La Diablada

This weekend sees the annual festival of La Diablada, or the Devil's Carnival, in Oruro, Bolivia.




According to Whatsonwhen.com:

Every spring, Oruro goes into carnival mode. The costumes on show are phenomenal and include anything from llama herders to Amazonian Indians sporting feathered head-dresses. The combination of colour, outlandish masks, music, dance and fireworks is bound to leave you wide-eyed.




One of the highlights are the devil dancers, the tradition of which derives from a peculiar kind of devil worship. Oruro is a mining town and the locals, spending so much time underground, decided to adopt a god of the underworld. Christian tradition dictates that this must be the devil and the Oruro faithful thus adopted Satan, or Supay, as their god. They would perform sacrifices to the devil on a regular basis to ensure their safety in the mines and the devil dancing in the carnival derives from their belief in Satan as their protector underground.




These days, the procession tends to focus more on the patron saint of mining, the Virgen del Sovacón and Pachamama (Mother Earth) than the devil, but devil dances are still an important part of the proceedings. Supay and his wife Supay China are closely followed by a multitude of he-devils and she-devils. Next come a series of animal characters, common to the area during the Middle Ages, including snarling bears, graceful condors and pumas.




The carnival draws to an end on the Monday, known otherwise as the Día del diablo y del moreno. Revellers gather in the town square for a thunderous exchange of water bombs. Gringos beware!




All things come to an end with the ceremonies of Ch'alla. Liquid, both alcoholic and non-alcoholic, is ceremoniously poured onto the ground, back to Mother Nature where it came from. That is, if you don't mind wasting your drink!

It sounds very interesting - and it reminds me of similar 'mix-ups' when Christianity came to Africa, competing with the native Animist religions. There were many instances where a Christian icon, or the Devil, would be adopted by the locals in exchange for one of their own gods or ancestors, so that the two religions would become intermingled. It goes on to this day in Africa, where some 'churches' will worship Jesus Christ as the Son of God, but simultaneously offer animal sacrifices to the spirits of their ancestors. Strange mixture.

The video clip below shows La Diablada in full swing.

Peter