Carnival in Mazatlán

The Mazatlán Carnival is the most important carnival in Mexico and is said to be the third largest in the world after Rio and New Orleans .

history

Carnival has been celebrated in Mazatlán practically since the first settlers arrived in the region. The oldest recorded celebration of this kind took place on February 12, 1827. It was actually organized in the form of a protest by soldiers stationed in the port city, with which they wanted to draw attention to the outstanding payment of their wages , and degenerated into a lively celebration.

According to the old chronicles, about 40 to 50 masked people came together on that Shrove Tuesday, wearing long robes and large hats. They roamed the streets of the city, sang improvised ironic songs and pelted the area with flour and dyes.

The so-called flour games ( Juegos de Harina ), in which opposing groups threw flour at each other, enjoyed increasing popularity, especially in the late 19th century. If the flour was initially thrown around by hand from bowls carried with it, it was later fired in the form of projectiles .

Under the influence of porfiriatism , Mazatlán developed into a prosperous and prosperous city, which placed increasing value on sophistication and therefore wanted to get rid of its bad manners, which included throwing and bombarding with flour. The city authorities would have preferred to ban the flour game by decree , but did not dare to take this step in view of the great popularity it enjoyed in large parts of the population. In this respect, the custom was merely transformed, the throwing and bombarding with flour replaced by the components of confetti and streamers .

This type of carnival has been held since 1898 and initially took place in Plaza Machado and the surrounding streets, such as Avenida Carnaval . Due to the increasing number of participants over the years, the streets of the old town were soon no longer able to cope with this onslaught and therefore the carnival events were moved to the coast, where they now take place on the Paseo Olas Altas and Paseo Claussen along the Pacific and between Friday and Saturday Attract up to 60,000 people a night Tuesday.

Web links

• Official web representation (Spanish)
• Historia del Carnaval de Mazatlán (Spanish; accessed March 2, 2014)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Vis à vis: Mexico (Dorling Kindersley Verlag GmbH, Starnberg), p. 178 / ISBN 3928044133