The Coronado Expedition to Tierra Nueva: The 1540-1542 Route across the Southwest

22. A Large Canyon Like Those of Colima

W. MICHAEL MATHES 304 n the “Relación de la Jornada de Cíbola,” its author Pedro de Castañeda (1596: 80v–81r), a former resident of Culiacán and member of the expedition of Francisco Vázquez de Coronado of 1540–1542, stated that after four days’ march across the plains, Rodrigo Maldonado reached “una barranca grande como las de colima,” where the entire expedition subsequently camped for an unspecified time. While the eastern escarpment of the Llano Estacado Caprock is broken by several large canyons and Castañeda had had ample experience observing the great barrancas of the Pacific slope of the Sierra Madre Occidental in his travel from Culiacán and the march northward, this particular canyon of the Llano Estacado was, to him, specifically and notably different from those others, in that it was “like those of Colima” (Mora 1992: 101). The question therefore arises relative to Castañeda’s need for such a precise topographic description of the campsite barranca. In the sixteenth century the alcaldía mayor of Colima, centered on the villa of Colima, incorporated a far greater territory than the modern state of the same name. The jurisdiction was bounded on the south by the Pacific Ocean, on the east by the Río Coahuayana, on the west by the Ríos Purificación and Apamila, and on the north by a line extending eastward from a point somewhat south of Autlán, C H A P T E R 2 2 W.MICHAEL MATHES A Large Canyon Like Those of Colima 304 A LARGE CANYON LIKE THOSE OF COLIMA 305 continuing south of Tapalpa and Sayula, and thence southeasterly to Jilotlán. This administrative district incorporated the numerous barrancas to the east of the Nevado de Colima and Volcán de Colima formed by the Río El Naranjo and the Río Tuxpán. The valley between the volcanoes and the Cerro de Tuxpán formed by these rivers was the principal route from the coast and villa of Colima to the crossroads at the commercial center of Sayula in the third decade of the sixteenth century and remains so today as the route followed by México 110 from Manzanillo to Guadalajara. During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, numerous mule caravans passed over this route to Sayula, from whence they continued northward to Guadalajara or eastward to Pátzcuaro and the Ciudad de México. Virtually anyone Map 18. Road from Colima to Compostela, mid-sixteenth century. W. MICHAEL MATHES 306 Figure 22.1. La Barranca Atenquique, Jalisco. Photo by W. Michael Mathis. traveling between the villa de Colima and the interior of the viceroyalty would be familiar with the canyons between that city and Zapotlán (Ciudad Guzmán) (Gerhard 1993: 178–182). Although a part of the neovolcanic axis of the region, the subregion of valleys of escarpmented slopes formed by the rivers El Naranjo and Tuxpán is composed of yellow and white sedimentary soils with extensive diatomaceous, gypsum, and similar calcium deposits. These deposits are particularly evident between Quesería, Colima, and Atenquique, Jalisco. The canyons formed by these rivers are relatively shallow and wide, rarely exceeding 120 meters in depth, and frequently reaching a width of 2 kilometers. The alluvial soils in the bottoms and on the walls of the canyons allow extensive vegetation, particularly during the rainy season from June to November. Because of the width of the canyons, the bottoms are generally farmed or used as pasture. An individual traveling from Colima to Nochistlán would easily distinguish between these canyons and the deeper, narrow canyons cut by the heavily flowing and rapidly descending rivers of the Sierra Madre and the interior highlands of modern Jalisco and Nayarit (Secretaria de Programación y Presupuesto 1987). These northern barrancas frequently reach depths of over 350 meters and rarely exceed more than a few hundred meters in width at the bottom. Thus, the A LARGE CANYON LIKE THOSE OF COLIMA 307 Figure 22.2. Barranca near San Juan Espanatica, Jalisco. Photo by W. Michael Mathis. canyons of Colima are specifically distinctive in size and nature from those found elsewhere on the northern Pacific watershed of New Spain. A visual survey of the topography and composition of canyons of the eastern escarpment of the Llano Estacado Caprock shows clearly that red and orange color of soil/rock strata, lack of vegetation on the...