With the name of Concheros, Aztec Dancers, Dances of Conquest, or Chichimeca Dance, dance in rural populations, the districts of the City of Mexico (old Calpullis), and in different states from the Republic, as they are: The State of Mexico, Guanajuato, Jalisco, Michoacán, Morelos and Querétaro among others; the dancers who integrate it are indigenas and mestizos of all the social stratus, craftsmen, profesionistas, small retailers, clerks, etc.
They fulfill his obligations in the catholic temples, in these places where they are our Teocallis and where are our ancestral spiritual guides and the divinities of our old religion. Dance in the sunday, thus to fulfill a cycle of 52 weeks. Concheros is our name because we take a stringed instrument whose box of resonance makes with an armadillo shell.
Thus dancing since they made our ancestros, they make vibrate the Mother Earth and we projected to the Cosmos, they establish bridge between both: the Mother Earth (Coatlicue), and the Father Sun (Tonatiuh).
The
groups of Dance we are integrated by men and women organized hierarchically
by Generals and Captains, who represent the greater authority, the Malinche
that is the one in charge to take the fire; the Sergeant who is the person
in charge of the order, because when a Law is disobeyed, he pays,
because the Dance is harmony. Some are made position play certain musical
finally and, the assembly of dancers or soldiers we are them, from the
children, children, women, men, to venerable old and the old ones. The
number of dancers is variable: 8, 10, 60, elements. There are groups that
get to count, with than 100 elements, conquered more by our traditions.
Thus
the groups have permanent existence, around the cult of a domestic altar
(pulls), and we identified ourselves with a standard, in the case ours
we belong to group of the Virgin of Dolores. The Group of Aztec Dance Xinachtli
(seed that germinates), that directs to the Commander in chief Distinguished
Andrés Segura. Also we have commitments (obligations), in the main
sanctuaries of energy or Sanctuaries, (Sacramonte, Remedies, Villa, Chalma,
Tlatelolco). To the festividades also one invites other groups of neighboring
luggers or distant regions, so that they give force and a greater number
of dancers is combined. This custom is based on affluent reciprocity established.
The clothes are of precolonial inspiration: Maztle and Tilma for the men,
Quexquemitl and Huipil for the women: Tekahtle (huaraches) and Ikuazéhatl
(Plume), adorned with pens of diverse birds (Guajolote, pheasant, pavoreal,
eagle, guacamayo, avestrus, etc). and in clothes are used colors shining
with spangle strips. Music has as it bases rythmical the Huehuetl drums
(vertical), and Teponaxtli (horizontal), to which the Ayacaxtli (sonajas),
the Ayotl (Tortoise shell), and the Coyolli are added (Strips of ayoyotes
that we put ourselves like bracelets in the ankles). Melodías is
in charge of the Tlapitzalli (flauta of reed), and the Atecocolli (marine
snail), is used in the permission that is requested to the four courses
of the Universe and to the Center. It is possible to indicate that when
we are going to fulfill our obligations, first we requested permission
to the Giver of Life, (that by that it is lived, Teotl, calls God to him,
the Indigenous brothers of the North call the Great Espirítu to
him, finally the symbol is same, with the different ones name in the different
cultural traditions), and to the guardians of those places, the Gentlemen,
that guide our steps, to fulfill our mission in the Mother Earth and to
the conquering bores of the four winds that left these beautiful memories
us (the heads of the tradition that returned to the Mother Earth). When
we requested permission we say our praises inside of the Church and later
we, their heirs left to fulfill the obligation with Dance in the vestibules
because therefore hacián our ancestoras and wing time. At the end
of the obligation we thank to the guides of the Red Tradition, the guides
of the Tradition Atlante, the guides of the Mexica Tradition and to our
own personal guides, by to have fulfilled our obligation in that day. At
the beginning of the obligation we conformed two columns, later to make
a circle with movements that evoke the Symbol Nau Ollin (4 movement). For
each dance that begins and finishes we make reverences and we marked or
the steps very so that the cross forms very or (the four courses del Universo),
that is to say, with each foot marks to the form the rythmically cross.
Almost 475 years of the heroic defense of Mexico-Tenochtítlan, we continued keeping the forms and the traditions that bequeathed our ancestros to us through the oral tradition, of ear mouth and written. In all that time and space that we have lived, we know that we have maintained to a contral ideological fight the dominant ideology: European, Centralista and Consumist. Against all this we have developed several fields of the knowledge of the ancestors: Cosmography, Herbolaría, the Maternal Languages like the Nahuatl that have territory, talkers and grámatic; the poetry, the dance, etc. We did not despise the culture which we lived at the present time, nor say that she is bad but is not ours, does not appear of our hearts, is not incarnated in our ways, we have another one idiosincracia, another genetic memory, Jose Vasconcelos, spoke with wisdom when saying: " By my race the Spirit will speak ", if, but the one of my ancestros, since if we do not know our cutural rootsl, we will continue being foreign in our communities. To know our culture is not to try to return to our past, but simply not to forget it, because the knowledge that we have by inheritance, they follow effective daily actually of the town, because they are useful... also because they are BEAUTIFUL.
We followed the steps,
that left us by inheritance, the Young Grandfathers, Huey Tlatoani Cuahtémoc.
The tlathoani of Mexico-Tenochtitlan, in the last decree, that he presented
the 13 August of 1521, he says: " Our Sun has been hidden, our Sun
has hidden and it has left us in the most complete dark. We know that he
will return to leave to illuminate to us again. But while he remains back
in the Miktlan (silence), we must be united. Hiding in ours hearts everything
what we loved. Let us destroy our Teocallis (temples), our
Kalmekak (schools of high studies), our Tlachkouan
(ball fields), our Telpochkaltin (schools for young people), our Kuikakaltin
(house of sing), and let to the streets desert to lock in itself in our
homes. From now, our homes, will be our Teokaltin, our Kalmekameh,
our Tlachkouan, our Telpochkaltin, and our Kuikaltin.
From now on until he leaves the New Sun.
The parents and the Mothers, do not forget to say
to their children which has been until today Anáhuac, under protection
of our Gods as result of the customs and the eduación of our olds.
That they either do not forget to say to his children which a day
he will have to be Anáhuac: "The Country of the New Sun "
After knowing the last message Cuauhtemóctzin, the people of Mexico-Tenochtitlan,occurred to the task of keeping in its hearts the most appraised than we have, its traditions and customs. For that reason we dancing in old the Teocallis, where catholic churches and in the power centers of being able were elevated.
When
we spoke of being able we are talking about
the spiritual power, nonmaterial, we know that the gentlemen guides who
govern those places are there, with us and they illuminate the way
to us that there will be to walk, to fulfill here mission in the Mother
Earth. All the steps that we give or in the dance or when we visited
places of being able, are not at random, when
doing these visits are for fortifying the conscience of Nation in many
occasions slept of the people of Mexico.
We know that when dancing we make representations of how it is the cosmos:
as it is above, it is down, everything is constant movement
in the daily life and also there where on some way it is lived, in the
Miktlan, in the place of silence.
As we previously said it with the
praises we requested permission and we thank
in agreement with the oral tradition and with the advice who give our mayores
us, our Nanitas and Tatitas, and as it says the last decree to us of our
Huey Tlatoani Cuahtemóctzin: These beautiful memories we continued
them keeping in our hearts, when we
danced we died, to return to be born and to have an encounter with we ourself,
is the other I, the other face, is our genetic memory;
some profane ones say " these Indians just jump, just jump ", but they
do not know that these Indians give life him to the things... to the
Universe, to live in harmony. We them Concheros
are Mexican with Mexican thought.
Chimal- Pan said:
"WHILE THE WORLD EXISTS, NEVER FINISH
THE FAME AND THE GLORY OF MEXICO-TENOCHTITLAN"
IN-TLANEZTIA-IN-TONATIUH-MEXICA-TIHUI
" The Sun is shining, ahead Mexicans"
..
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Xiuhcóatl (J.S.B)
FUNAAZ
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