While living in Central America for almost 10 years, we had the opportunity to explore all of the seven countries on this tropical isthmus that connects North America to South America. During our travels we visited many fabulous, colorful markets filled with arts and crafts from this part of the world.
One particular market, about 87 miles northwest of Guatemala City and north of the beautiful Lake Atitlan with its surrounding volcanoes is being held twice a week in the large, indigenous town of Chichicastenengo. The local's claim that the market has existed for over a thousand years and it is not only a market , but as well a spiritual center for the proud Maya community that still lives in the surrounding hills.
On Thursdays and Sundays, the calm of the town with its cobbled streets and adobe and wood houses is awakened at dawn as the stall merchants prepare to do business. A few locals in Panajachel, where we spent the night told us how crowded and how many "touris
tas" there would be, but we found our market experience enchanting.
The rows of stalls which had existed for generations had grown on top of each other but if you looked slowly in between the clutter and slow chaos there were real gems to be found. Nothing cut and polished but real honest "sink your teeth into kind stuff" was what we found.
Beautiful Mayan calendar wall hangings woven and hand stitched with heavy yarn of green and earth toned strands of natural dies, wood carvings, baskets, pottery, endless woven textiles and masks used in traditional dances. From the shadow's of Don Enrique's mask collection crept out a wooden coyote head. Its long canine snout hung down to just touch the top of your sternum as you placed it over your face and its teeth just showed under carved gums smiling a sly yodel dog grin.
As we walked t
he market taking in the scents and sounds of our surroundings, I found a shy grandfather who leaned with his elbow on a stone wall at the periphery near a narrow alley. He was disengaged and seemed surprised when a big "gringon" showed interest in him. He had placed next to him three very old machetes with their leather fringed scabbards.
My Spanish was very passable after all the years in Nicaragua and I introduced myself. He looked out from under his battered straw cowboy hat and greeted me back. We found it hard to communicate at first and evolved to talking with simple words that use hands and eyes to help the meaning. I asked him if I could touch the blades and remove them from their covers. He very quietly agreed with a nod. So just the two of us went about looking at what he had hoped someone would deem valuable enough to take home and reward him for his efforts and the long walk back to his house.
I pulled loose each of the three and could see that they had been someone's pride ages ago , but that like this old man were past their age of prime. I selected one that had a wonderful cast pewter handle that terminated at the butt into an eagle's head. The eyes and mouth had been carved by the forger. Inlaid in the grip on one side was antler and the other was obviously a repair in the past with a piece of hard wood from the farm, carved and fitted.
Every so faintly visible on the sides of the long thin blade was the original manufacture embossing. Made back in a time when people were proud of their products and each piece was formed and fitted by hand. On the left as you held it, feeling its heft in your wrist,
was a bull rearing with its front hooves stomping the ground and surrounded by flourishes and swirls of leaves and vines that work their way towards either end of the blade. The right showed the words almost worn invisible by the decades of use that mentions the "Sancerra Hms". In researching it, I found it was the Sancerra brothers or hermanos as the Hms stands for who made this machete and the best date we can put on them is the early 1920s. Like old rifles from the end of the 1800s what stories this cherished tool could tell. Alas it is silent in its tale, but we are content to have it share our wall space till it's ready to tell what toil it has done.
There was no negotiation with the old gentlemen. No haggling back and forth, stomping of feet and false exits no hem and haw. He and I stood alone at his wall and he quietly mentioned a price and then looked up at me with thin eyes. I respectively paid him and wished him well and once in the car regretted not turning around and buying all three.
The best deals are known in the soul and I feel good that for one day back when, I helped bring something good to this old man and he shared with me an old friend of his that I put to rest on my wall at home.
One particular market, about 87 miles northwest of Guatemala City and north of the beautiful Lake Atitlan with its surrounding volcanoes is being held twice a week in the large, indigenous town of Chichicastenengo. The local's claim that the market has existed for over a thousand years and it is not only a market , but as well a spiritual center for the proud Maya community that still lives in the surrounding hills.
On Thursdays and Sundays, the calm of the town with its cobbled streets and adobe and wood houses is awakened at dawn as the stall merchants prepare to do business. A few locals in Panajachel, where we spent the night told us how crowded and how many "touris
tas" there would be, but we found our market experience enchanting.The rows of stalls which had existed for generations had grown on top of each other but if you looked slowly in between the clutter and slow chaos there were real gems to be found. Nothing cut and polished but real honest "sink your teeth into kind stuff" was what we found.
Beautiful Mayan calendar wall hangings woven and hand stitched with heavy yarn of green and earth toned strands of natural dies, wood carvings, baskets, pottery, endless woven textiles and masks used in traditional dances. From the shadow's of Don Enrique's mask collection crept out a wooden coyote head. Its long canine snout hung down to just touch the top of your sternum as you placed it over your face and its teeth just showed under carved gums smiling a sly yodel dog grin.
As we walked t
he market taking in the scents and sounds of our surroundings, I found a shy grandfather who leaned with his elbow on a stone wall at the periphery near a narrow alley. He was disengaged and seemed surprised when a big "gringon" showed interest in him. He had placed next to him three very old machetes with their leather fringed scabbards.My Spanish was very passable after all the years in Nicaragua and I introduced myself. He looked out from under his battered straw cowboy hat and greeted me back. We found it hard to communicate at first and evolved to talking with simple words that use hands and eyes to help the meaning. I asked him if I could touch the blades and remove them from their covers. He very quietly agreed with a nod. So just the two of us went about looking at what he had hoped someone would deem valuable enough to take home and reward him for his efforts and the long walk back to his house.
I pulled loose each of the three and could see that they had been someone's pride ages ago , but that like this old man were past their age of prime. I selected one that had a wonderful cast pewter handle that terminated at the butt into an eagle's head. The eyes and mouth had been carved by the forger. Inlaid in the grip on one side was antler and the other was obviously a repair in the past with a piece of hard wood from the farm, carved and fitted.
Every so faintly visible on the sides of the long thin blade was the original manufacture embossing. Made back in a time when people were proud of their products and each piece was formed and fitted by hand. On the left as you held it, feeling its heft in your wrist,
was a bull rearing with its front hooves stomping the ground and surrounded by flourishes and swirls of leaves and vines that work their way towards either end of the blade. The right showed the words almost worn invisible by the decades of use that mentions the "Sancerra Hms". In researching it, I found it was the Sancerra brothers or hermanos as the Hms stands for who made this machete and the best date we can put on them is the early 1920s. Like old rifles from the end of the 1800s what stories this cherished tool could tell. Alas it is silent in its tale, but we are content to have it share our wall space till it's ready to tell what toil it has done.There was no negotiation with the old gentlemen. No haggling back and forth, stomping of feet and false exits no hem and haw. He and I stood alone at his wall and he quietly mentioned a price and then looked up at me with thin eyes. I respectively paid him and wished him well and once in the car regretted not turning around and buying all three.
The best deals are known in the soul and I feel good that for one day back when, I helped bring something good to this old man and he shared with me an old friend of his that I put to rest on my wall at home.
I'm sorry but you just bought a modern manufactured machete. I have one nearly identical that has nearly the exact same design and materials except with a plastic grip (what Mayans can afford) that I bought at a tiny town in the east highlands that I haggled down to 20USD.
ReplyDeleteI also have a Ch'orti' Mayan example gifted to me by a man that came down from the communidad's surrounding the town to find a job, start a business, and raise a family. When he learned that I was part of a clean water project in the communidads the now elderly man gave his to me because it's expected for men to carry one on the mountains. I was shocked by its beauty and his generosity but he would not accept payment even when I offered 100USD. He hugged me and his son relayed his words "we believe god is in the sky" he said.
This machete is made out of old leather softened by age and darkened with sweat into a deep shifting brown - designs sewed in with a foot pedal sewing machine and held together with rusted repurposed horseshoe nails, it is decorated with shoelace grommets. It is amazing. It is old. The blade has been sharpened so many times as to be visibly altered in shape.
A genuine Mayan blade is marked only by its intense usage and the resourcefulness that went into its craftsmanship specifically for its purpose: a tool of struggling farmers.