TRAINING WITH CURANDERAS/OS Chapter 2. Historical and Cultural Background: The Mexica and Yucatec Maya THE MEXICA YUCATEC MAYA Chapter 3. Pre- and Postcontact Texts: Sources Used and Why PRECONTACT CODICES POSTCONTACT ETHNOHISTORICAL RECORDS Part II. Commonly Practiced Limpias from Ancient and Modern Perspectives

Chapter 4. Platicas: Ejecting Unwanted Energies from the Body THE PLATICA RITES OF THE MEXICA THE PLATICA RITES OF THE YUCATEC MAYA INTEGRATING ANCIENT MESOAMERICAN WISDOM PLATICAS AS SACRED CEREMONY PLATICAS FOR SOLO PRACTITIONERS Chapter 5. Fire Limpias: Transformation and Renewal THE FIRE RITES OF THE MEXICA THE FIRE RITES OF THE YUCATEC MAYA INTEGRATING ANCIENT MESOAMERICAN WISDOM Chapter 6. Water Limpias: Cleansing and Rebirth THE WATER LIMPIA RITES OF THE MEXICA THE WATER-LIMPIA RITES OF THE YUCATEC MAYA INTEGRATING ANCIENT MESOAMERICAN WISDOM Chapter 7. Sweeping: The Way to Purification and Revitalization THE SWEEPING LIMPIA RITES OF THE MEXICA THE SWEEPING LIMPIA RITES OF THE YUCATEC MAYA INTEGRATING MESOAMERICAN WISDOM CAN YOU DO LIMPIAS ON YOURSELF? Chapter 8. Sacred Spaces: Creating, Vivifying, and Renewing THE SPACE LIMPIAS OF THE MEXICA SPACE LIMPIAS OF THE YUCATEC MAYA INTEGRATING ANCIENT MESOAMERICAN WISDOM HOW TO DO HOUSE AND SPACE LIMPIAS CLOSING SPACE LIMPIAS CREATING, ACTIVATING, AND VIVIFYING SACRED SPACE

Epilogue Footnotes Endnotes Bibliography About the Author About Inner Traditions • Bear & Company Books of Related Interest Copyright & Permissions Index

T An Introduction to Limpias and Curanderismo I weave back my disassociated identities moving forward in unity and wholeness. Riding the undulating serpent. La Xicana, who long ago reclaimed a dynamic and eclectic identity that was hers to shape and adore. La Feminista, who now no longer pokes at, or intends to destabilize normative androcentric mores; this is simply incidental; her essence, presence, often stirs and shakes, it just does. La Curandera, who understands the illusory paradoxical nature of attaching to defined identities; her appropriation and negotiation of identities is a way of communicating, embracing, and weaving back all dissociated parts of herself into her sacred heart. ERIKA BUENAFLOR his book is an ofrenda (offering) of love. The material draws from over twenty years of practicing as a curandera; studying with curanderas/os and shamans in the Yucatán peninsula, the Sacred Valley of Peru, and a few botanicas in Los Angeles; and my graduate research on curanderismo and ancient Mesoamerican religious and shamanic practices. *1 This book focuses on limpias, which are Latin American curanderismo cleansing rites that can clear, heal, and revitalize the mind, body, spirit, spaces, and situations, as well as facilitate soul retrieval—recovering sacred essence energy that has left the body as a result of trauma. Limpias can also cleanse on the levels of different but interconnected dimensions, realities, and spaces.

Limpias typically incorporate holistic healing practices, including, for example, the use of plants and meditative remedies. They can also be shamanic in nature, as the curandera/o often knows, sees, or senses energies around the subtle energetic bodies and can journey to different states of reality or consciousness to track and clear the issues that have caused disturbances. These aspects take practice and trust in our intuition, but after many limpias, subtle energies become easier to manage. Limpias can also draw from magical practices in order to change a likely but unwanted outcome to an ideal one. Limpias are incredibly practical in that their sacred tools and methods are very accessible and effective, even for complete novices. Limpias are the most common rites within curanderismo because of their high utility; they facilitate holistic cleansing, healing, positive transformation, renewal, and rejuvenation. This book provides the fundamental building blocks for the most prevalent types of limpias. It also provides examples of how they have helped my clients to attract ideal situations; heal from various forms of depression, insomnia, anxiety, and other types of illnesses; and experience what some would call miracles. I will explain what curanderismo is in more detail below. But for now, it is sufficient to know that curanderismo is a Latin American shamanic healing practice whose foundations lie in ancient Mesoamerican shamanic traditions. In this book, I trace limpia ceremonies to the ancient Mesoamerica shamans, particularly those of the Mexica, also known as the Aztecs, and Yucatec Maya of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. My most influential mentors came from the Yucatán. They had either lived there all of their lives, or they had moved there at some point; at any rate, they were familiar with both Maya and Mexica or Nahua curanderismo and shamanic practices. *2 I focus on these two ancient indigenous peoples, the Mexica and Yucatec Maya, because my mentors identified with these traditions and taught me their modern practices. The different limpia traditions, and their ways of understanding, are as diverse as the thousands of indigenous peoples that have existed in the Americas. Clean lines of continuity between ancient and modern traditions definitely do not exist. These traditions often comprise jagged and idiosyncratic discontinuities of consciousness. Nonetheless, there are shared underlying methods, values, beliefs, and goals that have continued. 1 There are three intertwined reasons for tracing limpia rites to their ancient Mesoamerican roots. First of all, being versed in the roots of a particular shamanic or healing practice enables the practitioner to be more comfortable and fluent in it, thereby making the practices more potent. I will explore the limpia

processes and tools that the ancient Mexica and Yucatec Maya understood to procure cleansings, healings, purification, rebirth, birth, and revitalization. These processes were not necessarily seen as being linear in the sense that one process would result in a healing while another would facilitate a purification. Rather, limpia rites were often imbued with multivalent meanings and expressions; they could facilitate healings, purifications, births, and rebirths all at the same time. By tracing these roots, I hope to improve the ability of both novices and advanced practitioners to conduct effective limpias. Secondly, tracing curanderismo practices to their ancient Mesoamerican roots allows us to reclaim indigenous healing methods that have historically been derided, ridiculed, and misappropriated. Reclaiming histories, ancestral medicines, and wisdom is often a critical component in the soul retrieval process for most modern Western peoples, who typically have no connections to ancestral medicines and wisdom and often feel disconnected as a result. This reclaiming is medicine in itself, and it can inspire us to weave our disassociated ancestral wisdom back into our heritage, as well as learn from, respect, and honor indigenous traditions. Finally, intertwined in these goals is to enact the potential healing power of epistemology; claiming these histories as being worthy of being examined, further explored, and produced, embodying the power and right to choose how we shape and identify ourselves and our stories. Be shaped by someone or something else, or choose to shape yourself— limpia lesson number one. After I trace the most prevalent limpia practices to their ancient roots, I discuss how these traditions have influenced my own methods. I also explain how to conduct limpias and what should be considered when using each method and its related tools. In addition, I share how limpias have helped change the lives of my clients and myself. It has been argued that the term shaman is a Western-constructed term that is inappropriate for describing practitioners of the sacred traditions of indigenous peoples because it essentializes these traditions and obscures their rich diversities. This reductionism can also perpetuate racist views and understandings of the indigenous person as a “noble savage.” 2 Although shaman and shamanic are not always the preferred terms among some scholars, I use them because they can also denote fluidity and dynamism. I use the term shaman to describe those among the ancient Mexica and Yucatec Maya peoples who could enact sacred and magical rites of cleansing, birthing, rebirthing, purification, and rejuvenation, and could see beyond the

veils of different realities—the predecessors of curanderas/os. I use the term shamanic to describe the rites they engaged in. This is not to say, however, that every ancient Mesoamerican shaman could perform all the limpia rites described herein, or would have performed them in the same manner. There were hundreds of different kinds of ancient Mexica and Yucatec Maya shamans with different specialties. Nevertheless, because the critical study and categorizing of their specialties is fairly recent and ongoing, until I am aware of a more specific name, I will use the term shaman to identify these ancient curanderas/os and shamanic to describe their rites. BOOK SECTIONS AND CHAPTERS The first section of the book encompasses the first three chapters and examines who and what influenced my practice as a curandera, as well as the sources I relied on. The first chapter discusses how I met my most influential mentors, the catastrophic accident and other events that inspired me to fully embrace becoming a curandera, and why I sought out ancient Mesoamerican limpia practices. The second chapter describes the Mexica and the Maya people of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries in terms of their dominant religious beliefs, calendrical systems and ceremonies, and shamanic trades. The third chapter explains the precontact and postcontact sources I relied on to examine the limpia rites of these peoples and acknowledges both the strengths and limitations of these sources. The second section, comprising the last five chapters, discusses the most common types of limpias performed by contemporary curanderas/os. Each chapter is broken into three parts: (1) a discussion of the ancient Yucatec Maya and Mexica limpia rites; (2) an account of how these ancient practices influenced my own practice; and (3) an explanation of how to conduct limpias. The specific rites and tools that I trace and explore encompass: platicas (heart-straightening talks), fire and water ceremonies, sweeping rites, and methods of activating and vivifying sacred spaces for conducting limpias. WHAT IS CURANDERISMO? This perspective and introduction on curanderismo comes from the sacred heart of a Xicana curandera who has been on a quest to understand herself, what has

or had compromised her, what drives her questions, and what she chooses to be now. And as a Xicana, lovingly welcoming back the fragmented parts of herself into her sacred heart— La India, La Española, La Mexicana, La Americana, La Africana . . . The root word of curanderismo, curar, means to heal. A curandera is a female healer, and a curandero is a male healer. A curandera/o is someone who heals on a holistic level—mind, body, spirit, and soul. We generally approach healing by integrating an understanding of the soul and spirit with that of the body and mind. We curanderas/os are trained to work with the person on a holistic level and often use many tools to do so: our hands, our intuition, the spoken word, and the power of the mind. Nonetheless, there are some curanderas/os who specialize in the use of one particular tool. The following are some of the more common specialties. Sobaderas/os Sobaderas/os are known for using massage and acupressure points. *3 But sobaderismo treatments are not simply intended to relax the body or to heal it of physical aches and pains. Rather they are intended to release many kinds of wounds—emotional, spiritual, mental, and physical— that may be stuck in the cellular body, spirit, and soul. A loving touch generally tends to melt hardness and stubbornness and can be incredibly effective in facilitating a limpia or soul retrieval. One curandera who mentored me taught me to use massage and acupressure points to facilitate limpias and release energetic and physical ailments from my body. After a major hiking accident that broke many of my bones from the head down and placed me in a wheelchair for almost a year, I used the sobaderismo techniques that she taught me to relieve any pain and ensure that my muscles would not atrophy. I was able to walk with a completely normal gait in less than two weeks, after having been in a wheelchair for almost a year. Of course, I also applied many other tools I had learned from curanderas/os and shamans during my initial years of training; training that has been a continuous and ongoing process. But sobaderismo techniques were essential for helping me to walk normally again. For the sobaderismo treatments I provide, I move stuck energies from the body using particular strokes, charged essential oils, and hot stones and crystals; then I release this energy with my intention and place pressure on particular

acupressure points to facilitate a release. I have had clients begin to spontaneously cry or laugh as this energy is released from their bodies. Afterwards, they tell me that they feel physically, emotionally, and spiritually calm and rejuvenated. Parteras/os There are some curanderas/os who act as parteras/os (midwives). Parterismo is a distinct specialty in that most curanderas/os are not necessarily trained to work as midwives. Parteras/os provide prenatal and postnatal support for the mother, and sometimes for the entire family. Parteras/os act as dietitians, counselors, healers, doctors, and nurses to ensure the physical, emotional, mental and spiritual well-being of both the mother and her baby. They talk to the baby and the mother during and after the pregnancy. Parteras/os are typically familiar with massage and herbs, use their intuition quite frequently, and may work with other tools as well. Along with prescribing particular foods, drinks, and plants, parteras/os may also advise the mother about how to protect herself and her baby from unwanted energies that could have adverse effects on them. A partera/o may advise that the mother stay indoors during an eclipse. If an expecting mother goes out at night during a full moon, she is to place a red yarn that has been tied three times in her bra. If she believes that she will be around negativity, she should tie a red yarn around her belly. Parteras/os also give massages to the mother to ensure that the baby is being formed in the right position and is in constant preparation for the actual delivery. This tradition goes back to ancient Mesoamerica. Parteras/os would give sobaderismo treatments both inside and outside the temāzcalli (sweat lodge in Nahuatl). *4 In fact, recruiting a partera/o was an endeavor that involved the parents and grandparents-to-be, and took place over a ceremonial feast. The partera/o was thought to be highly responsible for ensuring the health of the baby and mother. During one of my mentorships in Bacalar in the Yucatán, when it was still a sleepy little town, I had the honor of experiencing a temazcal ceremony with an old partero named Pedro. After my first ceremony, I struck up a conversation with this very sweet man and learned of his specialty. I became incredibly curious, particularly because he was the first Maya partero I had ever met. When I asked him if there were any issues because he was a male delivering babies, he gave no indication that being a male partero was of any consequence. After his

nonchalant response, I did not give a second thought to his gender; I was more interested in any stories he had to share. Pedro had spent decades delivering babies in temazcales. According to him, the family of the mother, the elders in particular, would be in the temazcal when the mother was in labor. They would sing songs and play the drum to honor and welcome the birth of the baby. Herbs were chosen to ensure a graceful outcome for the delivery and were integral to facilitating the well-being of the baby and mother during the process. My interactions with Pedro showed that he was knowledgeable about plant medicines and their preparation. One lady from our group was experiencing severe nausea. He made a fresh tea blend of lavender, basil, oregano, and cinnamon sticks, which more or less instantly alleviated her dizziness and nausea. He also made a salve for me of spearmint, camphor, yarrow, and aloe vera, which relieved the itchiness and swelling I had from a bug bite. When I asked him about his training in working and healing with plants, he said that these remedies were common knowledge. But he had received special training from his mother, who was the partera that trained him, in working with plants to heal most of the common illnesses pregnant women may experience. Yerberas/os Yerberas/os are curanderas/o who work principally with plant medicine. The name is derived from yerba, which can refer to an herb, a weed, or a plant. Many yerberas/os know how to heal and work with flowers, fruit, weeds, tree bark, vines, leaves, vegetables, flowers, fungi, cacti, and succulents. Most yerberas/os know the healing and magical properties of hundreds of plants, possibly even thousands. Some practitioners may work strictly with plants that grow in their area, often because they have established a particular relationship with the soul essence of these plants. This relationship may have developed from a diet whereby the yerbera/o ingests the plant, prays, and calls forward its essence repeatedly for a certain number of specified days. The soul essence teaches the yerbera/o where to find the plants, when and how to pick them, and how to prepare them. There are also some rites that require plants to be fresh and harvested at a certain time of the day or night, which also makes it necessary to work with local plants. While in Lamanai, Belize, I had the honor of meeting a yerbero whose local medicinal plants were located in a lush jungle. When I took a walk with him in the jungle, he began by welcoming me and inviting me to join him in a prayer

and tobacco offering for the plants. He could identify the healing properties of hundreds of different plants and knew how to prepare medicines from them. Over dinner, he told me that his greatest teachers have been the plants themselves. As a young man, he had a teacher that taught him how to begin spotting, picking, and preparing plants for medicinal and magical purposes. He would go with his teacher to spot the terrain where they grew, and the teacher taught him where to cut them so that there would be more for him to pick later. He watched and helped his teacher heal hundreds of people from many different types of illnesses with plant preparations. But his teacher particularly stressed how to listen and connect with the spirit of the plants, because they would teach him more than he ever could. Praying with, walking, and meditating with the spirit of plants were essential for him in developing his connection with their soul essence. My connection and work with plants has developed and evolved throughout the years. My first plant mixture was with rosewater when I was five, a gift for my mom. Then, when I was eight, I felt it necessary to steep bougainvillea in warm water and add lime for my sore throat. It turns out that bougainvillea flowers have been used by many curanderas/os for colds and sore throats. I dabbled a little here and there, and throughout the years I made various herbal and flower remedies to heal the body, spirit, and soul. During my quarterly trips to the Yucatán, where I received the bulk of my training, I always offered to help and pick up any necessary plants, either at the open-air market or from my mentors’ backyards. Typically, in exchange for lending a helping hand, the curandera/o was willing to teach me what the plants were being used for and how to prepare them for many things, such as sweats, magical preparations, limpias, and healing remedies. Throughout the years, as a curandera, I continued my training in working and healing with plants. Eventually I began my own healing garden, and dove deeper into connecting with the soul essence of plants and welcoming them in to teach me. The plants I work with regularly have been and continue to be some of my greatest teachers. At my yerberismo classes, we cover different topics, such as ceremonies for connecting with the essence spirit of each plant; the plants’ magical and spiritual qualities; how to create magical and healing oils, tinctures, salves, ointments, liniments, and poultices; when and how to pick and prepare plant mixtures in relation to the time of day or night, the specific day, and the phase of the moon; and how and where to store plants. At each class, I always have my students work with plants to make tools, such as complex tea blends, tinctures, bolsas poderosas (magical power bags), smudge bundles, salves,

ointments, oils, and blends for baños (spiritual baths). This way, they get firsthand experience working and healing with plants. Although I know a thing or two about these subjects, it is not necessarily my specialty, so I do not identify myself as a yerbera. There are other curanderas, such as consejeras/os, who principally use spiritual counseling to heal; espiritualistas/os, who connect with deceased spirits; mentalistas, who work solely with the power of the mind to heal; perfumeras/os, who use the scent of plants to heal and work magic; santeras/os, who work with the Santería religion to heal and cleanse; and hueseras/os, bonesetters, who work with broken and injured bones. Many other curanderas/os no doubt identify themselves or are identified by different names throughout Latin America. Research in the American Southwest on curanderismo identifies another type of specialty, the “total curandero,” one who is skilled at all of the specialties. Perhaps this label was appropriate when the Southwest was mainly composed of Mexican-Americans, but it is arguably outdated as a result of globalization and immigration. I am unsure whether a Peruvian, Cuban, or Puerto Rican curandera/o would be skilled at all of the same specialties as a Xicana/o curandera/o or vice versa. CURANDERISMO AND ITS ROOTS Curanderismo has evolved as a dynamic and eclectic practice. Scholars point out that curanderismo is rooted in Mesoamerican practices, African medicine, Spanish spiritual theories, Judeo-Christian beliefs, early Arabic medicine and health practices, Greek humoral medicine revived during the Spanish Renaissance, and, later, European witchcraft and African medicine. 3 These complex processes of negotiating and appropriating beliefs and practices often allowed Mesoamerican peoples to continue to practice rites postcontact that were already familiar to them in varying degrees, prior to the arrival of the Spaniards. *5 But the question that is often left unanswered is, Which specific curing practices have their roots in ancient Mesoamerica? Typically, what is discussed are the early Spanish influences on indigenous curing rites and beliefs. For example, many scholars who have written about the origins and development of curanderismo state that the Spanish theory of humors influenced the practice of curanderismo early on. This theory, which can

be ultimately traced back to the Greek physician Hippocrates in the fifth century BCE, identified four humors: (1) blood; (2) phlegm; (3) yellow bile; and (4) black bile. Sickness developed when one of these humors was out of equilibrium with the others, and it was the healer’s job to ascertain the imbalance and correct it. Certain physical conditions were treated with the application of heat or cold, for example. 4 Some scholars, such as George Foster, assert that the influence of Spanish medical theory is so great that it is difficult to discern what is truly Mesoamerican in origin with regard to the sixteenth-century medicinal documents written by indigenous scholars. Foster further claims that indigenous scholars had been trained using European books and were therefore influenced by Hippocratic-Galenic humoral theory, so references to a “hot” or “cold” remedy should not be considered indigenous. Unfortunately, this line of thinking has influenced the study of curanderismo, particularly as it relates to its Mesoamerican origins. 5 Mesoamerican scholars, such as Alfredo López Austin and Bernardo Ortiz de Montellano, however, have critically compared many early ethnohistorical records and disagree with this dehistoricization. Ortiz de Montellano points out that Francisco Hernández, King Phillip’s appointed physician sent to conduct scientific investigation in the Americas in 1570, often criticized Mesoamerican healers for misclassifying or mislabeling plants in relation to hot-cold applications. For example, when classifying memeyas, plants that secrete a milky juice, he claims that they are certainly of a hot and dry nature and disagrees with the Mexica’s classification of them as being cold and fighting against fevers. His criticisms of the hot-cold applications make no sense unless the indigenous peoples also had their own system of applying “hot” or “cold” labels. 6 In the Florentine Codex, Friar Bernardino de Sahagún, sixteenth-century ethnographer, discusses how the Mexica treated certain illnesses with hot and cold therapies. When discussing a constant cough, he notes that one should abstain from fruit and other cold food and should only drink hot beverages. 7 If they were healing an infected knee, for example, they would take the humor, or phlegm, out and place a poultice of powdered toloa foliage on the knee. 8 In Primeros Memoriales, Sahagún also lists different cures for humoral imbalances such as bloody phlegm, white phlegm, and yellow phlegm. 9 Many hot-cold designations were also related to the loss and gain of tonalli, a particular type of soul piece or sacred essence energy, an exclusively

precontact Mesoamerican concept. 10 The loss of tonalli, for example, was regarded as the result of a hot and cold opposition. 11 Tonalli was regarded as an impersonal regenerative energy, composed of heat and light, that circulated throughout the cosmos, and one of three animating energies possessed by humans. 12 As an energy within humans, it was a regenerative inner life force that provided vigor, heat, strength, and growth and was determined by the character or sign of the day under which one was born. This inner life force was primarily received from the sun. The more tonalli something contained, the hotter it was; the less tonalli, the colder it was. In fact, every situation of fear produced a feeling of coldness. 13 A loss of tonalli caused a state of coldness in the person, which could lead to severe illnesses, and sometimes death. A retrieval of the tonalli, performed by a shaman called the tetonalmacani, often incorporated hot and cold treatments. A comparative critical rereading of these early documents suggests that the understanding of hot-cold applications in curing traditions can be directly traced to ancient Mesoamerican practices. This is not to say that Spanish humoral theory couldn’t have influenced curanderismo. But before immediately assuming that Spanish humoral theory actually influenced curanderismo curing practices, the focus should be spatially and temporally contextualized with special attention to the quality of interactions and instructions between them. While there were a select few to whom the Spaniards taught their healing theories and practices, the sources suggest that most curanderismo shamanic curing practices can be traced to ancient Mesoamerica. In this book, I intend to explore the largely neglected contexts of ancient Mesoamerican limpia rites. I consider, when appropriate and available, the ritual and theatrical space in which they were performed. In addition, I also focus on their polysemic nature and on their consequent transformative power in healing, purification, birth, rebirth, and revitalization. I will then expand on what we can learn from these ancient practices and how they have influenced my own methods.

M 1 Coming into Being A Modern-Day Xicana Curandera y early childhood was full of stories of my great-great-grandmother, who was a very well-known and respected curandera, in Chihuahua, Mexico, during the Mexican Revolution (1910–1920). She was a short, large in frame, gregarious woman who, in addition to being a curandera, was a saloon owner and a bold businesswoman. People throughout Mexico and the Southwest came to her for healings and magic. She was known to be a no-nonsense, perhaps a bit gruff, curandera who wore a patch over her right eye. She had injured the eye when making a concoction that required many roses. She was reaching deep into a thick rose bush when a thorn punctured and damaged her iris. Although she was able to prevent infection, she was unable to repair the damaged iris and had to wear an eye patch. It eventually became her trademark, and part of her persona. She had her saints decorating her saloon and the private room where she worked with clients individually. She offered sobaderismo treatments, worked with various plants, and relied on platicas (heart-straightening talks) to help clients release and heal and to diagnose what needed to be done. She was also able to do divination through cooking, specifically by making tortillas. Her daughter, my great-grandmother, whom I was very close to, had the same skill. As a little girl, I was always amazed by how my great-grandmother would tell me who was coming to the door by the way the tortilla landed, and to my surprise she was always right. It was said among our family that one day the rambunctious Mexican rebel Pancho Villa came into her saloon and began harassing one of the waitresses. My great-great-grandmother immediately greeted him by placing a shotgun to his head and ordered him to leave. A man who had evaded the Texas Rangers for years, and who was known for taking and doing what he wanted, meekly followed her orders. He left and never came back.

Although she had a hardness to her, my great-great-grandmother healed many people who were unable to pay with money. Even if they were penniless, they would pay her in the manner they could, with, for example, food, livestock, or clothes. Nonetheless, whether it was due to respect or fear or a little bit of both, people always paid for their drinks. My great-grandmother, her daughter, also knew how to heal and work with plants. But her daughter in turn, my grandmother, felt the pull toward a more modern life and pursued nursing instead of curanderismo. She eventually dropped out of nursing school to get married and become a mother. My greatgrandmother lived a block from my grandmother, so I had the opportunity to be around my great-grandmother quite a bit. She told me many stories and shared many tidbits of curanderismo wisdom with me during my childhood. My father was shot when I was two years old. He was a foreman engineer at a maquiladora (factory) in Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico. At that time Mexico wanted to demonstrate that its border towns were a good place to invest in—with resources that could be polluted and full of cheap, docile labor. The maquiladora where my father worked was trying to organize a union independent of the government union. My father allowed the organizers to talk to workers during their breaks, because this, he held, was allowed per the Mexican constitution. According to the police, the nongovernment organizers came in armed, held up the people they were trying to organize, and shot my father. The story is ludicrous, but as I learned when I got to college, this kind of incident was quite common at many places of employment. Much to my grandparents’ surprise, and displeasure, their widowed twentytwo-year-old daughter, my mother, wanted to be the first in her family to go to college. Perhaps she was inspired by my father, who graduated from college with an engineering degree at the age of sixteen, making him the youngest graduate of the University of Texas at El Paso at the time. Whether it was from inspiration, despair, a desire to continue moving up the ladder of modernization, or all of the above, my mother started the family trend toward going to college. Because she was busy studying or working, I was able to spend more time with my greatgrandmother, so as a young girl I was influenced by her stories of curanderismo. We moved to Los Angeles permanently when I was about nine. The move was very difficult for me. I was an only child, was incredibly lonely, and endured many years of sexual and psychological abuse by my so-called stepfather, a man my mother married after my father’s death. Fortunately, at a very young age, I became captivated by her metaphysical books, particularly those by Carlos Castaneda. Out of necessity and curiosity, I mastered the art of astral projection.

When he came into my room, I left. My childhood and adolescence can be described as periods of extreme duality. The sexual abuse went on for almost a decade, until I spoke out against it. It was “remedied” with an apology to my mom and me and a day trip with my best friend to my favorite theme park. The psychological abuse from my socalled stepfather came in many forms, including having this Mexican man constantly berate and ridicule anything I did that reflected Mexican culture, such as speaking Spanish. He constantly told me that people would assume I was a “wetback” because of my last name, Hernandez. When I was about twelve, I begged my mother to legally change my last name to her maiden name, and she did. I had been programmed to believe that her name did not make me sound too much like a wetback. Growing up, I never spoke Spanish, constantly dyed my hair to make it lighter, and got blue-eyed contacts as soon as they were available. It took a very long time and a lot of healing to love and adore my dark brown eyes and hair and olive complexion. Despite this grave cultural disassociation within myself, I knew even as a young girl that I had the don, the gift of healing, and was a curandera shaman; this knowingness kept me strong. Although my mother had allowed that man and others to stay in our lives, she nonetheless served as a source of inspiration. I knew that being a widow, being the first in her family to go to college, and learning how to speak English in school was no easy feat. I always admired her for that. I did not grow up with any type of religious affiliation. My mother was forced to go to Catholic school, but as an adult she did not identify herself as Catholic, nor did she require me to adhere to any religion. Nevertheless, as a young girl, I was very spiritual. I knew there was more to life than the naked eye could see and always felt an incredibly strong bond with angels, fairies, Buddhas, and saints from various traditions. I sensed the divine, and I knew I was loved by all that is divine. When I got to college, I began to experience an awakening of my spirit as a Xicana feminist. With the help of many Xicana/o classes, I finally had an opportunity to reclaim and love my history, culture, and ethnic identity. I had an opportunity to shine, and I did. I got As or A+s in most of my classes and got into an honors program at UCLA, which allowed me to take many graduatelevel courses, giving me the freedom to choose what I wanted to focus on. I also sharpened my critical and analytical skills to an art and questioned everything. I became acutely aware of the many forms of institutionalized discrimination and sexism, the health issues with genetically modified foods, the assortment of

atrocities committed by First World countries, and many other types of injustices. I wanted to be of service and help to eliminate these injustices, so I decided I would become an attorney. But I also shaped my curriculum in a way that began to feed my hungry spirit and soul. Alongside studying political theory and the recent effects of economic globalization, I studied curanderismo. Law school was another period of stifling duality. I stuck through it because I was unaware at the time that I could create other possibilities for myself. My spirit was awakening, but my psyche was still very much wrapped up in a dualistic prison. Perhaps it was enduring thirty-plus years of repeated cycles of incredibly challenging traumas that motivated me to be diligent in continuously seeking out curanderas/os and shamans that were willing to train me and enabled me to be incredibly disciplined in studying, learning, and carrying out their assignments. MY TRAINING WITH CURANDERAS/OS After I survived my second year of law school, Breata, a high school friend, and I planned a trip to Cancun to unwind and relax. We were both in school, and finances were tight, so we could not by any means afford a five-star hotel. Nonetheless, we spent a little more than expected in order to stay somewhere that still appeared to be a tropical paradise. On the day we were leaving for our trip, Breata’s car broke down, and we missed the flight. We were a little disappointed but were still in great spirits. Missing our flight enabled me to meet Rob, a very interesting gentleman who helped make the world of curanderismo accessible to me again. At first glance, I never would have thought that this man, who continually identified himself as a “gringo,” would have served as my first bridge back to curanderismo. Rob was in his late fifties, about six feet one, with short gray hair, a large belly, and very skinny legs. He had buck teeth, which peered out a bit even when he closed his mouth. His eyes were full of life, but the layers of bags beneath his eyes suggested that he worked late too often. He was incredibly friendly and sparked a conversation with us immediately on the flight to Cancun. After establishing where we were going and what we did, Rob told us about his properties in Puerto Aventuras and Tulum and entertained us with fascinating stories about these then-quiet cities. Rob also told us about his restaurant on the beach of Tulum. When you

walked in, you were greeted by a white pathway adorned with hundreds of different kinds of orchids, coconut and banana trees, and a few casitas (small houses) to the left that were still being constructed. The restaurant on the beach was covered by a giant palapa (palm roof), reminiscent of a traditional Maya house. He also began to talk about the book The Celestine Prophecy. At the time I had never heard of it. I had had my head buried in books on torts, constitutional law, and civil procedure for what felt like an eternity, and I welcomed hearing about something uplifting and beautiful. When the pilot announced that we were about to land in thirty minutes, Rob offered his beachfront house to us. He told us that he only intended to stay for a few days and that we could continue to stay there after he left. He proclaimed that we were not going to like Cancun; it was too busy and overrun with tourists. As much as we loved his stories, we were not sure if he had ulterior motives or whether his stories were actually true. We immediately responded with a gracious thank-you and turned him down. He then drew a map to his restaurant in Tulum on a paper napkin. This is where he intended to be most of the time and where we could find him in case we changed our minds. The map did not have any street names; rather it was all landmarks, including the second tope (road bump) where we would make a left to find the strip of new construction that housed his magical temple restaurant. I took the map and put it in my purse. When we landed, we said our goodbyes. Although I was grateful for meeting such a colorful, upbeat, and entertaining storyteller, who took the sting out of missing our first flight, at the time I did not think I would be seeing Rob again. When we got to Cancun, it was exactly as Rob described. Our hotel felt cold, not just from the uncomfortably blasting air conditioners, but from its artificiality. It was nothing like the natural tropical paradise we imagined. Although our room was nicely furnished, it had a lingering moldy smell that made me ill. They moved us to two different rooms, but the mold smell lingered throughout all of them. The town, with its dizzy happy hour of howling and whistling, was also not what we had in mind. After the second night, we decided to drive down to Tulum to visit our friend. Although we told each other that we were just going to visit, we packed our bags and took our luggage without any mention of why. After all, if we did not care for his place, we would immediately leave and come back to the room we had reserved and paid for. We headed down to Tulum in our little rented Volkswagen. The drive itself was invigorating. We were surrounded by gorgeous, lush green fields and were heading to a possible adventure that sounded ideal. We laughed at ourselves for following a napkin map with landmarks, but we kept

going, singing to our freedom. We got to the first landmark, the sign to Tulum, a very popular ancient Maya site. Then we simply paid attention to the road bumps, turned down the street to the beach strip that contained all of the new construction, and found our way to Rob’s Maya temple restaurant. We were amazed. It was as gorgeous as Rob had described it. We made our way down the white path to the restaurant. Breata and I looked around and saw we were the only potential customers. Almost immediately we were welcomed by Pancho, Rob’s right-hand man. We asked if Rob was around, and Pancho confirmed that he would be coming shortly. In less than five minutes, we heard Rob singing our welcome, incredibly joyful that we had decided to visit him. He had his staff prepare the most amazing dishes for us and simply spoiled us. Over lunch, Rob mentioned his curandero friend at the lighthouse who worked with herbs and many other tools, such as candles and eggs, to do cleansings for people. My attention became fixed on his comments about this curandero. He realized that I was captivated by what he was sharing, and he told me that he also knew a few curanderas who worked with massage and herbs. He promised to introduce us to the curandero at the lighthouse and to arrange for us to meet the curanderas as well. Two years of law school had starved my barely awakening spirit. I was thrilled at the chance to nourish it, and to move beyond reading about curanderas/os to actually being in their presence again. After lunch, Rob introduced us to Puerto Aventuras and his beach house. It was in an interesting little gated community with its own streets, a small downtown, and a place to swim with the dolphins. (Rob, however, immediately dissuaded us from swimming with the dolphins.) His beach house was breathtaking. He had a large private pool that overlooked the sea, and impressive glass walls providing full views from the bedrooms, the sunken living room, and the kitchen. We had not mentioned that we would be staying at his house. He nonetheless showed us upstairs and simply handed us the keys to our individual master bedrooms. That night he took us into Playa del Carmen, showed us around, and treated us to dinner. The whole time he was funny and a perfect gentleman. He appeared to be happy to be seen in the company of two pretty young ladies that were mesmerized by his stories and laughed at all of his punchlines. The next day, as promised, Rob took us to the curandero at the lighthouse, Don Tomas. He apparently had taken and referred many people to Don Tomas. On our way there he told us more stories about the curandero’s miraculous healings for various types of ailments, chronic pain, depression, skin rashes, scars, and much more.

When we got to Don Tomas’s house, he was busy attending to someone, with another person waiting to be seen in the living room. Don Tomas’s house was very minimal. The combined living and dining room was furnished with an old couch, a television that looked as if it was from the 1970s, a rocking chair, and a dining table with chairs. His nephew was also in the living room, glued to the television, hypnotized by the cartoons. The nephew acknowledged us for a quick second and went back to watching his cartoons. The wall had a couple of crosses, a Sacred Heart of Jesus painting, and a Virgin of Guadalupe collage. There were no visible altars. We sat at the dining table. A door next to the television led to what appeared to be the backyard. What caught my attention were the many vases with different flowers he had throughout the room. After we were waiting for about thirty minutes, Don Tomas came out. He was instructing the lady he had just attended, apparently reminding her what to buy and where and how she had to place it under her bed. He shook her hand and said his goodbyes with a common Catholic salutation, “Vaya con Dios” (go with God). Don Tomas was a short, stocky man with a warm, gigantic smile. He knew a little English, and when Rob introduced us, he made sure to let us know that he also spoke Yucatec Mayan by teaching us how to say hello and greet people in the language. From our first interactions and many thereafter, I got a strong sense that he loved his culture and was very proud of it. Rob asked him to give us the limpia especial (special). After taking care of the payment for our limpias, Rob turned to us and told us that he would be back for us in a few hours. Breata and I were completely comfortable with this and smiled in gratitude and agreement. Don Tomas took the other lady, who was there before us, to his working room and attended to her. I was curious, so I tried to listen to what he was doing in the other room. But the volume on the television was too high for me to hear anything. Breata and I sat there waiting patiently and were in awe at the amazing turn of events. We were grateful that we had missed our flight and sat next to Rob. Approximately an hour later, Don Tomas came out and instructed the lady about what she needed to do and buy to continue the work. Breata and I had decided that she would go first, so he took her into the room. About twenty minutes later, he went out to his backyard and came back inside with a handful of plants. I could hear him preparing something in the kitchen for her, which took about fifteen minutes. Then he went back to the room with a pitcher

containing what he had apparently concocted with the plants. They came out an hour later. Breata was wrapped up in white sheets. Don Tomas was leading her to another room to rest. Then he came for me and took me to the room where he did his work. Inside there were three main altars with saints: the Virgin of Guadalupe, San Simón, and another one that was cloaked with scarves. The altars were all decorated with different items and offerings, including water, earth, coins, flowers, corn, pictures, and petitions. He sat me down at the small table in the room and began a platica. At the time, I knew there was something missing in my life. But I had spent a lifetime burying my traumas deep inside and was unsure of what or why something was missing from my life. I told him that I did not have anything specific I wanted to let go of or heal. He asked me what I was currently doing with my life, and I told him. He basically said the same thing that all of my Xicana/o professors had said when I asked them for a letter of recommendation for law school, “What? Why would you do something like that?” He insisted that I was in the wrong career and that the road to this realization was going to be very challenging for me. He told me that he was going to send a few additional guardian angels and saints my way with the limpia because, according to him, I would be needing their help. He got a bottle that smelled of cologne, herbs, and flowers and began to sprinkle the liquid inside all over me as he was saying his prayers. He then handed me a bucketful of herbs and instructed me to get in the shower and douse myself with what was inside the bucket. Thereafter I had to rinse myself off with very cold water. He explained to me that cold water dissipates dense or negative vibrations and that I should always shower with cold water if my spirit felt heavy. Afterward, I was to wrap myself in a white sheet he had waiting for me on the bathroom counter. I did as he told me, but even though it was a very hot day, washing myself off with very cold water was not enjoyable in the slightest. When I came out of the bathroom wrapped in the white sheet, he led me to the other room where Breata was lying down and sleeping. I also fell asleep. When I woke up, there was some cold herbal tea waiting for me next to my clothes. I calmly drank it. Breata’s comment, “Wow,” exactly reflected how I felt. Rob came for us a little while after we got dressed. The rest of the week was very much how Rob had indicated it was going to be. He would be gone, and we would have access to the house with all of its amenities; it was what we were hoping for and were ecstatic that it happened the way it did.

When I came back to Los Angeles, I had a spark inside of me awakened. I wanted to return to the Yucatán as soon as possible. I remembered that Rob mentioned he wanted to rent the house when he was not there but did not have time to do so and had not found a person he trusted to help him do so. My instincts kicked in. I called him two days after returning and offered to rent out the house if he paid me a commission. This commission became my ticket for the next couple of years to allow me to return regularly to the Yucatán and begin my mentor-ship as a curandera. After I became an attorney, I was able to fund my trips to continue my mentorship. From 2000 to 2005, I returned to the Yucatán every four to six months. During this period, I principally studied with Don Tomas and another curandera/sobadera, Barbara. I also attended various sweats and would spend a few days here and there learning from curanderas/os who facilitated the sweats. I also began to learn Mayan divination using the tzol’kin calendar. The other set of master teachers in the Yucatán were the buildings at the Maya sacred sites. Every time I went to the Yucatán, I spent at least one day at the sites, meditating and journeying, receiving the wisdom they so gracefully shared with me. Sometimes the buildings taught me about the ceremonies that had taken place there and about the multilayered reasoning behind the ceremonies. One of the most profound visions was seeing in my mind’s eye various Maya and Mexica images of body postures, which gave me an understanding of their physiological and spiritual effects and providing a way to tune in to the energies of particular deities or sacred conduits. I felt these effects when I sat on top of a rock at Tulum while allowing my body to contort into various asanas for a few hours. Then I was guided to sit down and look at myself swimming in the sea as some kind of water serpent. I saw the etheric outlines of a sea serpent and knew that it was me out there gracefully coming up from and into the sea. My most intense visions have been typically induced by prolonged periods of meditation and yoga. Almost a year after going to Don Tomas for limpias and consultations, he told me I was a curandera like my great-great-grandmother. I knew he was right, but I did not see a way of putting my knowledge into practice given my enormous and growing law-school loans. After he told me this, he asked to begin to mentor me. I jumped at this opportunity. Don Tomas taught me how to heal with plants, how to clear maldades, *6 and the basics of doing divination work with plants. He let me sit in when he

worked, typically with clients who only spoke English, where I served as his translator and assistant. Don Tomas, who worked a lot with plants, taught me the essentials of picking plants for limpias: the number that should be taken, where to pick them, and the importance of leaving offerings for them. He also taught me how to dry and store the different plants. He had spaces in a little shed where he had various hanging plants. He also put some underneath the beds on top of a window screen, and he had the sturdier ones in cardboard boxes and grocery bags. Sadly, in late 2004, after not visiting him for more than six months, I found that he was no longer at the lighthouse. The entire area, house and all, was fenced off. At this time the property values in Tulum were beginning to skyrocket. I got the sense that he may have been forced off by someone who saw the financial value of a piece of land with an extraordinary view of the city. I sensed that whoever took the property paid Don Tomas for it, but likely nowhere near what they sold it for. This feeling was confirmed in 2008, when I drove around the area with friends who were real estate agents, when the small hills of Tulum had been turned into pockets of plush gated communities. Barbara, the other curandera with whom I worked intensively during my first mentorship period, was from Mexico City. When I met her, she was fifty-two but looked incredibly young. Barbara had been trained in both Aztec traditions, as well as in Yucatec Maya ones. She was the one who would invite me to many of my first ceremonies, including my first peyote ceremony. During the first two years that I worked with her, I hired her as a sobadera, partly because she had amazing healing hands, but also because I wanted to learn from her. Hiring her was the best way to ensure that she would teach me, as she was very popular in Puerto Aventuras and neighboring upscale gated communities. Rob was the one who first introduced me to her. On one occasion, when I returned to Barbara sometime in 2003, my energy and light had been vastly depleted. I was representing the partners in my law firm in a malpractice lawsuit, which would have been OK if they had not been at each other’s throats. There was a time when I actually called two grown men into my office and asked them to stop coming to me with chisme (gossip) about each other. And the gossip was the nicer part of it. The first year or so was tolerable, but when the malpractice suit was filed, all hell broke loose. When I came to Barbara, she was disturbed to see that I had rashes all over my body from the stress. I admitted to her that I was in a state of shock and was terrified at the thought that I would have to work in this profession for any extended period.

After seeing me in this sad state, she began to teach me her limpia methods, as well as different techniques to release stress from my body. From my treatments with her, I had already learned acupressure techniques to relieve pain from an aching back and shoulders. But after this point, my training began to encompass the magical side of sobaderismo. I learned the different ways to release and heal traumas within the body and using the elements, such as water and heat, to facilitate cleansing. She also invited me to my first temazcal ceremony, which eventually became a common practice every time I visited the Yucatán. She also taught me about curanderismo soul retrieval and working with the gifts of the cardinal spaces or skybearers to retrieve lost sacred essence energy. I loved working with Barbara. In early 2005, she got married and moved to Kauai. Along with my Yucatán mentors, from 2000 to 2005 I took many other alternative healing classes and became certified in quite a few when I was in the States. My interests were rather eclectic—everything from mindfulness meditation, tantra, shamanism, crystal healing, and sacred geometry to various energy healing modalities. I was also an avid yogi and went to an average of two yoga classes a day. But at this time I saw my passion and love for integrating various healing modalities as a curandera mentee as ultimately a mere hobby, something I did on the side. In May 2005, a catastrophic injury changed this view and led me to fully embrace my don, the gift of healing given by God. On May 15, I decided to go to Red Rock Canyon in Las Vegas. I was in Las Vegas for a work convention, but I did not want to gamble afterward; I wanted to do something peaceful and go hiking. A few days before, when I was still at home, I had been walking to the kitchen carrying some plates. I saw a vision of myself in a wheelchair. I dropped to the ground and let the plates fall out of my hands. I knew this vision was going to happen and cried out, “No, God, not like that.” Then I snapped out of the vision and went to get ready as if I had not seen it. Nevertheless, before the trip, I mapped out the two Bikram yoga studios in Las Vegas and found out about Red Rock Canyon, which was very close to the hotel where I was staying. On the last day, the convention ended early enough so that I could do a little exploration at the canyon. Some of my close friends had a tradition of activating spin cycles at particular earth-energy nodes. Despite my vision earlier that week, I felt compelled to go, as if the canyon was calling me. Although it reminded me somewhat of the Red Rock canyons of Sedona, the energy felt very different and dense. After hiking for thirty minutes, I sat down to meditate. I envisioned the earth’s crystalline inner grids, and at the particular

points where I was, I saw the intersections begin to spin. After what felt like fifteen minutes, I looked at my watch and became alarmed. I had been meditating for more than two hours, even though I had only intended to stay at the canyon for about an hour. I must have resembled the rabbit in Alice in Wonderland, scrambling in a state of panic, worried that I was going to miss my flight. I slipped and fell off a cliff that was over thirty feet high. A couple of hours later, I woke up as I was being airlifted out of the canyon. I was in and out of consciousness for the first three days. On the third day, when I was lucid enough, the doctor told me that my fall had resulted in a skull fracture, a brain hemorrhage, a left acromioclavicular joint separation, two fractured vertebrae, a shattered coccyx, three fractures in my left leg, and, on the right leg, bones fractured from the knee down, one of which came out of my heel. Six weeks later I also got severe osteomyelitis in my right heel and lost a third of the bones in my heel. I was also given a diagnosis that I would be in pain the rest of my life from the shattered coccyx and was told that if I walked again, it would only be with some kind of assistance. The first day I received these dire diagnoses, I knew it was time for me to decide who I was and to fully embrace my don. I knew without a shadow of a doubt that I would be 100 percent free of pain, would walk with a completely normal gait, and would be dancing again. The next time I heard any dire diagnoses—and this was quite often—I would look at the doctor and ask when I would be able to return to doing my yoga. The doctor would usually give me a puzzled smile and walk away. I was stuck in the hospital for a couple of months because of the severe osteomyelitis. After the third debridement, the doctor came to tell me that it was very likely that they would be amputating my right foot that evening. After the doctor left, I heard a voice tell me that I needed to stay grounded and work with the earth’s energy grids, because there was going to be an earthquake. I got upset. I silently responded, “How I am supposed to stay grounded after I’ve just found out that I am going to have my foot amputated?” Right then, I felt an incredible lightness come over me and was told to use the blue ray. I felt without a shadow of doubt that it was the Archangel Michael who had told me to use the blue ray. I had been exposed to a lot of different healing modalities, but at that time I had never had anyone tell me to use the blue ray. I snapped out of my selfpity, surrendered, and became the blue ray. The next thing I knew I saw a flash in my third eye, felt myself outside of my body, and saw myself shape-shifting into Krishna, Archangel Michael, El Morya, and other beings who embodied a divine

blue light. I went into surgery late that night. The next morning, I finally got to leave the hospital, get off the intravenous antibiotics, and, the best part of all, I got to keep my foot. The infection had changed in less than eight hours. I did not have to return to work right away, which gave me an opportunity to completely dive into the world of curanderismo. I put into practice many of the healing methods I had been studying. I applied them to avoid having to take pain medications and to manage pain, release stress, and prevent my muscles from going into atrophy. I had been in a wheelchair for almost a year. After this time, in less than two weeks, I was walking with a completely normal gait. I was also completely pain-free. During the recovery period, what made me the saddest was the thought of returning to work as an attorney, rather than the thought that I might not fully recover. (I knew I was going to fully recover.) Prior to my injury, I had gotten to a point where I was really trying to make the best out of a situation I felt stuck in. I even started to tell myself that I loved what I did. But I knew this was a lie. In November 2006, a month after my last surgery, which removed the hardware from my left knee, and a few months after returning to work, I returned to the Yucatán. On this trip, I met my next mentor, Malina. Malina was a resident curandera at Laguna Bacalar. When I met her, I was with a group visiting the Maya sacred sites of Quintana Roo and northern Belize. And yes, I climbed up all the temples at the sites, including the great pyramid of Calakmul, which is 148 feet high. The ability to release fear in this manner, and to sit with my ancestors once again, was both exhilarating and incredibly healing. At the end of the day, my feet looked like swollen potatoes. But I knew rubbing techniques that would help with the swelling and discomfort. One of the places we stayed at the longest on this trip was Rancho Encantado. At the time, Malina was a curandera there. The first time I met Malina, I felt an immediate bond with her. She embodied gentleness and exuded power and strength at the same time. Interestingly, at that time I went by the name Malin, short for Malintzin. We both had taken on the name of a Mexicana-Xicana mythical archetype, who acted as Hernán Cortés’s translator and diplomat and helped to defeat the disliked Mexica. Even though hundreds of Mesoamerican peoples allied themselves with the Spaniards to defeat the Mexica, for hundreds of years she was the one identified as the whore and traitor who sold out her people. When women do something that is out of favor or unsavory they are labeled as malinche or malinchistas. I took on her name to reenvision this archetype in a different light, one beyond the simple dichotomy of whore versus virgin.

As a curandera, Malina had a very eclectic healing practice. She was from New Mexico and incorporated New Mexican Navajo ceremonial healing practices and would mention them when it was appropriate. She had lived in Maui and had studied native Hawaiian balanced movements that could clear and raise energy, among other practical benefits, such as staying centered and focused. She had also been to China twice to study and advance her qigong practice. The way she honored and worked with saints and the soul essences of plants integrated Mexica elements and Yucatec Maya practices. Although I never had the opportunity to watch her dance, according to Don Fernando, another mentor to whom she introduced me, she was an extraordinary Aztec dancer. She was very sweet, tender, and stern, all at the same time. During my first visit at Rancho Encantado, when we were eating, I always made my way to sit next to Malina and listen to her stories. She talked about her training in northern Mexico and her experience with plant medicines. Once she told me that the following day was her day off and invited me to visit with her. Kimi, another lady from our group, and I decided we would pass on going to Kohunlich with the group and stay behind to hang out with Malina. The next day, Kimi, Malina, the then-owner of Rancho Encantado, a few other people that worked there, and I sat together for breakfast. As everyone was sharing stories, Malina instantly drew me in with the cadence of her voice and the look of her eyes. She asked me, “So, Malin, are you living your bliss, joy, and happiness?” She looked into me, into my very essence, as she asked the question and waited for my response. I was thrown off-kilter. A simple question, yet she pulled me in a manner that I had never experienced. I stuttered a bit and responded, “Well, yes, I am a happy person. I am a very happy person.” She refused my meek, fumbling response. She then pulled me in further. Among a table full of people, for moments that lasted for an eternity, we were the only ones there and there was nothing else. She asked again, “No, I asked are you living your bliss, joy, and happiness.” She stressed “living” as she drew me in further. I was completely dumbfounded and unable to answer her. Nothing came out of my mouth. She smiled and continued to share more stories. That day we walked around the grounds and talked about the healing properties of the lagoon and the hundreds of orchids at the property, and she showed me some balanced-movement steps to gracefully clear energy. Her question, however, was still lying on the cusp of my subconscious. Every night I kept hearing her question and seeing my inability to respond. A couple of months later, I realized that I could no longer live a lie. I knew that I

definitely was not, by any measure, living my bliss, joy, or happiness, even after a near-death experience. I decided to pursue what I had become incredibly passionate about. A month later, I managed to sign up a group of people to take an extended energy-healing class with me and also to tour the Maya sacred sites of Quintana Roo. As soon as all the people in the group put their deposit down, which was rather immediate, I called Malina and told her my plan. I was taking my first group of people to the Maya sacred sites in April 2007 and was planning on quitting my job. I was not entirely clear about what I would do in the other months or how I would pay my mortgage, hefty student loans, and all the other bills. But I was very sure I was leaving. One morning, I remembered a job offer I had gotten a couple of years previously to serve as a private tutor to help people pass the California Bar Examination. This was nothing close to my ideal, but I wanted to secure some kind of income and work part-time. I felt the pull to pay a visit to the people who had offered that job on the same day I remembered the offer. It just so happened that a tutor had recently quit and they needed someone to help them, so I resigned from my full-time job as an attorney. In 2007, I used my very flexible schedule to return to the Yucatán quite frequently and work with many new mentors, including Malina. Malina taught me various effective ways to clear and raise energy with touch and movement. I also started to learn Nahuatl medicine songs that were sung during sweats. Most importantly, Malina taught me the importance of discipline—the discipline of self-love, a discipline that gets easier and easier. She never put up with any of my B.S. and cut through it very swiftly and with strong love. I remember one occasion when she sent me to work with a curandera she admired, Don Fernando. I was whining that Don Fernando had ordered me to sleep in a hammock hovering over a candle and other sacred tools for clearing work. I was not fond of the idea of sleeping outside with the insects and the wildlife that roamed the area at night. Disappointed, Malina looked at me and asked, “Do you want his help or don’t you?” I nodded. She responded with an obstinate look and said, “Well, do as he says.” Next to Malina, Don Fernando was the mentor I studied under the most during my second mentorship period. Don Fernando was Yucatec Maya and spoke fluent Spanish and Yucatec Mayan. *7 At the time he was the principal caretaker of Kohunlich, a Maya sacred site south of Chetumal, a few minutes from his house. When I first started going to him for limpias, he always made sure to do something radically different for me and always explained what he was doing and why. I never told him that I wanted to study under him, but he

knew. Eventually he began to invite me in when he worked with certain clients and would teach me. He would ask me to return the next day with items from the botanicas of Chetumal and some rare herbs he did not have in his backyard. I always complied. From Don Fernando, I further developed my skills in conducting limpias and doing readings from them. He taught me how to read the yolk after doing an egg limpia, how to read a puro (cigar) after doing a limpia with one, and how to read the residues from a fire-based limpia. He taught me a lot about the magic and cleansing power of doing velaciónes (candle work), which included the candle formations and their purposes, the uses for the types and colors of candles, and when and what type of offerings to make. He also taught me sortilege divination. He would lay out day signs from the tzol’kin Maya calendar; arrange flowers, cups, and other tools; and throw flowers or corn to determine the likely outcome of events, as well as the limpia work that needed to be done. Although I was and still am very grateful for my mentors, I wanted to go deeper into my practice as a curandera. I wanted to dive into ancient Mesoamerican roots of my practice and understand the rich indigenous history of curanderismo. My mentors gave me some insight into the indigenous background of what they were teaching me, but I was hungry for more. I was very inquisitive. I remember on one instance I asked why it was necessary to use a pencil when writing petitions, and where that tradition came from. I was asked in turn why I asked so many questions and was then told that this is the way things were done and had always been done. I knew that generations of oral tradition were pervasive and necessary in our curanderismo traditions for many complex reasons, including survival and protection from the Inquisitions. But I was also aware that many of these ancient curanderismo traditions had been documented by early ethnographers and that there were precontact codices that had survived the Spanish fires. I wanted to further develop my understanding of the shamanic and ceremonial practices of the ancient Mesoamerican shamans, their methods, the tools used, who had access to these things and why, and the complex meanings behind these practices. I prepared to apply to graduate school late in 2007. After meeting with Karl Taube, a well-known Mesoamerican scholar, and a few other professors from the University of California at Riverside, I had my eyes set on this university. I was accepted to attend the following year, in September 2008. Until then, I continued to visit the Yucatán, took people on spiritual tours to the Maya sacred sites, and continued to study with my new mentors.

While in graduate school, I gained access to an immense amount of information about ancient Mesoamerica. I went to school two or three times a week, and every time I came home with a cartful of books. I read them all and was loving it! While in graduate school, I continued my practice as a curandera but was very private about it. I basically went to school to get books. I also continued my trips and training in the Yucatán. Although I loved reading and studying, I did not care for graduate-school politics. I did not want to study curanderas/os; I wanted to be a curandera and practice what I was learning. I did not see graduate school as a place that would appreciate this desire, so I decided I would stop once I got my master’s degree. After I obtained my degree, I returned to practicing law while I figured out how and whether I would make the shift to practicing as a curandera. Although I had an opportunity to work on matters dealing with social justice—“good cases”—I found the work to be less and less satisfying by the day. I was able to get my clients money for being harmed. But this money was not going to help heal the wounds that had formed as a result of the harm. I became aware that bridging these two worlds, curanderismo and being an attorney, was not going to be possible, nor did I really want to anymore. I remember a case of a family who had lost a father and husband because the nurses became nervous and failed to perform the Heimlich maneuver in the hospital cafeteria. As a result, my clients’ husband and father died there. Yes, we got the family the full value of the case. But after I had come to know this family intimately, getting them money for their loss felt incredibly empty. I eventually walked away from my career to pursue what I loved, curanderismo. The books I gained access to in graduate school shaped and informed my practice as a curandera. I read all of the early postcontact codices, as well as various books on the few Mesoamerican precontact codices that had not been destroyed by the Spaniards. I had been studying curanderismo since 1996, in academia at UCLA and out in the field, so I was very familiar with curanderismo practices and could identify them when they were described in the sixteenth-, seventeenth-, and eighteenth-century ethnohistorical records. Coming fully out of the closet as a curandera was, however, a process. Although I had been working with many clients since 2003, for some reason I was still sometimes hesitant to identify myself as a curandera. In 2014, our love for the grandmother plant, ayahuasca, inspired my husband and me to take our honeymoon in Peru. After several transformative ceremonies with grandmother and a very powerful private conversation with the shaman Diego Palma, I finally decided to embrace my don, my divine gift of healing, on a whole new level. I

came back to Los Angeles with many layers of my psyche healed and fully stepped into my power as a curandera. Thereafter everything began to fall into place, and my practice almost immediately blossomed.

S 2 Historical and Cultural Background The Mexica and Yucatec Maya pirituality, politics, and culture were highly intertwined in ancient Mesoamerica. Sweeping the house, for example, could serve as a limpia rite, as an offering that invited supernatural beings into a home, or it could influence the success of a husband’s fight in the battlefield. 1 The ancient Yucatec Maya and Mexica generally understood sacred objects and spaces as having animate qualities, with their own sacred essence energy. Ceremonial tools and sacred spaces, including buildings and altars, were understood to be imbued with sacrality and were thought to contain a divine soul-like essence that made them living beings. The names given to these ceremonial tools and spaces were explicitly linked with the owner’s sacred essence energy, and naming them commemorated the renewal or activation of the object’s own sacred essence energy. 2 This chapter introduces the ancient Mexica and the Yucatec Maya of the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, their calendrical systems, and the various types of shamanic trades within their societies. This book focuses mainly on the limpia rites that were typically connected to their calendrical systems, because most of the information we currently have on these rites relate in some way to their calendars. Calendrical rites were likely the most commonly practiced ceremonies because of their importance: they were intricately tied to attempts to understand, divine, and influence nature, as well as human fate. 3 Most ancient Mesoamerican peoples utilized the Calendar Round, which was composed of two calendars: a solar calendar of 365 days and a divinatory calendar of 260 days. When the 260-day calendar and 365day calendar were set in motion in alignment with each other, it took exactly 52 years of 365 days, a total of 18,980 days, for a given date to repeat. It should not be assumed,

however, that all the indigenous peoples of ancient Mesoamerica practiced limpia rites in the same way or ascribed exactly the same meanings to them. While all cultures throughout Mesoamerica made use of the same Calendar Round system, each one chose to give its own names to individual months, reflecting local environments and distinct agricultural necessities and activities. 4 I will discuss some of these particular names and meanings of the Calendar Round system. THE MEXICA Before discussing the Mexica, it is first necessary to explain the terms Aztec, Azteca, Mexica, and Nahua, as these terms have all been used in academic and popular literature to describe the same peoples, the Mexica. The terms Aztec or Azteca have been used to mean a number of different things, including the empire that encompassed the Anahuac plateau (much of modern Mexico); the people who were the masters of the magnificent lake city, Tenochtitlan; and the four Azteca houses, who left Aztlan, the people’s mythical homeland, in 1064, and finally made their way to Tenochtitlan in 1273. 5 I use Aztec empire to describe the many different indigenous peoples living on the Anahuac plateau at the time of the Spaniards’ arrival in 1519. The term Nahua has also been used to denote the indigenous peoples of Central Mexico, mainly because the Spanish friars used Nahuatl as a lingua franca among these peoples. Recently the term Nahua is often used to describe the many indigenous peoples of Mexico and El Salvador. The term Mexica is generally understood as an ethnic marker that designates the Nahuatl-speaking group that inhabited Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco, the two island settlements that later became the center of Mexico City. By the early sixteenth century, the Mexica had subdued much of the Anahuac plateau—extending from the coast of the Gulf of Mexico to the Pacific Ocean and as far south as Chiapas and Guatemala. 6 When Cortés and his army arrived in 1519, the Aztec empire consisted of 200,000 to 250,000 people, who lived in Tenochtitlan; approximately over one million people lived in the Valley of Mexico, and another two to three million dwelt in the surrounding valleys of Central Mexico. 7 Although there were cultural and linguistic similarities among the peoples of the Aztec empire, many had their own sets of religious beliefs, different rites, and corresponding deities,

and many did not use blood sacrifices, particularly blood sacrifices involving death. Once the Mexica had conquered a city-state or tribe, they tolerated cultural and some socio-organizational differences, as long as the conquered peoples paid their tribute. 8 The Great Temple of Tenochtitlan, Templo Mayor, 60 meters or 197 feet high, dominated the landscape of the capital. The north side was dedicated to Tlaloc, the rain god, while the southern half was the principal temple of the people’s tutelary deity, Huitzilopochtli. According to various sixteenth-century sources, the southern side of the Great Temple symbolized the mythical mountain of Coatepec, the birthplace of Huitzilopochtli. 9 Tenochtitlan contained more than seventy-two temples, as well as monasteries, nunneries, colleges, seminaries, artificial ponds, ball courts, botanical gardens, skull racks, and a special dwelling place for foreign gods. 10 Their deities were organized in a hierarchy reflecting that of people. They had familial ties, affections, jealousies, and many other complexities. They had potential influence over the very existence of the world. They also had the capacity to affect the forces of nature. Patterns in nature were explained by the interaction of the forces of the supernatural world with those of the physical one. 11 The concepts of duality, equilibrium, and fluidity were integral components of their cosmology and religious philosophy. 12 Duality was a dynamic principle that was constantly changing and gave its impulse to everything. Duality was conceived in a fluid manner, manifesting itself on all planes of the cosmos. This included a dynamic feminine-masculine dyad that was fundamental to the creation of the cosmos and to its regeneration and sustenance. At the apex of the dyad was the creator, Ometeotl (double god or spirit of duality), who was associated with the origins of the universe. 13 Ometeotl embodied a divine pair whose masculine and feminine poles were, respectively, Omecihuatl (lord of duality) and Ometectli (lady of duality). Ometeotl manifested itself in many other divine pairs and was an active principle that gave foundation to the universe at the beginning of each new age. 14Although Ometeotl was the ultimate source of all, it was the divine pairs who performed the actual deeds of creation. Ometeotl was often portrayed as an aged being with a sagging lower jaw. The Mexica and many other Mesoamerican peoples associated old age with the accrual of more life force. 15 Many of the Mexica deities also had overlapping and competing attributes. Some had a pantheon of attributes and a corresponding deity over all of them for

those particular attributes. For example, there was the Teteo innan complex, which has been identified as a complex of goddesses that were variant aspects of one earth goddess. 16 The goddess Toci was also known as Teteo innan (“mother of the gods”) because of her grandmother status within the complex. Toci was associated with spinning, weaving, sweeping, healing, midwifery, divination, and acting as a protector and warrior. 17 The ritual instruments that shamans utilized to invoke or personify her included the shield, the broom, the weaving spindle and batten, and the temāzcaltin. 18 Other goddesses, such as Cihuacoatl and Xochiquetzal, were also part of the Teteo innan earth-goddess complex. 19 Typically, the supernatural was always present in the daily lives of the Mexica. Rain would come if the rain deity was properly honored and appeased. Wind would come and blow strongly or too weakly if a rite dedicated to the rain god had not been done correctly. Spirits could inhabit or embody inanimate objects, such as houses, altars, and statues, as well as natural creatures and wild animals. Auguries and oracles could predict the success or failure of any activity. The ceremonies and rites of the Mexica were, in their worldview, fundamental to cosmic change and recurrence: they ensured both order and transformation. The most elaborate religious rites were the state rites associated with the Calendar Round. Various beliefs about eschatology and the need to keep the world in cyclical motion and equilibrium during periods of unpredictable liminality, such as seasonal transitions, were integral to these and were observed by many in the Aztec empire. The world of the Mexica was always in a state of flux, while at the same continuously reestablishing itself. 20 Ceremonial rites were art forms incorporating devotion and sacrality—understanding, honoring, and working with the infinite interconnectedness of all that is. They were seen as essential to the world’s regeneration. The Mexica’s 365-day xiuhpohualli calendar was composed of eighteen twenty-day “months.” Each of the twenty days of the month was designated by its own name and symbol (see plate 1). The five days that were left over were regarded as unlucky days, nameless and profitless. 21 The symbols representing each day of the month also functioned as letters. They were used in writing describing native history and lore, memorable events in war, victories, famines and plagues, prosperous and adverse times. They also taught the days on which to sow, reap, till the land, cultivate corn, weed, harvest, and store crops. If chili was not sown on a certain day, squash on another, and maize on another, for example, people felt there would be great damage. These activities also correlated with the observance of feasts for the gods. Each month, or a period of

twenty days, they dedicated to a god, except for two of the months, in which they celebrated the feasts of two gods for each month. So although there were eighteen months, the feasts celebrated in them were twenty. 22 The 260-day calendar, the tonalpohualli, was the fundamental tool of ritual prognostication and divination (see plate 2). The secrets of the divinatory calendar were shown and explained only to a few. 23 There were twenty day signs, and it was said that they reigned over thirteen days each, making 260 (13 × 20) days altogether. The good or bad fortune of a day sign could be tempered by their coefficient number of repeating cycles of 1 to 13, which would cycle numerically and pair with a day sign: 1 Cipactli, 2 Ehecatl, 3 Calli, 4 Cuetzpalin, 5 Coatl, 6 Miquiztli, 7 Mazātl, 8 Tōchtli, 9 Ātl, 10 Itzcuintli, 11 Ozomahtli, 12 Malīnalli, 13 Ācatl; and then return back to 1, 1 Ocēlōtl, 2 Cuāuhtli, 3 Cōzcacuāuhtli, 4 Ōlīn, 5 Tecpatl, 6 Quiyahuitl, 7 Xōchitl, 8 Cipactli, 9 Ehecatl, and so forth. 24 Divinatory specialists, tonalpouhque, would construct auguries for individual days using their multiple associations in one or more almanacs, interpret the meaning of their multiple auguries, and render a prognostication for the timing of both daily and ritual activities, such as the fortune and life events of those born under them. This calendar was believed to express the relationship between time and space on the one hand and the world of the divine and the gods on the other. Each day sign was dedicated to a god or elemental force, the provider of tonalli (sacred essence energy, solar heat) for the day. 25 The tonalpohualli was consulted for various types of matters, including marriages, deaths, and when to initiate battles and feasts. 26 The 260-day calendar is still used among some Oaxacan peoples. 27 There were many different types of shamanic trades, with particular specialties. There were some shamans, who resembled priests in that they did not marry and often served a particular deity: *8 the cihuatlamacazque (female shaman), tlamacazque (male shaman), and tlenamacac (higherranked shaman who was responsible for performing human sacrifices and the New Fire Ceremonies). 28 Some other shamans and their trade specialties include: temacpalitotique (who could possess people to do things); tlacatecolotl (sorcerer); temixiutiani, tietl, or tlamatqui (midwife); mecatlapouhque (who used strings to divine the origins of illnesses); nahualli (shape-shifting shaman); tetonalmacani (a diviner and shaman who restored tonalli); and telacuicuilani (who sucked out illnesses). 29 Sahagún describes many others. He tells of some who could breathe evil on

people, cast the evil eye, and perform sorcery. 30 Other shamans were skilled at opening pathways to good fortune for people and conducting platicas. 31 Some shamans were highly skilled at healing with herbs, trees, stones, and roots. Others could set bones, give emetics, and create healing potions. 32 Still others could press places in the body, totlatlaccaia, to heal the mind, body, and spirit. 33 There were shamans whose specialty it was to conduct dream interpretation. 34 It is likely, in fact, that there were hundreds more different types of shamans, possibly each with their own different specialty. Because sacred objects and places were often seen as having a soul essence, and were consequently treated in some ritualistic way, shamanic rites were a common part of life for most people. Being incredibly skilled warriors, the Mexica rose to power very quickly after their arrival in 1273. By the fifteenth century, they had formed a triple alliance with two other very powerful city-states, Texcoco and Tlacopan. But first Tlacopan and then Texcoco found their privileges and power diminishing under the unyielding pressure of the Mexica. By the beginning of the sixteenth century, their alliance with the Mexica was more honorary than actual. 35 When the Spaniards arrived in February 1519, the Mexica were undergoing a social transformation because of extraordinary prosperity procured by military conquest and great expeditions. 36 Tenochtitlan was headed toward becoming a single-headed state. Many of the indigenous peoples of the Aztec empire and the surrounding areas were resentful of the Mexica, tired of paying taxes to this young and ambitious city-state, which had aggressively risen to power so quickly, and as a result many peoples joined forces with the Spaniards to finally defeat the Mexica on August 13, 1521. 37 YUCATEC MAYA Before talking about the Yucatec Maya, I will discuss the terms Maya and Mayan, as these terms have been used differently by academic and popular scholars, and they have not necessarily been adopted by all indigenous peoples. The meaning of the term Maya has changed notably over the years. From the time of the Spanish conquest up to the twentieth century, the term Maya only applied to the natives of the northern part of the Yucatán, people who spoke the language, Yucatec Mayan. This area was known as Mayab before the arrival of the Spaniards. At this time no indigenous groups outside of the Yucatán ever

used the words Maya or Mayan to refer to themselves; rather, they came to be applied by anthropologists and historians to the many different peoples and languages of the area, including those who never even made use of the terms in referring to themselves. 38 Currently, relatively few K’iché’ or Tzotzil people, for example, identify themselves as Maya: the term has little ethnic meaning or frame of reference for them. 39 Some indigenous peoples from regions identified as being part of the Maya civilization have for many reasons appropriated the term Maya. Individuals may even identify themselves as “Maya elders,” even though they may not be from the Yucatán or speak Yucatec Mayan. 40 What has been identified as the Maya civilization rose and developed over the course of many centuries and encompassed most of the course of Mesoamerican history. *9 The Maya were neither politically nor culturally a single, unified people. There were approximately thirty distinct Mayan languages in the sixteenth century, and most are still spoken today. The Maya civilization consists of three principal periods, each reflecting its own particular art styles and architecture: Preclassic (400 BCE–250 CE), Classic (250–909 CE), and Postclassic (909–1697 CE). The core characteristics of the Preclassic period of the Maya was the use of the Long Count calendar and stelae (slabs of stone) that were placed in front of their ceremonial centers and political buildings. These stelae were generally carved with hieroglyphic inscriptions accompanying historical portraits, reflecting the rise of a new political ideology and dynastic kingship. The Classic period is typically identified with the height of the Maya, who expanded into more than sixty kingdoms in central Mexico. 41 There were relatively few Maya languages spoken during the Classic period. The number of languages increased as the culture fragmented over time. 42 The Postclassic had the bulk of the populations largely concentrated in the northern Yucatán and southern areas of Guatemala and Belize. During this period, the Maya no longer used the Long Count calendar or stelae to express the institution of divine kingship. 43 Despite the diversity, Maya culture remained remarkably homogenous throughout the lowlands, from the Petén to the Yucatán Peninsula. 44 Ancient Maya religion was largely polytheistic, having several divinities, often with overlapping and competing attributes, as well as deity complexes that had multiple manifestations of a single unity of being, where a single deity could be part of more than one complex. Despite their diversity, the religions of the various Postclassic Maya peoples, the peoples I principally focus on in this book,

shared many traits in common. Some of these include introductions from Postclassic Mexico, which had close political and economic ties to the Maya region. An example would be the central Mexican deity, Quetzalcoatl, the plumed serpent, who was called Kukulcan by the peoples of the Yucatán and Gucumatz by the highland peoples. Most shared religious elements derive from a deeper level of Maya culture and appear in the texts and art of the Maya lowlands in the Classic period. Their images of deities likely represented forces of nature, as well as supernatural beings. 45 The Classic Maya term ku or ch’u, which can refer both to specific gods and to the general quality of sacredness, reflects this understanding. 46 Itzamna was one of the principal creator deities and appeared throughout Classic and Postclassic art. 47 His consort was Ix Chel, who had an array of attributes and a corresponding deity for each of them. The moon deities, and sometimes the moon-earth deities, reflect this complex. 48 Friar Diego de Landa, a Spanish missionary and sixteenth-century ethnographer, identified this complex and the variant names of Ix Chel, goddess of the moon, childbirth, and medicine, as being Aixchel, Ixchebeliax, Ixhunié, and Ixhunieta. 49 Currently this complex of deities is often grouped together into two gods: Deity I and Deity O. *10 Deity I is identified as having both youthful and aged aspects, whereas Deity O is the aged deity who is associated primarily with the term chel (“rainbow” in Yucatec Mayan). 50 The younger Deity I has been identified as Ixik Kab (“lady earth,” in Yucatec Mayan) and is associated with earth, fertility, weaving, and lunar aspects. Deity O is associated with weaving, aspects of the moon and agriculture, fertility, midwifery, divination, medicine, and sweat baths. 51 The Maya observed calendrical rites associated with both the Long Count calendar and the Calendar Round. The Long Count is a remarkably sophisticated and complex calendric system that incorporated massive periods of time and had the 360-day period called tun as its basic building block, with five units of time. 52 Typically, the highest unit was the bak’tun (roughly 400 years), the next was the k’atun (roughly twenty years), then the tun (360 days), then the winal (20 days), and finally the k’in (a single day). 53 Long Count dates are typically presented with the bak’tun first and the k’in position at the end, followed by the Calendar Round (e.g., 9.15.0.0.0 4 Ajaw 13 Yax, which corresponds to August 20 in the Gregorian year 731 CE). 54 Various limpia rites were performed for particular Long Count unit endings. The books of Chilam Balam, a Maya prophet credited for auguring the coming of the Spaniards, encompasses the

most important corpus of colonial Yucatec information concerning the auguries of the K’atun. 55 The Maya’s 365-day calendar, the ha’b, is composed of 20 days and 18 periods, with 5 unlucky days at the end of the year. These 5 days were referred to as the wayeb’ or xmak’aba’k’in (the unnamed days). 56 The day signs may refer to food, plants, seasons or other telling characteristics of a particular period. For example, yaxk’in is “dry season” or “winter;” mol means “harvest.” Periods were also probably understood as animate beings in their own right. 57 Each period had its own limpia rites of cleansing and renewal and particular tools to facilitate these processes. The 365-day calendar is still observed by many modern-day Maya communities as a type of civil calendar. Currently, the K’iché’ Maya of Momostenango, Guatemala, refer to the calendar as the masewalq’ij, “the common days.” 58 The 260-day divinatory calendar of the Yucatec Maya was the tzolk’in (a term invented by archaeologists). 59 There were 20 day signs, each of which reigned over 13 days. The 13 days ran in sequence and then started again. The Yucatec Maya used this calendar largely for divinatory and shamanic purposes. 60 Each of the 20 day names had a specific association and supernatural patron, and many had associations with natural phenomena. 61 The tzolk’in calendar is still used throughout highland Guatemala and parts of Mexico, such as communities in Oaxaca, among speakers of the Mixtec language. 62 The Yucatec Maya typically had a high shaman whom they called ah-kin may or ahuacan may. He was held in great reverence by all the chiefs and by many shamans, who routinely gave him offerings and contributions. The ah-kin counseled chiefs on many matters and answered their inquiries. 63 Other Yucatec Maya shamans and their trade specialties included the chilán (diviner within the town), ah cunal can (animal charmer), ah cunal than or pul yaah (spell caster), ah dzac-yah (doctor and surgeon), ah pul cimil (who was able to cause illnesses in others), ah uaay or ch’a-uay-tah (shapeshifter), and nacoms (war officer, who was imbued with the spirit of the gods). 64

Figure 2.1. Eighteen months of the Maya ha’b. SD-4101. Drawing. Maya. Glyphs and names of the [eighteen] months of the [ha’b] or 365-day solar calendar. Drawing by Linda Schele. Copyright © David Schele.

Figure 2.2. Twenty days of the tzolk’in. SD-4100. Drawing. Maya. Glyphs and names of the twenty days of the tzolk’in or 260- day sacred calendar. Drawing by Linda Schele. Copyright © David Schele.

Other shamans healed by the use of herbs, ceremonies, and rites. There were shamans who specialized in the calendrical systems and the many related ceremonies, the administration of their sacraments, the omens of the days, different forms of divinatory work, and remedies for different types of sicknesses. 65 The Yucatec Maya soothsayer shamans were excellent statisticians, diligently assessing and documenting historical patterns, looking to the past to see what might happen again, and assessing related variables. They often used limpia rites to influence healing, purification, birth, rebirth, and revitalization.

T 3 Pre- and Postcontact Texts Sources Used and Why his chapter examines the precontact and sixteenth-, seventeenth-, and eighteenth-century postcontact sources that I have relied on to examine the limpia rites of the Mexica and Yucatec Maya. I first discuss the precontact codices, including a brief description of what codices are; the texts’ names, age, and provenance; and their limitations as sources on limpia ceremonies. Thereafter I explore the postcontact sources that I have relied on. Most of these were written by Spanish missionaries, as well as a few mestizos and some indigenous peoples, each having their own distinct biases and agendas. The biases in each have made it necessary to compare various sources. They nonetheless contain a wealth of information concerning limpia rites. For the sake of accessibility, I have drawn mainly from secondary sources to examine precontact Mesoamerican codices. PRECONTACT CODICES Fewer than twenty precontact codices, from various regions of Mesoamerica, are still extant. They include three classes of books: Mixtec histories, Maya religious books, and highland religious books. 1 The codices of Mesoamerica are typically folded in accordion fashion, with both obverse and reverse sides containing pictures. They were often made of long strips of leather, cotton cloth, or bark paper and were occasionally protected by wooden covers. Codices, sometimes referred to as auguries or almanacs, were used to foretell the likelihood of an event; to determine how to influence its outcome with ceremonial rites; to anticipate the beginning or transition of a season for scheduling ceremonies and activities, such as harvesting; and much more. Divination work for the Mexica