Las flores del cacao

For this piece, I was inspired in amazonian systems of cultivation and edible plants domesticated by people in this region of the world. The cacao tree, from which chocolate comes from, was domesticated around 5000 years ago by Amazonian peoples in their gardens (chagras) immersed in the jungle and its biodiversity. From their chagras, cacao travelled through trade routes towards Mesoamerica (present-day Mexico and Central America) through the Pacific coast of what is now northern South America. The Olmecs where the first to grow cacao more than 3000 years ago in Mesoamerica. With time, cacao was grown and used by mayan and aztec populations. For them, the drink they prepared with the toasted and ground seeds was extremely valuable and only elites could consume it. Many nahua indigenous poets of what is now central Mexico dedicated poems to the tree, it’s flowers and fruits. Poet Xayacamach de Tizatlán wrote in the XV century: “He gets drunk with the heart of the cacao flower. A beautiful song resounds, Tlapalteuccitzin raises its chant. Fragrant are its flowers, the flowers tremble, the flowers of cacao.”