Cora people

Cora
Náayarite

A group of Cora people photographed by Carl Sofus Lumholtz in 1896.
Total population
(Mexico: 24,390 (Mexican census 2000) (figure includes members of households where at least one parent or elder is a self-declared speaker of the Cora language))
Regions with significant populations
Mexico (states of Nayarit, Jalisco, Durango)
Languages
Cora, Spanish
Religion
Syncretism, Animism, Peyotism, and Roman Catholic
Related ethnic groups
Tepehuánes and Huicholes

The Cora are an indigenous ethnic group of Western Central Mexico which live in the municipality El Nayar in the Mexican state of Nayarit and in a few settlements in the neighboring state of Jalisco. They call themselves náayerite (plural; náayeri singular), whence the name of the present day Mexican state of Nayarit. The 2000 Mexican census reported that there were 24,390 persons who were members of Cora speaking households, these being defined as households where at least one parent or elder claim to speak the Cora language. Of these 24 thousand, 67 percent (16,357) were reported to speak Cora, 17 percent were nonspeakers, and the remaining 16 percent were unspecified with regard to their language.

The Cora cultivate maize, beans, and amaranth and they raise some cattle.

The Cora live in the rugged mountain and canyon country of Nayarit and across the border in neighboring Jalisco, Durango, and Zacatecas. In the early 18th century they were an anomaly in that they had never permitted Catholic missionaries to live in their country. They had become a pagan island in a sea of Christian Indians and Hispanic culture. In 1716, a Spanish expedition to attempt to bring the Cora under Spanish control failed. However, in 1722, the Spanish returned in force and the Cora yielded. According to Spanish accounts many of them became Christian and practice, up until the present, “Catholic-derived customs.”

The Cora religion is a syncretism between the pre-Conquest religion and Catholicism.

The ancestral Cora religion has three principal divinities. The supreme god is the sun god, Tayau, "our father". He travels across the sky during the day, sitting down in his golden throne at noon. Clouds are believed to be smoke from his pipe. In earlier times the priests of Tayau, the tonatí, were the highest authority of the Cora communities. His wife is Tetewan, the underworld goddess associated with the moon, rain, and the west. Her alternate names are Hurima and Nasisa. Their son, Sautari, "the flower picker", is associated with maize and the afternoon. Other names for him are Hatsikan, "big brother", Tahás, and Ora. He is also associated with Jesus Christ.