Every year, 40 days before Easterthe towns of the Humahuaca in Jujuy they celebrate their own Carnival. The festivity combines the traditional European celebration, introduced more than 500 years ago by the Spanish during the conquest of America, and cults of the native peoples of the region linked to the land.
The Carnival of the Quebrada de Humahuaca It begins the Saturday before the Carnival weekend, when groups of comparsas arrive at the foot of the hills that surround the towns to dig up the “devil”, who was buried at the end of the last carnival. The “evil” is a small doll, called pucllay, which symbolizes the sun. According to the local myth, he was in charge of fertilizing the earth, recognized as the pachamama. Once the devilish puppet is unearthed, the curious celebration begins.
With loud fireworks, the procession starts running down the hill with a hundred participants dressed as devils, in many cases drunk. The festivity and the locals dance to the rhythm of the “jujeño carnival. Live music is performed with native instruments such as erkenchos, anatas, charangos and bass drums.
The traditional comparsas carry banners that identify them and go through the streets of the town, where in different houses they are invited to toast with native and artisanal alcoholic beverages. The inhabitants who receive the comparsas dress in colorful costumes using bells and masks, paint their faces with flour and many carry basil branches, leaving a particular aroma on the sidewalks.
According to custom, then comes the time for the “fort.” After parading through the streets of the towns, the comparsas meet at strategic points where clubs are created with music and dancing until dawn. Finally, on Carnival Sunday, after several days of celebration, the celebration ends with the new burial of the devil in the so-called “Temptation Sunday”. The participants return to the foot of the hills and bury the doll in a hole with different offerings and ending the closing celebration with fireworks.
In recent years, the presence of women among the massive number of disguised people has been noted, as confirmed by Susana Lascano, a young carnival devil, who told the Télam news agency that since she was a child she learned to make “the molds of the two-color ensemble, which is not just any garment, because for us it is a celebration to sketch it.” The female devils also command the comparsa, they are equal to the male devils and humorously replicate the performance among the people.
Unlike the devil, the devil’s costume, instead of wearing a headpiece, uses striking wigs along with a headband with horns and some choose to wear a mask and not a mask like the men’s. “Carnival allows those of us who share the same feelings to come together, and the excitement of seeing our comparsa take to the streets makes us enormously proud,” said the female representative of pucllay.
Source: TELAM
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