no doubt that the concoction is highly perishable and must be consumed quickly. When the drink would go bad, the Aztecs called the spoiled, foul-smelling libation octli poliuhqui (spoiled pulque)—perhaps this was how the Spanish got the name for pulque.
Although pulque was by far the most important, all sorts of other fermented alcoholic beverages were crafted in Mesoamerica: matzaoctli (pineapple wine), xoco octli (wine made with the “hog plums” of genus Spondias), tlaoloctli (maize wine), and capuloctli (wine made from the cherries of Prunus capuli), among other potent drinks capable of causing altered states of consciousness.
It has long been assumed that no one there knew about spirits-distillation until the Spanish came and showed them. But in recent years, mezcal-making experiments have been performed using replicas of two-tiered pre-Columbian clay pots, for which the previously assumed use was bean-cooking. A team of scientists, mezcal producers, and archaeologists placed fermented agave mash in the bottoms of the bean-pot “stills,” heated them from below, and collected the resulting condensations from the upper halves. The alcohol contents suggested that it was entirely possible that indigenous peoples knew how to distill. A recent ethnoarchaeological study confirms this.
Along with alcoholic beverages, the conquistadors found natives using such mind-altering substances as peyotl (Lophophora williamsii, or peyote cactus “buttons”), teonanácatl (Psilocybe fungi, or so-called magic mushrooms), and ololiuhqui (Ipomoea violacea L., or morning glory seeds). Yet no substance was quite so venerated in the Aztec world as pulque, which was believed to be a form of divine breast milk.
The Aztecs worshipped multiple gods, who governed many different aspects of their world. There were the feathered serpent-god Quetzalcóatl (ruling the planet Venus, arts, crafts, wind, dawn, and knowledge) and Tezcatlipoca (overseeing sorcery, thievery, and the dark sides of life). Their sacred maguey goddess, Mayahuel, is usually depicted in codices in the company of a flowering agave and a vessel of pulque, much like the one Anita had on the counter of her stall. She is also shown with multiple breasts, for nursing pulque to the Centzon Totochtin, the four hundred rabbit-moon pulque gods who represented the infinite forms that intoxication could assume.
According to one myth, Mayahuel was a lovely maiden who lived in the sky with her grandmother, one of the devilish tzitzimime (star-gods) that tried to keep the sun from rising. One day, Mayahuel was swept away by Quetzalcóatl, and as they were entwined in a verdant tree, her angry grandmother sent some of her cohorts to destroy them. Quetzalcóatl managed to escape, but Mayahuel was chopped to bits. After her lover returned and buried her remains, they sprouted into agaves, which is why she was considered the mother of all maguey.
The Aztecs are often considered warlike, superstitious, and legendary for ghoulish human sacrifices, which they performed in the tens of thousands. But they were hardly unsophisticated, and were skilled in astronomy and medicine. The Spaniards were awestruck by their capital, Tenochtitlán, a city of splendid buildings and canals that occupied an island with an altitude of 7,350 feet in the middle of Lake Texcoco. It had a population of over two hundred thousand at the time, more people than in London, and has evolved over the centuries into Mexico City, which now has over twenty-one million inhabitants in its greater metropolitan area.
The Aztecs were wary of the destructive potential of alcohol over their society, and they revered the power of intoxication. Because of the dual nature of pulque—that is, nourishing and damaging in equal measure—its use was strictly regulated. No one younger than fifty-two was allowed to drink it regularly, except for pregnant women, priests, and sacrificial victims. Anyone else caught swilling pulque might be executed.
Yet, with the disintegration of Aztec culture during the Spanish Conquest, pulque found its way into mainstream use. By the nineteenth century, there were pulque bars all over Mexico City, and agave plantations supplied a national thirst for the drink, which was celebrated in art, music, and literature. Just as tobacco, once revered by the Aztecs as a sacred herb, became a source of addiction, so pulque lost its honored place and alcohol abuse became widespread.
WE BEGAN FINDING our way back through the dizzying market. Ron led me past bustling women in flowered aprons and men hauling handcarts laden with goods. We stopped at a stall where Ron knew the friendly proprietor. She served us steaming bowls of goat stew. We topped them with salsa, chopped cabbage, pinches of cilantro, and squeezes of lime, then wolfed down our comida (lunch) with warm corn tortillas that came wrapped in an embroidered cloth napkin tucked inside a straw basket.
“There’s an ancient Huaxtec legend,” Ron told me between bites of goat, “that warns of the dangers of the fifth pulque. That’s the one that gets you really fucked up! After drinking five cups, a chieftain got naked and scandalized his tribe.”
Since I was still feeling the effects of just two pulques, I could only imagine what drinking five might be like. Yet it was interesting to imbibe something so deeply rooted in the past of this place. Was I feeling the same way as others had a hundred years ago, or a thousand, or even more? Or had something been lost in translation—certain sensations, or a higher consciousness that one was meant to tune into?
It was impossible to know, but I could just as easily have asked the same questions after eating chocolate, which had also originated in Mesoamerica, possessing its own sacred role in Aztec religion before becoming molded into Hershey’s Kisses on assembly lines. But not once during my chocolate-consuming life had it occurred to me to wonder about its history for even a second.
There was something else, too. Looking around, I could see how it might be fun to get to know your favorite chocolate vendor, talk to her about where her cacao beans had come from and who had grown them, and ask her to grind them just so. Here, it seemed, shoppers weren’t so much interested in products as in ingredients and the people and stories behind them.
OUR BELLIES FULL of goat stew and the pulque still in our systems, we emerged from the darkened recesses of Abastos Market into the blazing sun that pounded the wide boulevard outside. This may have been the rainy season, but it could be incredibly hot anyway. The traffic lanes were clogged with a slow-moving procession of taxis decorated with elaborate floral arrangements and brightly colored crêpe streamers. It was fiesta day for the Oaxacan cabbies, and they were having fun making their way around town, honking the horns of their taxis and blasting salsa music through their stereo speakers.
Ron told me that fiestas are almost a daily occurrence in Oaxaca—mostly held for religious observances. But there were also some esoteric ones, such as Noche de Rábanos (Radish Night), which takes place in December. For this annual competition, the crimson root vegetables (a Spanish introduction) are painstakingly carved into saints, nativity scenes, and human figures, then displayed in the town plaza. The winning sculpture appears in local newspapers. I wondered if Ron was pulling my leg—until I came across a postcard of a disturbingly depicted radish-person. That’s probably how I look to most people who live here, I thought: pink and strange.
Across the boulevard from the market were a couple of bodegas selling mezcal. I followed Ron between the taxis to one of them, a dimly lit shop. As my eyes adjusted, I could see a broad assortment of vessels: plastic garrafones (jugs, or jerry cans), glass bottles of various shapes and sizes, hand-painted gourds, and crudely made clay vessels. A number of ceramic containers were shaped like changos (monkeys), and others had been garishly formed and painted as lactating breasts and ejaculating penises. Ron explained that mezcal is widely considered an aphrodisiac.
There were also bottles of pink, baby blue, and caramel-colored cremas (cream-flavored mezcals), as well as expensive especial mezcals, like pechuga (breast), named after the chicken part traditionally hung in the still vapor during pechuga distillation, and tobalá, made from the wild-grown Agave potatorum. Ron speculated that both these fancier types were likely fakes. Bottled mezcals of varying shades of brown (reposados and añejos) were allegedly barrel aged—but Ron said many makers just added dye. Last, but not least, a huge glass jar on the shop counter held brackish-looking mezcal and several inches of what appeared to be wrinkled pinkish-red