Mercury mines at Almadén - how we´ll use them (part 3 of 3)

We're hoping to use the mercury mines at Almadén in our documentary-in-progress, Flamenco:  la tierra está viva (Flamenco:  the Land Is Still Fertile).  Because it seemed to use that the mines are a good representative of the centuries of discrimination and mistreatment of gitanos in Spain, we wanted to film a scene there.

Oh, why not.  Me, getting ready to go down into the mine.

Our original idea was to have singer and co-director Antonio de la Malena sing some flamenco tientos from a CD called Persecución, part of which refers to the mines.  The album is sung by el Lebrijano with verses written by Felix Grande.  On listening to the CD, however, I don´t much like the verses...not poetic enough for my taste.

The second level of the mine.  There are 32 levels, most of them flooded now.

The next idea was for Malena to write some verses of tientos, thinking of the mines and the gitano prisoners.  We´d film him inside the mines themselves, beside the tunnel called the galeria de los gitanos.  This would be reasonably complicated and expensive but if we got funding, well, why not?

But another problem has developed.  For several centuries, the mines were run by a German banking company as a means for the Spanish crown to pay  it back for some monstrous loans.  The best work on what conditions were like in the mines is a secret report written by an agent of the Spanish king in which he interviewed both prisoners and the mine´s manager and prison supervisors.

Until modern times, the mine shafts were lit with these oil lamps.

This secret report was written in 1593 by Mateo Alemán, a lawyer and man later to become a novelist who was a great influence on Cervantes.  Alemán, himself, served time in debtor´s prison and so was sympathetic to the prisoners and not to the German company managing the mines.

Luckily enough, I found a copy of his report in the library of the University of California at Berkeley.  I´ve now read the entire thing plus an introduction written by a relatively contemporary Spanish poet.

Without going into too much detail, this secret report is helpful but problematic.  In the first place, at the time it was written, gitanos sent to the mines were sent for actual crimes.  In later centuries, they were often sent simply for being gitanos.  It was against the law to be gitano.  That is more what we want to illustrate.

Looking down the shaft where the water was brought up from lower levels.

It is likely, however, that the conditions in the very late 16th century (1593) were not too different from the conditions in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, when gitanos were sent to Almadén simply for being gitanos.  This would mean we could still make use of the secret report.  But there is even another problem:  lots more gitanos were sent as prisoners to work (usually for life) on the Spanish galleons than were sent to the mines.

The galleons were sailing ships and as far as I know, there aren´t anyof those left.   On the other hand, the people in charge of the mines would be delighted to have us film there.  Bottom line is that we are now thinking of letting the narrator explain the galleon part, and still film Malena singing a tientos in the mines - funding permitting.

NOTE:  In addition to gitanos, there were many white and even some Arab and black prisoners in the mines, along with slaves AND free miners.  The worse thing about the mines, by the way, was the mercury poisoning.  This is not to say that the prisoners and slaves were treated well;  often, it was pretty brutal.  But the mercury poisong...well, no fun.

Water pump and bucket.

AND A FINAL NOTE:  The task that the prisoners and slaves were made to do that was hardest was pumping water out of the mine, which was done with a hand crank.  The most dangerous job was sweeping ashes out of the processing shed.

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Our next post will be related to our documentary, Strong Roots, Bright Flowers:  Arts of Mexican Immigrants and Chicanos.  Keep up with our progress on the flamenco documentary and our other work by going to this LINK.

Mexico´s indigenous civilizations - the Aztecs (part 3 of 3)

And now, a brief run-down of Aztec history: 


The Aztecs, also called the Mexica, were part of a larger group of peoples who spoke the Nahuatl language and inhabited central Mexico.  Up until 1225, the Aztecs seem to have been nomads but after that date, they settled and built cities including the city which has now become the capital of Mexico.

At first, the Aztecs were vassals of other neighboring city states but slowly, through alliances and wars, they came to rule over the others and by 1427 had created an empire.

A pyramid and temple built by the Aztecs.

Their last great ruler was Montezuma II, who in 1620 was captured by the Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés and shortly afterwards, died.  (Cortés´ generals had previously killed off most of the Aztec nobles and generals, attacking them while they were unarmed and in the middle of a religious celebration.)

The Aztecs had two emperors after Montezuma II died, but both ruled for only a few weeks, one dying of smallpox and the other, living as a captive of Cortés after the latter conquered the empire in 1621.   Five years after this conquest, Cortés had him executed.

Smallpox, incidentally, killed probably one third of the Aztec population between the arrival of the Spaniards (who brought the desease to Mexico) and Cortés´s triumph.

The Aztec Empire at its height, shortly before it was conquered by Cortés.

The fall of the Aztec empire did not mean the end of the Aztecs, of course.  Several thousand live in the United States, especially in the state of California and other states that border Mexico.  In Mexico itself, an estimated 1.5 million people speak the Nahuatl language and around 1 million of them consider themselves Aztec.  They live mainly in the Mexico City and its surrounding countryside.

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In our documentary-in-progress, Strong Roots, Bright Flowers:  Arts of Mexican Immigrants and Chicanos, we interview an Aztec drummer and watch part of an Aztec ceremony to learn more about Aztec culture. Keep up to date on our progress by going HERE.  

Mercury mines at Almadén, gitanos, forzados and slaves (part 2 or 3)

Since mining mercury was so dangerous, why was anyone willing to engage in it?

That's a simple one to answer.  In the 16th through the 19th century, all the most dangerous work was done by prisoners - called "forzados" - and slaves.  This meant that the ordinary, free, miner might survive the experience.  In addition, free miners could stop work for a while if they noticed signs of mercury poisoning, which allowed the mercury to be expelled from their bodies.  Prisoners and slaves could not.

By the end of the 19th century, advancing knowledge about what caused and how to avoid mercury poisoning made the mining much safer.  In addition, there was no more slavery, and prisoners were no longer condemned to the mines.

Ruins of prison cells today, seen from above.  They were very small.

The mines were extremely important to the Spanish crown.  Spain was involved in almost constant warfare during this period and the wars were paid for from loans advanced by a wealthy German aristocratic family.  The product of the mines of Almadén were dedicated to paying off these loans, or at least the interest on them.

The slaves used in the mining were people sent there by their masters as punishment.  The prisoners were just ordinary people caught up in the law.  Starting in the 18th century and perhaps before, gitanos were sent to the mines on 20 year sentences simply for saying they were gitano, or for speaking their Romani language.  There were enough of them so that one section of the older part of the mine is named "the gitano shaft."

A model of the prison.

Other people were condemned to work in the mines for having committed crimes - sometimes petty crimes such as stealing a loaf of bread, and sometimes serious crimes, such as murdering their neighbor.

There was a large prison complex to house these unfortunate people.  They wore chains day and night.  They were chained inside their cells when in the prison and for most of this period, they went from the prison to the mines by way of a tunnel, so that they never saw the light of day.

Inside a cell, with an iron ring for attaching to the prisoner's chain.

Inside the mines and the refinery, they were sometimes chained to their tasks, especially if the work were really dangerous.

And for gitanos sentenced to those 20 years of hard labor, when the 20 years were up, they were not released because they were considered homeless vagabonds, and you could only be released if you could prove that you had a fixed home to return to.

NEXT EPISODE to appear on Sept. 27.

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We are working on a documentary (Flamenco:  la tierra está viva (Flamenco:  the Land Is Still Fertile) in which we plan to film a scene down in these mines.   Keep up with our progress by going to this LINK.

Mexico´s indigenous civilizations - the Aztecs (part 2 of 3)

Back to the Aztecs´ pyramids and human sacrifices.

According to Aztec mythology, the human sacrifices were necessary in order to keep the sun going around in the sky.  The sun god was considered very weak, and he needed help to move the sun.  Human sacrifice was the only way to provide this help.  

A priest for the sun god (also the god of war) sacrifices to the deity.

If you were sacrificed, there was an important consolation:  you became a deity upon dying - and that was a whole lot better than becoming a wandering ghost, which is what was said to happen to some people.  Still, I can´t imagine many people volunteering.

To put human sacrifice in context:  it's a pretty horrible thing, but it was certainly not unique to the Aztecs.  It was practiced by almost all of the early civilizations in Central and South America, as well as in many other parts of the world (including probably in Europe).  

We should also remember that at the time the Aztecs were practicing it, the Europeans had their Inquisition, and later, their guillotines and revolutions and, of course, the concentration camps of the Nazis.   In the United States we remember the witch hunts, slavery of blacks, and massacre of Native Americans;  Asians had their revolutions and conquests, etc., etc. and Africans had their....you get my point...

The gigantic Pyramid to the Sun was sacred to the Aztecs, even though it was built by other people more than a thousand years before the beginning of the Aztec Empire.

Back to the Aztecs:  another thing you should know about them is that they really loved playing ball.  Their favorite ball game was called ullamalitzli.  It had religious and political overtones, but still, it was a ball game.  Only aristocrats were allowed to play, and people bet heavily ... not only putting up money, but also land, ceremonial feather, and even their own children.  In fact, sometimes people would give themselves up as slaves in order to pay off a debt incurred by losing at a game.

That is to say, they REALLY loved the ball game.

Aztec cities would always have a ball court as part of the holy, ritual part of town. 

The most important aspect of the game was that the ball could not be allowed to touch the ground.  Ever.
And in the Aztec version, the players couldn´t touch the ball with their hands, or their feet, or their legs, or their chests:  only their knees, elbows, heads and hips.

An "I" shaped Aztec ball court for ullamalitzli.  There are two players at each end.

The game was played not only by the Aztecs but by most other ancient Mexican civilizations including the Maya, the Olmec, the Toltec, and others.  Its origins pre-date the Aztecs by more than a thousand years!  

The object of the game was to get the ball to go through a hole in a stone ring at the side of the ball court.  This was so difficult that some ball courts didn´t even bother with the ring, it apparently being assumed that it would be impossible to get the ball to go through it.

If neither team got the ball through the hole in the ring, the winner would be chosen according to which side got the highest number of points.  One way to get lots of points was to get the ball to hit one of six markers built into the sides of the court. 
 
NEXT EPISODE will appear on Sept. 20.
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In our documentary-in-progress, Strong Roots, Bright Flowers:  Arts of Mexican Immigrants and Chicanos, we interview an Aztec drummer and watch part of an Aztec ceremony to learn more about Aztec culture. Keep up to date on our progress by going HERE.