Mestizo or Ladino?

1 The problem is discussed in detail in my essay 'On the word Caste' (forthcoming).

I have discussed the problem in 'Who are the Indians?' in Encounter, Vol. 25 No. 3 (September 1965).

'Ladinos were all those of Spanish or half-Spanish descent who considered themselves "white" and lived, dressed and thought according to a European heritage; they lived apart from the native Maya or Indios.' Nelson Reed, The Caste War of Yucatan (Stanford, Stanford University Press, 1964), p. 5n. It would be hard to devise a more misleading statement about Yucatan on the eve of the war, though it would be quite correct if it applied to twentieth century Guatemala. In fact I find no evidence that the word 'ladino' was used to denote an ethnic entity in mid-nineteenth century Yucatan at all. It is inconceivable it could have been used as Mr. Reed maintains, for at that time there were three clearly defined ethnic statuses: the blancos or Españoles, the mestizos and the indios. Negros and pardos were still recognised if somewhat ill-defined categories.

John L. Stephens , Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatan ( New Brunswick, Rutgers, 1949), Vol. 11, p. 336.

A. de Remesal , Historia General de las Indias Occidentales, y Particular de las Gobernación de Chiapa y Guatemala Escrivese justamente los principion de neuestro glorioso Padre Santo Dominigo, y de las demas religiones (Madrid , 1620; Guatemala, 1932).

Manuel B. Trens , Historia de Chiapas, Vol. I, Desde los tiempos más remotos hasta la caída del segundo imperio (Mexico, 1957). The figures given by Moisés T. de la Peña are, for 1762, 528 whites only: Moisés T. de la Peña y otros, Chiapas Economico (Mexico , Textla Gutierrez, 1951).

Thomas Gage , The English American: A New Summary of the West Indies (1648 ); (London, George Routledge, 1948).

Stephens, op. cit., Vol. II, p. 114.

Used by Magnus Mörner as frontispiece to his recent book, Race Mixture in the History of Latin America (Boston, Little, Brown and Company, 1967).

See on this point François Chevalier, La Formation des grands domaines du Mexique; terre et société aus XVI-XVIIe siècles (Paris, Université de Paris, Travaux et Memoires de I' Institut d'Ethnologie, 1952), pp. 301-13.

Lorena Mirambell , 'Evangelización y organización eclesiastica' , in Mesa Redonda , Vol. VIII, 'Los Mayas del Sur y sus relaciones con los Nahuas Meridionales' ( Mexico, 1961).

Stephens, op. cit., Vol. I, p. 69.

Ibid., Vol. II, p. 345.

As Blanchard , one of the first scholars to investigate this problem, thought: 'Les tableaux de métissage', in Journal de la Société des Americanistes (1908), p. 62.

Howard Cline, Related Studies in early Nineteenth Century Yucatan History (Microfilm collection of mss. on Middle American cultural anthropology, Chicago University, 1950).

Eligio Ancona , Historia de Yucatan, desde la epoca más remota hasta nuestros dias (Mexico, 1888), Vol. IV: 'Porque si os estamos matando ahora vosotros primero nos mostrasteis el camino', from the answer of the Indian leaders to the peace offer conducted by Padre Vela.

Ibid.

Baqueiro writes of Novelo as an indian, in spite of his name. Other writers refer to him as a mestizo: Scrapio Baqueiro, Ensayo historico sobre las revoluciones de Yucatan, 1840-64 (Merida, 1978-87), 3 Vols. See also the testimony of an informant of Pustunich, Doña Serafina Be'Ku', 1964: 'Son como animales, comen gentes', she said on being asked about the indians.

Stephens, op. cit.

Cline, op. cit., Vol. I, p. 32. In Catherwood's drawings one sees many Indians garbed in this manner. Today however, one does not.

Alfonso Villa Rojas, the Maya of East Central Quintana Roo , (Washington D.C., Carnegie Institute , Washington, Publication 559, 1945); Robert Redfield , The Folk Culture of Yucatan (Chicago, Chicago University Press, 1941), p. 54.

In fact indians who became Indians. In the jungles to the East of the Andes live a number of peoples who have taken to the jungle in pursuit of their independence and have reverted from agriculture to a simpler way of life and 'neo-tribalism'. Yet students of Yucatan have been curiously unwilling to admit the same. It did not accommodate Redfield's general theory of the 'folk-urban continuum' (op. cit.) and the romantic indigenistas were yet more loath to accept it. Pacheco Cruz, for example, identifies the indians of Quintana Roo as the real descendants of the classical Maya and stops at nothing to prove it. S. Pacheco Cruz, Antropología cultural maya; reseña historica de la vida y costumbres de los mayos de los estados de Yucatan, Campeche y Q. Roo (Merida, 1962).

See note 18 above.

The Papers of Robert Redfield (Chicago, Chicago University Press, 1963), Vol. 1, p. 183.