BajaNomad

Second Harvest

bajalera - 3-17-2004 at 11:00 PM

A fellow Bajaficionado and I are having a friendly difference of opinion about the term "Second Harvest," as it is applied historically in Baja California.

One of us says, "Most people who tune in to the Nomad board know what this refers to."

The other says, "Oh no they don't"

If you can spare time to take part in a little survey with no importance whatsoever and no redeeming features at all, we'd appreciate your posting a Yes if you know what the Second Harvest was, or a No if you don't--or being wordier than that, of course, if you happen to feel like it.

Lera

elgatoloco - 3-17-2004 at 11:18 PM

Like recycling, only different. ;)

David K - 3-18-2004 at 12:32 AM

Yes, sort of a what goes in must come out, with an encoure!

Second Harvest

Mike Humfreville - 3-18-2004 at 12:48 AM

The first time I heard the term it was used in Jesuit Fra Baegerts book written in the mid 1700's after he has spent 17 years living across the peninsula.

His "second harvest" was a term reflecting habits of Cochimi Indians (Inhabiting approximately the central desert region of Baja), and indicative of a habit they employed to keep themselves alive.

Unfortunately, our copy of this 300 year old book died in the fire that destroyed our home in 1997, but having read the details, they're difficult to forget.

The "rancheros" (nomadic tribes) of Cochimi wandered throughout the central desert during the difficult times of the year for the purpose of gathering food (Agave, lizards, snakes, rabbits, whatever). Assumedly they were territorial and used their familiar camps as they wandered and used the same locations to defecate. Then, during the early spring, the leanest part of the yearly cycle foodwise, when they returned to these same sites as their previous yearly cycle, some of them (young and elderly assumedly) were literally starving.

They would return to the sites of their year-old defecations, locate their own tribes droppings, pick the undigested seeds out of the filth, grind them up and cook and then eat them.

Hey, it kept them alive. I was going to say it kept them going but that might have conjured up another notion. I bet Neal Johns knows about Fra Baegerts book. Perhaps, if fact, they were friends!!!

Skeet/Loreto - 3-18-2004 at 05:13 AM

Good Morning Mike:
It was referred to in "Black Robes of Lower California" which I first read in 1981.
Your question has given me cause to read it again.
Skeet/Loreto

"In God We Trust"

Second Harvest

academicanarchist - 3-18-2004 at 07:30 AM

The term originally came from Baegert's book, originally published in exile following the Jesuit expulsion in 1767/1768. He served at San Luis Gonzaga in the Magdalena Desert, and the natives were the Guaycuros and not the Cochimi (actually a linguistic group). Baegert also directed the construction of the Church with two towers that still survives at the site.

Petroglyph from Big Bend

academicanarchist - 3-18-2004 at 07:49 AM

I previously posted several photos from a rock overhand in Big Bend State Park with petroglyhs dating bacj around 4,000 years. I found in one of my files this photo from that series, that I had forgotten about. It looks to me like a couple of sun/star symbols, and a human figure.

[Edited on 3-18-2004 by academicanarchist]

PITAHAYES FRUIT

Baja Bernie - 3-18-2004 at 03:55 PM

A long while ago 'Jesse' posted a thread on harvesting the PITAHAYAS FRUIT from the cactus--The seeds of this plant are the ones recycled by many Indians in Baja Sur. Often they did not wait for the next year. The Padres took a dim view of this survival technigue. I should point out that the harvesting or re-harvesting is no longer in use.

David K - 3-18-2004 at 07:02 PM

Yah, specially since the Indaians are all gone!

I think 'Lera wanted to see how many here knew what the 'second harvest' was... but we couldn't restrain ourselves from answering...

AA may know for a fact, but I did read that there really was no 'second harvest'... The missionairies thought the natives were so primitive, they invented the Second Harvest in their reports to show disgust for the primitive people... who wanted to remain naked, eat fruit, fish, and have orgies... (something wrong with that?)

Second Harvest

academicanarchist - 3-19-2004 at 08:14 AM

The Baegert account says that it did take place, and he was the guy on the spot writing about it. Unfortunately, as David points out, the natives are gone, and they did not leave their version of things for us.

David K - 3-19-2004 at 08:21 AM

Robert, how would you describe Baegert's opinion of the naitive Californian's?

Baegert's Opinion of native peoples

academicanarchist - 3-19-2004 at 12:21 PM

Pretty consistent with the opinion of most missionaries towards native peoples in Baja California, California, and other areas where European missionaries tried to elevate and bring culture to peoples they considered to be inferior and child-like savages, pretty denigrating. Given the prevailing attitude of the missionaries towards the natives, based on assumptions they went to the missions already believing, and also given that Baegert was writing for people with like mentalities and attitudes towards native peoples, I do not believe that he had to make up things about native practices such as the second harvest. If you have seen the movie Black Robe, there is a scene that is very telling. LaForgue is a young priest, and talks with a Jesuit who had just returned from Canada. The natives had disfigured the Jesuit. LaForgue asks what has happened to him, and his response was the the "savages" did this to him. If you read the early Jesuit reports on the Baja California missions, and particulalry the 1744 reports, you get a clear sense that there was a collective disparaging of the Baja California natives by the missionaries. this mentality was also codified in Spanish colonial law that governed the Indians. They were legally defined as "ninos con barbas," or children with beards, meaning that although they were physically mature adults, the underlying assumption was that they were intellectually inferior children.

[Edited on 3-19-2004 by academicanarchist]

bajalera - 3-19-2004 at 01:17 PM

Baegert was a complex man, who wrote in bitterness (and as a Jesuit was, I think, entitled to be). There's a definite pattern to his writing style--he opens a discussion with a lot of negatives, then often mellows out--but in statements that are easily overlooked unless you read carefully.

For example, he describes peninsula Indians as stupid, awkward, rude, etc., but in the middle of the next paragraph says, "They are endowed with reason and understanding like other people, and I think that, if in their early childhood they were sent to Europe, the boys to seminaries and colleges, and the girls to convents, they would go as far as any European in mores, virtues, in all arts and sciences. Many good examples of that can be found in different American provinces."

For the era of Euro-centrism in which it was written, that statement is practically heretical.

Baegert describes the Second Harvest in the usual picking-out-the-seeds terminology (which I'm convinced is not applicable), and adds, "Whether all this happens because of want, voracity, or out of love for the pitahayas, I leave undecided." That last option, I think, also indicates an unusual degree of understanding for its time.

The detailed Second Harvest process Miguel del Barco describes in his Historia natural y cronica doesn't look to me like stuff he would have made up.

One of the interesting things about Baegert, to me, is that the only place his name appears in del Barco's book--except on a list of Jesuits who worked in Baja--is in Miguel Leon-Portilla's footnotes. The guy apparently did something to pee off del Barco.

bajalera

PEE OFF? Let's make that p*ss off!

[Edited on 3-19-2004 by bajalera]

[Edited on 3-19-2004 by bajalera]

second harvest

marv sherrill - 3-19-2004 at 02:22 PM

I recall from a book on Islands of Baja - small paperback - that the pitahya is quite nutritious but causes extreme bloating and swelling of the face to such an extent that some could not see. The only reason for eating the seeds a second time is that they took on hallucinogenic properties after passing through the human intestinal tract - so the second harvest had a specific purpose... probably the only reason anybody would do it....

DelBarco and Baegert

academicanarchist - 3-19-2004 at 03:01 PM

You have to keep in mind that both men were in exile when they wrote their accounts, and DelBarco was writing primarily to correct the errors he believed were in Venegas's official history. Pitahaya Fruit is very nutricious, as is all cactus fruit. In terms of causing hallucinations, you may be confusing it with Peyote.

bajalera - 3-19-2004 at 04:06 PM

The bloating description comes from Baegert, who said he didn't recognize some of his converts after they'd been pigging out on pitahayas for a couple of months.

Baegert wrote in protest of the Venegas/Burriel book as well.

Baja Bernie - 3-19-2004 at 08:53 PM

Still wish Jesse would chime in with his story about harvesting the seeds.

more pitahayas

bajalera - 3-19-2004 at 10:14 PM

Okay, I lose the argument: most bajaficionados apparently don't know about the Second Harvest. But those who do have interesting things to say, and I thank you all. "The Second Harvest Revisited" is Chapter 7 of a book I'm writing, and I'm grateful for the input.

And Jesse, up there in TJ: sign me on with Bernie--I wish you'd re-share your pitahaya experiences.

Marv, if you remember the name of that book I'd sure like to know what it was--I haven't heard of that particular slant before.

bajalera

Tell Us About Your Book

academicanarchist - 3-20-2004 at 05:26 AM

Tell us about your book project. Chapter 7 sounds interesting. The second harvest was a rational response to cycles of abundance and dearth in a hostile environment.

[Edited on 3-20-2004 by academicanarchist]

Stephanie Jackter - 3-21-2004 at 12:47 AM

Quote:

AA may know for a fact, but I did read that there really was no 'second harvest'... The missionairies thought the natives were so primitive, they invented the Second Harvest in their reports to show disgust for the primitive people... who wanted to remain naked, eat fruit, fish, and have orgies... (something wrong with that?)


.....only for Republicans.......- Stephanie

Stephanie Jackter - 3-21-2004 at 12:58 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by academicanarchist
The Baegert account says that it did take place, and he was the guy on the spot writing about it. Unfortunately, as David points out, the natives are gone, and they did not leave their version of things for us.


History gets written by the most literate, not necessarily the most trustworthy or least prejudiced. Ethnocentric bias always has to be looked at as THE grain of salt in any account of Indian Tribes by so called "civilized" people.

Second Harvest

academicanarchist - 3-21-2004 at 06:12 AM

The problem I have with that position is that, given their clear bias towards the natives to begin with and the generalized perception that they were inferior savages, there was no need to invent stories such as the second harvest. Moreover, there are descriptions of the second harvest from several Jesuits, which makes me think that it was not made up. It is the task of the ethnohistorian to evaluate the reliability of sources, and given the context of the situation and the mind set of the Jesuits, I do not believe they made it up, or had a reason to do so. I would like to know the source that claimed that there was no second harvest, and the basis for the claim.

[Edited on 3-21-2004 by academicanarchist]

Perspectives

academicanarchist - 3-21-2004 at 06:18 AM

Many years ago I was giving a talk at a library in Santa Cruz about Santa Cruz mission. I was making reference to one of the handful of oral history accounts recorded in the 1870s of a former mission resident, who discussed the murder of a Franciscan. There are many details in the account that confirm, in my mind, its accuracy, details corroborated by contemporary Spanish documents. The account described how, following the murder of the missionary, the men released the women from the dormitory where they were kept at night, and essentially had an orgy. A man in the audience who claimed to be a Native American said the account could not be true, because Native Americans don't have orgies. A little revisionistic history.

since you asked, anarchist . . .

bajalera - 3-21-2004 at 11:30 AM

My initial game plan was to make available in one book nine papers on Baja written by my late husband, an anthropologist (resetting the type for the sake of consistency). This plan veered off course largely because of Baja Nomad. And for that I'm grateful to Jefe Doug Means and all you enthusiastic Bajaficionados who post on this board.

To make the papers more readable for people who aren't anthropologists, I had already edited several of them to the husband's satisfaction (no big deal, editing is what I've mostly done for a living). But reading Nomad posts gave me the idea people might also be interested in some stuff I've written (or in some cases just thought about) over the years, and haven't seen published elsewhere.

The Second Harvest Revisited chapter is an example of my approach. Personal experience with pitahaya eating gave me a clue as to what was actually involved, a hunch reinforced by Miguel del Barco's first-hand account. This evidence indicates that the process was nowhere near as disgusting as commonly described.

Or maybe not. Yesterday I said, "Another thing about the Second Harvest--" at the breakfast table, and was interrupted by the anthropologist-in-residence, who said, "Mom, if you don't mind, save that till I've finished eating!"

So there you are.

bajalera

Anarchist,

Stephanie Jackter - 3-21-2004 at 12:31 PM

I'm not arguing that it did or didn't happen. I'm just saying that you shouldn't look to the historical documents for anything near propper context. If you've ever had occasion to be at an event where something was blown totally out of proportion by modern press, and I have, you would take whatever a spaniard had to say about the "heathen" indians, with plenty of suspicion.

Even the orgy could have well been an act of protest toward the idiots who were isolating the women in convents- their captors- a way of collectively saying "screw you", as opposed to any kind of common practice. The insertion of these dominating people who hated them into their lives would not only color what was recorded, but the very nature of the activities that were being recorded.

I also wonder if the people who made the confirming accounts of these activities had any contact with each other or intermediaries between them. If so, one account of something done in the desperation of a late harvest or famine, could have been blown out of proportion, into something that was done regularly.

Sorry for being such a skeptic, but the void between historical perspectives and anthropological perspectives always fills up with a healthy dose of skepticism to account for bias and cultural contamination. Few ethnographic accounts stand out as suffering from neither.

The only relevance I see here is that finding cutural definitives in these accounts might, itself, be very similar to picking through doo doo to find pithayas. - Stephanie

David K - 3-21-2004 at 12:32 PM

Lera, Bruce Barber of San Felipe just published his book and one is being sent to me this week. He has a lot of Indian anthropology in it, I understand. Perhaps you would find some good details in it. As soon as I get it, details will be posted. If you would like me to make a Baja connection, drop me an email. Bruce is meeting me at Parral Canyon after my San Pedro Martir hike and he also is going to the Pyramid Resort's book signing party on May 1.

Debate

academicanarchist - 3-21-2004 at 02:39 PM

Stephanie. I agree that what the Spaniards wrote about Indians has to be treated carefully, which I do in my own writings, and good historians do not always accept what historical sources have to say. There are many very poor historians who do, on the other hand, read too much into what the Spanish did say. One example of this can be found in the writing of Peter Masten Dunne, S.J., or Zephyrin Engelhardt, O.F.M.. I also know that there is some controversy in anthropology, as evidenced by revelations a few years back about Margaret Meade. I have always thought that a few anthropologists have had the wool pulled over their eyes.

the real second harvest

bajagrouper - 3-21-2004 at 05:18 PM

happens every Sunday morning at the Hotel Serenidad...half full glasses of every drink are left around the pool,all you do is pour the leftovers into a large glass and drink...now that's a second harvest...ol

All the more confirmation of how difficult it would be to parse truth our of century old accounts.

Stephanie Jackter - 3-21-2004 at 06:06 PM

Quote:
AA: I also know that there is some controversy in anthropology, as evidenced by revelations a few years back about Margaret Meade. I have always thought that a few anthropologists have had the wool pulled over their eyes.

bajalera - 3-21-2004 at 08:33 PM

Stephanie and AA, I think we all object to the same kind of bias. Today I ran across this example from Padre Salvatierra's account of the building of a road from Loreto to San Javier:

A Capt. Mendoza, who had built roads on the mainland, scouted the area, and with 9 soldiers worked with picks and axes on terrain so rocky it wore out their shoes. They came to a place that needed a bridge, which would take 3 months--"when an Indian from Vigge came and said it was more practical to make the road on the other side. Don Cristobal Guitierrez and soldier Melchor de Luna accompanied the Indian, and later walked a little way and found the narrow trail--and on seeing it recognized the advantrage of opening the road through there in 3 days instead of 3 months."

So three Spaniards get named, but the guy who should be credited with the basic smarts was the anonymous Indian.

bajalera

Yep, that's classic

Stephanie Jackter - 3-22-2004 at 12:02 AM

I just visited an art exhibition in Phoenix which featured American "Masters". Well, that was debatable.....After walking through rooms and rooms of portraits of "Lady so and so" and Judge so and so, and merchant so and so, etc., almost all of which were poor looking copies of the style of the European masters, I came across this portrait of a black man, obviously a slave, that just jumped out of the frame; his smile and character were so vibrant looking. I looked in the guide to find the name of the painting and it said "Head of a Negro". But, after all the years, the subject, being the most compelling in the whole gallery, got the last laugh whether he was credited or not. You could almost tell on his face, he knew he would. - Stephanie

Second harvest

jrbaja - 3-24-2004 at 07:39 AM

Some of the best tomatoes I have seen came from a leak in a sewer pipe above our house. I had to complement our neighbors in their choice of salsas to produce such quality items. Does that apply as second harvest ??:lol:

Second Harvest

academicanarchist - 3-24-2004 at 08:15 AM

Marginally only. :lol:

Neal Johns - 3-24-2004 at 07:06 PM

Mike H.
Since I knew what the Second Harvest was, I just got around to reading this topic.

Bottom line - You're dead meat! :o:lol: