Amate Art of Mexico
(Where the Secular Meets the Sacred)

Nowhere was the cord between man and spirit more tightly bound than in the making of amatl, the sacred paper of the pre-Hispanic peoples. This paper was so important to the spiritual needs of the community, that in spite of intense repressive measures by the Spaniards, it has continued to survive and is still used to connect the unseen world with the seen. In the mid-1900s amatl underwent a rebirth which re-vitalized the relationship between the indigenous people and their ancient paper. Remarkably, even though the application is new, it is so related to its use of old that one feels an unbroken thread.

Paper was sacred to both the Mayans and the Aztecs. It was the medium on which their history and discoveries were chronicled. It kept their records of trade and tributes. It filled their libraries with documents for future generation to witness. And of no less importance, it was used in every religious ceremony as an intermediary between the people and the gods.

Records show that in 1507, when Moctezuma had to prepare for the New Fire Ceremony, a ritual of renewed life that took place every 52 years, he ordered a million sheets of amatl to be delivered to Tenochtitlan to insure that the ceremony would be successful and to avoid the wrath of the gods. The finest and whitest paper was set aside for writers and painters, for chronicling events, and for placating the gods. Once these needs were met, the remaining paper was given to the people for their personal use in rituals.

By the time Cortes arrived on the shores of Mesoamerica, there were at least forty-two papermaking centers, and they were producing almost half a million sheets of paper per year for use in tribute alone. The main papermaking centers were in the areas of what is now Veracruz, Morelos, Guerrero, Puebla, Hidalgo, and Oaxaca.

The town priests weren't happy with the sacred reverence in which the native population held their amatl. They saw the manipulation of the paper in religious ceremonies as a form of idolatry. They prohibited the art of papermaking, and the papermakers were brought to trial. Even as late as 1889 persecution against the Otomi people of Hidalgo for papermaking was recorded. Shortly after, the traditional process of making amatl, the Nahuatl word for paper, which has come down to us as amate, was thought to have become extinct.

In 1901, an anthropologist named Frederick Starr headed an expedition into some remote regions of Mexico to record Indian customs and practices. It was during one of his excursions that he learned that the craft of papermaking had survived and was being made in the Otomi village of San Pablito, Hidalgo.

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