Friars from centuries gone by
The village of Mama is in the south of the state, 57 km (35 miles) from Merida. In pre-Hispanic times it formed part of the lordship of Tutul Xiu, but in the 16th century it was established as an indigenous village and granted to the conquistador Juan Aguilar.
The place name is Maya, and possibly means “the water of Mam”, a word used for a maternal grandfather.
The old Franciscan monastery located in the center of the village was founded in 1612, and dedicated to the Assumption of Our Lady. According to father Diego López Cogolludo in his History of Yucatan, it held St. Anthony of Padua in Tekit as a visiting church.
The monastery complex was built in several stages between the 17th and 18th centuries. The oldest section comprises the presbytery, which was part of an earlier open or Indians’ chapel. In 1680, the religious administration of Mama was secularized, and it passed into the hands of the diocesan clergy as a parish.
The present church was completed on the 20th December 1756, as attested by an inscription on the façade, during the tenure of the parish priest Salvador Rosado.
The interior of the church of the Assumption in Mama retains various fragments of mural painting from the 17th century, which give an idea of the rich pictorial decoration the church once had, including painted reredoses, floral motifs and religious scenes.
The most outstanding is a composition showing two Franciscan friars seated on either side of a crest bearing the Cross of the Passion in the center.
The friars are depicted wearing the rough cloaks of their order, and a clerical tonsure or haircut in the form of a crown. They are sitting at a table in large wood and leather armchairs, of a kind popularly called “friars’ chairs”.
From its technical features, we can tell that these paintings were done by local artisans, who normally used the engravings and plates in contemporary religious volumes as models for their artworks.
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