The Splendor of San Angel The Garden of the

Jaime Abundis *

ave you been in San Angel? its gardens, its tuneful little fountains; on Mexico among the trees? And there in Have you seen it from its network of crystal-clear waters a blan - the background, where the double chain “H some where high up, from a ket of flowers unfolds, flowers of every of mountains that circle the valley, the tower? Is it not a paradise? Its orchards, color, of every kind, like a multi-colored ring in whose setting sparkle the knitted shawl thrown over a mirror. Have Popocatépetl and the ‘White Woman’ * Mexican architect. Researcher at the Na tion - you seen its village, its bell towers peep - like two diamonds, are lost from view, al Institute of Anthopology and History, INAH . ing over the balcony onto the Valley of disappearing in the milky distance of the

Panoramic view of the towers and domes of the El Ca rmen Monastery and church.

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the Xitle volcano that a little more than two millennia ago formed the San Angel Pedregal, or “stony crags”. The hills’ many glens nurtured innumerable streams and brooks, the most important of which are the Magdalena or Coyoacán. Criss crossing each other, they fertilized San Angel and its surrounding land. Thick oak, fir and pine forests covered not only the moun - tains, but the foothills, enriching the area with resources. The Pedregal lava malpais that physically separates from San Angel was the only jarring note Carlos Nebel lithograph of the Battle of Padierna, which culminated in the occupation of San Angel by U.S. troops. in the landscape, but it also meant more resources. It was these resources that in the remote past attracted men to the Mexico basin. The archeological remains at and el Bajo testify to the degree of development achieved by the ancient inhabitants before the Xitle erupted. The lack of systematic archeological exploration and the growth of the urban area limit our knowledge of San Angel’s pre-Hispanic past. Historic sources, on the other hand, do allow us to know mo re about the post-classical period. With the Nahua invasions, the became lords of the western river bank of the Mex - The Valley of Mexico in the nineteenth century, as painted by José María Velasco. ico Lake in the twelfth or thirteenth cen - horizon, there, very far away, on a back - that today survives only in literature, in tury. They set up their capital in Az ca pot - ground striped with the blue transparen - the faded photos and the memories of zalco and occupied Tacuba, Ta cu ba ya, cy of the lakes, have you seen the yel - the few people who had the good fortune M i x coac and Coyoacán . And so it remained lowish outline of the city that a reverent to enjoy it as it was. Now, it is a just until the reign of Maxtla, defeated by the Alexander von Humboldt called the City another part of the city, but it used to be around 1428, who then became of Palaces? Forgive these descriptions. I a town with a visage of its own, the prod - the new masters of the riverbank and, soon am overwhelmed by the spectacle, it was uct of specific history and geography. thereafter, the valley itself. so beautiful...!” 1 About 12 kilometers from downtown Coyoacán was made up of several ham - These little known words were writ - , central San Angel is in the lets, two of which were Tenanitla (meaning ten by a visitor to nineteenth-century foothills of what eventually to the south “next to the stone walls”) and Chimalistac San Angel, Don Justo Sierra, to describe and west becomes the Ajusco Mountains (“white shield”); this dominion came under the pleasing emotions evoked by a place topped with Ajusco Peak and, at its feet, the tutelage of after the

82 The Splendor of Mexico

Chapel door, San Jacinto Church. Patio of the San Jacinto Tenanitla cloister, founded by the Dominicans in the late sixteenth century.

Tepanec defeat at the hands of the decided to place the capital of his mar - others. From 1569 on, only the fri ars of Mexicas. quisate in Coyoacán, that included Santo Domingo de Guzmán remained to In contrast with Coyoacán, the seat of towns and hamlets like , La cover Coyoacán and its envi rons. They the dominion, which boasted a ceremo - Magdalena, Coajimalpa, , Los used its bounty to turn Tenanitla into a nial center with tall pyramids and tem - Remedios, Tenanitla and Chimalistac. place of rest and convalescence for the sick ples and more than 6,000 houses, half on Their abundant resources attracted the and the aged in the sixteenth century. The the land and half in the water —known Spaniards and the congenial surround - fame of Tenanitla as somewhere healthy as , or floating gardens— as ings favored the building of an incipient began there, rooted in its wonderful natur - described by Bernal Díaz del Castillo, settlement that began to be called al conditions. Tenanitla and Chimalistac were full of Tenanitla, still a part of Coyoacán. In 1596 in Mexico City, the Domi ni - orchards and gardens, sprinkled with The missionary friars were a central cans loudly celebrated the canonization of huts and a house or two, to the west, part of the appropriation process and the Saint Hyacinth, the missionary of where what is now San Angel lies. Its cultural transformation in this initial Poland and Northeastern Europe. As part resources had made them important stage of the colonial period. In 1524 the of their festivities, they agreed to dedi - hamlets since they contributed agricul - Younger Brothers arrived to Coyoacán cate a house to the canonization, found - tural products, animals, wood, charcoal, and shortly thereafter a small Franciscan ing it in Tenanitla. Soon, the house began basaltic rock and, of course, water in monastery was set up in the town. to be called Tenanitla de San Ja cin to abundance. When the Spanish took However, in 1529, the Dominicans (Spanish for Hyacinth) or San Jacinto Te- Tenochtitlan and made Coyoacán their arrived and founded their convent dedi - nanitla, and the original Marianist ori - temporary headquarters in 1521, many cated to Saint John the Baptist. For 40 gins of the name, Our Lady of the of them unleashed their greed on these years, the two religious orders shared the Rosary, were forgotten. A short time later rich lands. Coyoacán area, establishing small chapels they turned this small mo nas tery into the In 1529, Hernán Cortés became the in the towns and hamlets. The Domi - Hospice for Missionaries of the East, marquis of the Valley of Oaxaca and was nicans set up two chapels, dedicated to where the friars who came and went from granted the tribute of the indigenous peo - Saint Sebastian in Chimalistac and to Our the Philippines recovered from the hard - ples of many towns in . He Lady of the Rosary in Tenanitla, among ships of their ocean voyage; the church

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Oil of Saint Teresa of Avila, El Ca rm en Museum. also served as a parish church. The town was given a new name that would not last, but not for any reason the Dominicans could control. Meanwhile, San Jacinto Tenanitla con - tinued to grow and its visage changed slow - ly but profoundly. The great flowing Mag - da lena River, the most important in the south west of the Mexico basin, was perfect for wheat mills, textile workshops and fulling mills, where wool and other cloth was shrunken and smoothed. Ranches, , gardens and seed plantations also used its waters to irrigate their crops. The peasants began to add their num - bers to the workshop and mill laborers, as did a few city dwellers who enjoyed the benefits of such a magnificently well Facade of the San Jacinto Church, one of the first places of worship built by the Dominicans in San Angel. provided-for natural wilderness. The barefoot Carmelites, founded by discovered and colonized, at the same The seventh of these was the San Angel two such outstanding mystics as Saint time that they maintained their original College for which they received a land Teresa de Jesús and Saint John of the contemplative goals. Although they were grant in Tenanitla and Chimalistac in Cross in the second half of the sixteenth not destined to evangelize, their religios - 1597. century, had arrived in New Spain in ity and spiritual values led them to found In 1614, the barefoot Carmelites decid - 1585 to become part of the evangelizing 16 houses during the colonial period, ed to move their provincial college. This efforts of the new lands that were being that formed the Saint Albert Province. time they paid no heed to the obstacles put

84 The Splendor of Mexico

Saint John of the Cross, El Carme n Museum.

es) and aqueducts, a selection of apple, pear and peach trees, as well as vegeta - bles, plus enormous amounts of labor by the local population brought forth a gar - den and orchard that produced good yields for them in that very century. The famous fruit of the San Angel orchard sold easily in Mexico City and elsewhere. The Carmelites were already estab - lished in San Jacinto Tenanitla; their col - lege functioned very well; and the orchard and garden produced enough to support them. The local population benefited from the employment offered by the Car melites and, in imitation, they also covered the town with gardens and orchards. The boom was beginning and was soon reflect- ed in continual visits by viceroys, arch - Chimalistac Chapel, built by the Dominicans in the mid-sixteenth century in honor of Saint Sebastian. bishops, bishops and other civic and eccle - in their path by the Dominicans and Magdalena River and even included part siastic dignitaries to the college. The found ed an ecclesiastic hospice in of the Pedregal. Soon they began to turn number of summer houses owned by city Tenanitla to prepare for the definitive part of their lands into a model fruit and dwellers increased as the town gradually est ablishment of the college. Most of the vegetable garden, surrounded by a high became a favorite resting place. college’s facilities were built between stone wall. Cart loads of mulch and manure The Dominicans, on the other hand, 1615 and 1617. Their lands were so vast to fertilize the ground , dikes and dams were in decline: the local populace took that they reached from the college to the to store water, apantles (open water ditch - more to the Carmelites; the zeal of the

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economic wealth and influence, but this was only the first indication of the whirl - winds that were to come. Inde pendence brought significant changes. With the federal Constitution of 1824, San Angel became a municipality of the , ending all political links to Co - yoa cán. When in 1828 the law was passed expelling the Spanish, the Carmelites real - ized their future was uncertain. The few religious who remained in San Angel were those born in Mexico and a few ill The former Goicoechea was converted into one of San Angel ’s most exclusive restaurants. or incapacitated Spaniards. During the first attempted reform under Valentín Gómez Farías in 1833, the San Angel Carmelites sold some property to avoid a debacle in their entire province. The vegetable fields and orchards were saved, but their income dropped signifi - can t ly, and with it, the livelihoods of many of those who depended on them. Other prob lems came that checked the town’s prosperity: the continual coup d’états and the political changes they brought with them, the foreign wars of 1836 and 1838, the shifts resulting from political division and the chronic scarcity of public funds to name just a few. The main stage of the final San Angel and Contreras in a nineteenth-century oil painting by José María Velasco. phase of the war against the United States Eastern missions declined; they had less sidered a town in its own right. The rec - (1846-1848) was the Valley of Mexico. property; and, to top off all their difficul - ognized border was an accident of The battle at the Padierna Ranch and its ties, their parish was secularized in 1754, nature, the Magdalena River. San Angel continuation, the assault on leaving them only the hospice for the was emerging as a town made prosper - August 19 and 20, 1847, were two further missionaries of the East and no contact ous by its vegetable fields and orchards, defeats for the Mexicans, in addition to with the population. A gradual but irre - with its summer houses surrounded by the occupation of San Angel for several sistable change was taking place in the spacious gardens, encircled by other months. This period did a lot of damage to town’s name; slowly the name “San hamlets, haciendas and the Pedregal. This the population; the invading troops sacked Jacinto Tenanitla” was forgotten and prosperity was characteristic of the eigh - and destroyed property and abused the “San Angel” came into use. At the same teenth century. inhabitants. The college was a favorite tar - time, the economic boom that came Liberalism emerged at the end of the get, while the little San Jacinto monastery with the Carmelites meant that the ham - eigh teenth century as a result of the En - was used to jail the foreign soldiers of the let stopped being considered a neighbor - light enment. Carlos IV ’s royal decree of Saint Patrick’s Battalion and then to carry hood of Coyoacán and began to be con - 1804 deprived the clergy of much of its out their sentences. 2

86 The Splendor of Mexico

Amazingly enough, sunsets like this one can still be enjoyed in San Angel. The Liberal reform brought other orchard continued to be worked. Things Angel was established in the second half calamities. In 1856, Friar Rafael del Sa - would not stay like that for long, howev er. of the nineteenth century, with a house in gra do Corazón Checa, the last rector of the The college began to fall into disre - the Carmen Plaza as its terminal. When in Carmelite college, divided up and sold part pair: one part of it was used to house 1865 it became known that the Valley of of the vegetable garden and orchard to pri - troops and police, another as a municipal Mexico Circle Railroad Line would extend vate buyers; these lots were used for new jail. Still other parts were torn down to to San Angel, people hoped for better houses that changed the appearance of put in new streets, or divided up into lots transportation service. The day the railroad the heart of San Angel. Finally, as a result and sold off. This turbulent period was line from Tacubaya to San Angel was inau - of the laws of 1859 the San Angel College harmful to the town that one way or gurated in July 1866 was the only time no longer belonged to the friars and their another was linked to the Carmelites. Emperor Maximilian and Empress Carlota garden and orchard were sold to a private Some peace and progress did exist, ever visited San Angel. The steam locomo - individual. The church remained open however. Although the deplorable state of tive sped urbanization of the area, and it for worship; the college was managed by the roads made using it a torment, stage became possible to travel comfortably the local authorities and the garden and service between Mexico City and San from the city.

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The railroad also facilitated the area’s being a summering place. The new cen - virtues. It has this process of assimilation industrialization. In the nineteenth cen - tury brought with it a rather different in common with many other parts of the tury, the old workshops and fulling mills ambiance to San Angel due to the facto - city that used to be individual towns: from the colonial period gave way to new ries, the streetcars, the automobiles and Coyoacán, Tlalpan, Tacuba, Tacubaya, textile factories that continued to use the the new neighborhoods, but the flavor of Mixcoac, , and River Magdalena’s waters. Although it a provincial town and a place for spiritu - others. Despite their similarities, howev - only reached Tizapán, the project of con - al and physical renovation remained. er, it had its own traits that made it tinuing the Valley Railway to Contreras And just when everything was peace - unique. The purpose of this article has was undertaken, demolishing part of the ful came the Revolution. This period had been precisely to give the reader an old Carmelite buildings in its wake. no important direct repercussions in San overview of how those traits have devel - The dawn of the twentieth century Angel until the clash between Zapata oped from the remote past to the twenti - brought more changes to the town. and Carranza. Zapatista forces belea - eth century. No one can appreciate what Electric streetcars came in 1901, making guered the south and west ends of the he or she is not familiar with. pas senger and freight transportation valley and at one point took San Angel in Now, when you return from south - cheaper and easier. The streetcar lines 1916. But despite the overall remoteness west Mexico City, remember the words were flanked on both sides by corn of the armed conflict, the general politi - of Justo Sierra, “Imagine! I’ve just been fields, flowering hillsides and vegetable cal situation gravely affected normal life to San Angel!” gardens and orchards, but soon, the new in the town. settlements began to fill with people. The Culminating the revolutionary period Photography: Luis A. Aguilar Goicoechea hacienda, as well as the Gua - was the 1917 Constitution and the later dalupe hacienda and San José Ranch, were attempts by Presidents Alvaro Obregón NOTES divided up to make way for the new San and Plutarco Elías Calles to implement Angel Inn neighborhood. The old Car m- it to the letter. The result was the break - 1 Justo Sierra, Obras completas. Prosa literaria , vol. 2 (Mexico City: UNAM , 1977), p. 394. e lite vegetable garden and orchard final - out of the religious conflict that led to ly gave way to the push of progress when the closing of the churches between 2 See the article by Jim Fogarty about the battalion in the “History ” section of this issue of Voices of Mexico . it was divided and sold off to private buy ers 1926 and 1929. beginning in 1906. And then, suddenly, Finally, something unexpected hap - 3 María García Lascuráin deals with this process in her article in this issue. automobiles made their appearance. pened in San Angel’s Bombilla Res - The incipient industrial transforma - taurant: Alvaro Obregón, president-elect FURTHER READING tion of the nineteenth century sped up for a second term, was assassinated there Abundis Canales, Jaime, Antiguo colegio carmelita de with the new means of transportation. by José León Toral. León was taken to San Angel. Museo de El Carmen (Mexico City: Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Histo - One of the textile factories, the Our the local jail, situated on part of what ria/Museo de El Carmen, 1992). Lady of Loreto Plant, was refitted to pro - had been the Carmelite college, where ______“El Colegio de San Angel: árbol fructífero duce paper instead of fabric, thanks to he was imprisoned together with the y ejemplar del Carmelo mexicano,” Historia de un the enterprising Don Alberto Lenz. nun, Concepción de la Llata, or Mother huerto. Historia de la colonia Huerta del Carmen, San Angel, D.F. (Mexico City: Centro de Es - Tizapán became an offshoot of San Conchita, also charged with the assassi - tudios de Historia de México Con dumex/ De - Angel, but with a difference: its inhabi - nation, and they were tried in the local legación Alvaro Obregón, 1992), pp. 31-55. tants depended more on manufacturing municipal building. The affair put the Correa Duró, Ethel and Roberto Zavala Ruiz, Re cuen - to mínimo del Carmen descalzo en México. De la than on agriculture. Workers flooded old town in the national spotlight and antigüedad a nuestros días (Mexico City: Instituto Tizapán and San Angel, changing the sparked rapid changes. 3 Nacional de Antropología e Historia, 1988). local social structure. San Angel was a town in the environs Fernández del Castillo, Francisco, Apuntes para la his - Despite the transformations, San of Mexico City. Today, it is part of it, and, toria de San Angel y sus alrededores (San Jacinto Tenanitla); tradiciones, historia y (Mexico Angel stuck tenaciously to its tradition of as such, shares both its defects and its City: Editores Porrúa, 1987).

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