Guelaguetza, Loans, and Payments: Zapotec Organization of Community Affairs

The Zapotec Community of Coyotepec located thirty five kilometers from the colonial city of () was a burgeoning center of agricultural exchange and indigenous economic activity throughout the colonial period.  The Zapotec cabildo (local ruling body) and cofradia (lay confraternity) were led by caciques and principales who were not only linguistically but culturally fluent in Spanish style government.  This presentation is based on several Zapotec language documents that reveal the state of community affairs in the mid colonial period.  Most significantly, this presentation will discuss indigenous loans, terms of the loans and the Zapotec tradition of ‘Guelaguetza’ (a gifting system based on reciprocity) which appears in the native language documentation written and signed by the Zapotec cabildo.  This study points toward the pre-existing indigenous systems of organization which continued after the ‘conquest’ and which were activated in a systematic method during the colonial period when economic stress impeded natives from meeting all the requirements of taxation by Spanish officials.  Consequently, these indigenous systems were adapted to the changing conditions of the colonial reality revealing the cultural strategies used by native leaders in the face of colonial demands.