14 Short Mexican Legends based on popular folklore.

Several stories based on Mexican oral culture, legends with decades of history.

Short Mexican legends are famous for their mystical content and the cultural syncretism that shapes them. They are an important part of popular culture, since they represent and at the same time transmit values and imaginaries about life and death, masculine and feminine, morality and injustice, sanctions and rewards.

In this article you will find 12 short Mexican legends, as well as a brief description of these types of narratives and their functions. and what are the functions they fulfill.

14 Short Mexican Legends (and their meaning).

Legends are the stories that are transmitted from generation to generation through the spoken word, and to a lesser extent through texts. These are narratives that may include historical, fantastic or supernatural may include historical, fantastic or supernatural elements and characters, which interact with people and impact daily life phenomena.They interact with people and have an impact on the phenomena of everyday life. They have the function of explaining human or natural situations, and have the power to represent an important part of imaginaries, values and social conventions.

For the same reason, legends vary according to the place where they emerge and the culture that transmits them. In Mexican legends we can find a wide repertoire of symbolic images and mythical representations that fulfill important social functions. Although there are many more, we will now look at several short Mexican legends.

1. The Weeping Woman

Legend has it that a long time ago there was a woman who, in an attempt to take revenge on the man she loved, murdered her children by drowning them in a river. Immediately afterwards he repented, and out of guilt decided to commit suicide.

Since then, she wanders the streets of different cities at midnight (especially she appears near places where there is water), and repeats incessantly "Oh my children!". This is why she is known as "La Llorona."

The roots of this woman, and the motives that lead her to take revenge, vary according to the version.. There are also those who say that she is a woman who appears specifically to drunk men and punishes them by scaring them.

2. Popocatepetl and Iztaccihuatl

In central Mexico there are two volcanoes called Popocatépetl and Iztaccíhuatl, as they were named by an Aztec warrior and the daughter of one of the chiefs, respectively. Popocatépetl had to go to war, but promised Iztaccíhuatl that he would return as soon as possible.

However, another warrior who had heard them and was also in love with the chief's daughter, let Iztaccihuatl know that Popocatepetl had died in combat, although this had not happened. The sadness was so great that Iztaccihuatl decided to take his own life, and when Popocatepetl returned and did not find his beloved, he did the same. In a sign of trembling, the gods decided to reunite decided to bring them together again in the form of two great volcanoes..

3. The alley of the kiss

This legend, typical of the city of Guanajuato, tells that a suspicious father had separated his daughter Carmen from her lover. He disliked the love affair so much that he promised to marry her to another man, richer and more prestigious, who lived outside the country. Before doing so, he locked his daughter in one of the typical houses of the city, which are characterized by being high up and very close to each other, divided only by a small alley.

Fortunately for the lovers, the window of Carmen's room adjoined the window of a house for sale, which was quickly acquired by the lover as the only solution for their reunion. Thus the lovers were able to be together again..

But, shortly after, they were discovered by the father, who, in a rage, thrust a knife into his daughter's chest. Her beloved could only kiss her goodbye. Since then, this alley has been baptized as the kissing alley, and it is a tradition for couples who cross it to kiss right there.

4. The Mayan hummingbird

They say when the Mayan gods created the earth, each animal was assigned a specific task. task. But when they finished, they realized that there was no one to transport the ideas, thoughts and desires from one to the other.

On top of that, they had run out of clay and corn, which are the materials from which they had created the rest of the things. They only had a small jade stone left, so they decided to carve it and create a small arrow. When they finished, they blew on it and it flew away. They had thus created a new being, which they called x'ts'unu'um, meaning hummingbird.

5. The Mulata of Córdoba

La Mulata de Córdoba was a woman condemned to be burned at the stake by the Holy Office, near the coast of eastern Mexico. She was attributed the power of eternal youth and to be the advocate of impossible cases, such as those of unemployed workers and single women. She was always surrounded by men who easily fell in love with her and lost the path of righteousness. In the face of all of the above, they said that he had pacts with the devil and that she even received him in her own house.

Until she was arrested by the Court of the Holy Inquisition, being accused of practicing witchcraft and of having arrived on a ship that had not docked on any beach. One night before serving her sentence and while in a cell, she asked for a piece of coal to be brought to her, with which she drew a ship and was able to fly outside the bars. Upon arrival, the guards could only find a smell of sulfur, the existence of which is recounted to this day.

6. Dead Man's Alley

This legend tells that in the city of Oaxaca, in the south of MexicoA man whose job was to light the city's oil lamps was murdered right there. He had finished his work, but immediately realized that one was missing, so he returned just before going home. He died mysteriously and, since then, legend has it that his soul appears after 9:00 p.m. to wander the alley of the oil lamps.

This is one of the legends of Mexico with more recent origins, but it is still part of the popular culture of the region.

7. The nagual

Since pre-Hispanic times, several of the gods that have been part of Mexican culture have had the ability to change from human form to that of an animal. This faculty was later transferred to sorcerers, witches and shamans, who acquired the animal's acquire the abilities of the animal into which they are transformed and use it in and use it in favor of the community.

Thus, legend has it that the nahuales constantly appear to people, especially at midnight and taking the form of common animals.

This is one of the Mexican legends that shows the influence of pre-Hispanic folklore based on many animist beliefs according to which non-human objects and animals have intellectual faculties proper to our species.

8. Devil's Alley

Located in Mexico City, it is said that the devil himself appears in this alley. A skeptical man decided to verify this story.So one night he decided to walk down there. It was a shady place where there were some trees.

When he was not even halfway there, he stopped because he thought he saw a shadow behind a tree. He immediately continued walking, and they say that the shadow approached him, taking the form of a man who was laughing intensely. The previously skeptical man ran away, but he began to feel the ground sinking and trapping him tightly to prevent his escape.

However, he managed to escape and transmit his encounter with the devil to those he met along the way. In other versions it is said that the apparition was to a drunk man and that, to avoid it, it is necessary to deposit jewels and offerings daily under the tree where he appears.

9. The Island of the Dolls

In Xochimilco, one of the delegations of Mexico City where there is a large lake with numerous trajineras, it is said that a man named Julian Santana recovers the dolls' island. a man named Julian Santana used to collect abandoned dolls..

The man lived in one of these trajineras, and the reason he collected the figures was to scare away the lake spirits. Specifically, Don Julian offered these dolls as a symbol of peace to ward off the spirit of a girl who drowned there.

Currently there is a small island with the dolls collected by Don Julian in the canals of Xochimilco, and it is said that the soul of this man constantly returns to take care of them. In this way, this Mexican legend has given way to an urban legend whose reality takes place in the present time.

10. Princess Donají

This legend tells that Cosijopi, the last governor of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec in southern Mexico, had a daughter whom he named Donaji. During a war between the Mixtecs and Zapotecs, Donají was captured as a hostage and later beheaded. Although her body was buried, the location of her head was never revealed.

Some time later, a shepherd passing through the Oaxacan highlands plucked a lily (a wild flower also known as a lily). In doing so, he found what appeared to be a human head under the earth, and upon rescuing it, he took it and her body to be reunited in the temple of Cuilapam. It was then that the soul of the princess Donají could finally rest in peace..

This is another of the many examples that show to what extent death has a relevant role in Mexican legends, and almost always goes hand in hand with narrative elements related to drama.

11. The Vampire Tree of Guadalajara

Many years ago, a foreigner from Europe arrived in a village in the area of Guadalajara, Mexico. He was a strange and reserved person, but his lack of interest in socializing with the people of the region was not the most disturbing thing.

In fact, since the arrival of this mysterious man, first animal corpses began to appear, and then the lifeless bodies of children, all of them drained of blood.

One night, the villagers decided to look for the stranger to confront him, assuming he was the perpetrator. That night they found him trying to bite a villager, so they drove a wooden stake through him and then buried his body under a pile of bricks.

Years later a tree grew out of the bricks from the wooden stake, and it is said that when its branches are cut off, they It is said that when cutting its branches, streams of Blood appeared inside the cut, from the vampire's victims.of the victims of the Guadalajara vampire.

12. The legend of Tepoztécatl

Tepoztécatl is a legendary character from the Mexican region of Morelos. It is said that he was the son of a princess impregnated by magic through a small bird that landed on her shoulder. As she was not married, the princess' parents became angry with her, and the young woman was forced to separate from the baby once the birth took place.

And so began Tepoztécatl's journey, when his mother abandoned him in the forest and he was picked up by a colony of ants. These small insects fed him by cooperating with some bees, which gave up some of their honey so that the ants could take it to the little one.

Months later, the ants left the little Tepoztécatl next to an agave, and the agave took him among its leaves and fed him with its sap. Some time passed, and the agave left Tepoztécatl on some wood and placed him in the river, where the child traveled until an elderly couple from Tepoztlán found him and adopted him into their family.

Years later, when Tepoztécatl was already a strong and intelligent young man, a monster in the shape of a giant snake called Mazacóatl appeared to terrorize to terrorize the people of the region, and the old man who had adopted the young boy was chosen to fight it. As he felt old and weak, his godson Mazacóatl replaced him, and killed the serpent using a blade made of obsidian crystal.

13. The stone shepherdesses

This Mexican legend comes from Teloloapan. It tells us that many years ago, two shepherdesses joined a group of pilgrims who, having made promises who, having made promises to the Lord of Chalma, would walk to his hermitage for several days to pay tribute to him.

But at a certain point in the journey, the shepherdesses told the rest that they were exhausted, and that they regretted having promised to go to Chalma, so they would wait there for the group of pilgrims to return on their way back. However, when they started walking again, the pilgrims looked back and instead of seeing the shepherdesses, they saw two rocks in the shape of women.

14. The grotto of Xalapa

In the hill of Macuiltépetl, belonging to the city of Xalapa, there is a cave in which it is said that once a year mountains of treasures and riches appear. once a year mountains of treasures and riches appear, visible only to people in extreme need.visible only to people in extreme need. One day, a mother who had spent all her money trying to cure her baby without any positive result, saw a golden reflection inside the cave, and upon entering it, she saw great mountains of gold.

Carrying her baby in her arms, she left it on a pile of coins and began to fill her pockets with riches, using both arms to carry more and leave it in the saddlebags of her mule, which was waiting outside. But as he returned to the cave to fetch more gold and carry it to the saddlebags, he saw that both the treasure and the baby had disappeared.

Bibliographical references:

• Erbiti, A. (2004): Mitos y leyendas de México. Buenos Aires: Círculo Latino Austral.
• Fernández del Castillo, Francisco (1991): Tacubaya. History, legends and characters. Mexico D. F.: Porrúa.