Chamula, Chiapas a Tzotzil village.
Web gallery by Bob Freund
9/19/2005
with particiaption of Karen Elwell and Tom Aleto, Narratives by Karen Elwell 9/2005
info@mexicantextiles.com
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Almost all women and most men still wear traditional clothing. The woman´s outfit consists of a short-sleeved satin blouse decorated with embroidery around the neckline. The blouses are generally blue, but may also be lime green or bright yellow or other colors. The black wool wrap skirts are woven on wide backstrap looms and are worn folded in front of the body. Some skirts are so shaggy that the wearer appears to have a sheepskin tied to her body. The skirt is held up with a wide, tightly-woven red belt. Women use blue rebozos and also black wool capes, which are often folded and carried atop the head as a sunshade. Chamula blouses are sold widely in San Cristobal, both on the streets and in shops. The woolly skirts are designed to last 20 years and are very expensive. The black wool capes have become very fashionable in the Tzeltal town of Tenejapa and can even be bought there. Fine Chamula embroidery can be found at Na Bolom and Sna Jolobil.

Men wear a white wool poncho belted with a leather belt over western-style shirts and pants. Cowboy hats are commonly worn. Men and women wear special ceremonial garments on important occasions.

Chamula centro is surrounded by three sacred mountains and there is a cross shrine on top of each mountain. In the first photo, one shrine is visible in the distance behind the market.

We visited Chamula the first time in January 1993. As we were about to enter the church, a truck full of men arrived and proceeded to drag a woman from the truck to the church. The church was immediately closed to outsiders. A local child explained that the woman was an alcoholic who was being taken to the church for curing. We didn’t return to Chamula until January 2003 and were surprised at how large the town had become. The old adobe houses with thatched roofs are gone today. We spent Easter morning in Chamula in 2003 and witnessed the most spectacular ceremony we´´d ever seen in Mexico.