ABSTRACT
The Isthmus of Tehuantepec properly begins south of the Los Tuxtlas Range, on the basin of the mighty Coatzacoalcos River. Coatzacoalcos means in Nahuatl “in the sanctuary of the serpent,” and the name itself suggests the fantastic winding road the river travels-from its unknown sources in the Chimalapa mountains, through vast unexplored jungles, and into the plains of southern Vera Cruz, to empty into the Gulf of Mexico. Indian life, little changed since the days of the Conquest, survives today in the beautiful villages of Zaragoza, Otiapa, and Cosoleacaque, despite their glittering white churches and motor-buses and the cosmopolitan influence of near-by Minatitlán. The people of Cosoleacaque are handsome and clean, with fine faces and small, strong, stocky bodies. The men are always away from the village during the day, at work in their distant corn patches.
