Where Angels Feared to Tread: Franciscan Accounts of Huichol Religiosity, 1620s–1850s

Beginning in the late sixteenth century, Franciscan and Jesuit missionaries spread across west-central Mexico, attempting to teach and convert Spain's indigenous subjects.  The Spanish had only recently conquered the area surrounding what is now Guadalajara, and native peoples in the region resented alien intrusion into the mountainous hinterlands.  Indigenous groups like the Huichols  moved deeper into the Sierra Madre Occidental to avoid contact with the Spanish, resulting in a drawn-out process of conquest by the military and conversion by the Church.  Over the course of several centuries, Franciscan and Jesuit missionaries who worked among the Huichols and neighboring groups produced a body of literature that described life in the Sierra as the clergymen understood it.

One of the most important observations about indigenous life that Franciscans made concerned religious beliefs.  Franciscans frequently remarked about the Huichols and their "pagan" practices such as mummy worship, idolatry, and "drunkenness."  A common concern was the consumption of peyote among the Huichols, who according to friars believed the cactus to be a deity.  Over the course of two centuries, religious authorities attempted to halt the practice of peyotism and idolatry, explaining their work in various travel documents.  These accounts are critical to our understanding of Huichol religiosity and spirituality. By examining the accounts left by trailblazing friars, one gets a glimpse into indigenous religious practices over the decades and centuries.  Though diluted by the cultural misunderstandings of Spanish priests, the records tell intriguing stories.  The travel records from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century allow for a determination of how prolonged and increasing contact transformed Huichol religious, cultural, and social practices, while providing a glimpse into the character of the Franciscans themselves.