Santa María del Tule is a town and a
municipality
A municipality is usually a single administrative division having municipal corporation, corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate.
The term ''municipality' ...
in the
Mexican state
A Mexican State (), officially the Free and Sovereign State (), is a constituent federative entity of Mexico according to the Constitution of Mexico. Currently there are 31 states, each with its own constitution, government, state governor, a ...
of
Oaxaca
Oaxaca, officially the Free and Sovereign State of Oaxaca, is one of the 32 states that compose the political divisions of Mexico, Federative Entities of the Mexico, United Mexican States. It is divided into municipalities of Oaxaca, 570 munici ...
.
It is part of the
Centro District
Centro District is located in the Valles Centrales Region of the State of Oaxaca, Mexico. The district includes the state capital Oaxaca and satellite towns.
The district has an average elevation of 1,550 meters.
The climate is mild, with averag ...
in the
Valles Centrales region.
It is located SE of the
city of Oaxaca on Highway 190.
The town and municipality are named for the patron saint of the place, the
Virgin Mary
Mary was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Saint Joseph, Joseph and the mother of Jesus. She is an important figure of Christianity, venerated under titles of Mary, mother of Jesus, various titles such as Perpetual virginity ...
and “Tule” comes from the
Náhuatl
Nahuatl ( ; ), Aztec, or Mexicano is a language or, by some definitions, a group of languages of the Uto-Aztecan language family. Varieties of Nahuatl are spoken by about Nahuas, most of whom live mainly in Central Mexico and have smaller pop ...
word “tulle” or “tullin” which means
bulrush
Bulrush is a vernacular name for several large wetland graminoid, grass-like plants
*Sedge family (Cyperaceae):
**''Cyperus''
**''Scirpus''
**''Blysmus''
**''Bolboschoenus''
**''Scirpoides''
**''Isolepis''
**''Schoenoplectus''
**''Trichophorum''
...
.
The town's claim to fame is as the home of a 2,000-year-old
Montezuma cypress
''Taxodium mucronatum'', commonly known as Montezuma bald cypress, Montezuma cypress, or ahuehuete, is a species of ''Taxodium'' that is primarily native to Mexico and Guatemala, with a few populations in the southwestern United States. Ahuehue ...
tree, known as the
El Árbol del Tule, which is one of the oldest, largest and widest trees in the world. Its gnarled trunk and branches are filled with shapes that have been given names such as “the elephant,” “the pineapple” and even one called “
Carlos Salinas’ ears.”
History
The municipality of Santa María del Tule used to be a lake surrounded by marshes which included cypress trees.
This marsh was also filled with bulrushes which accounts for part of the town's name.
The population of Tule had made their living since pre-Hispanic times extracting and processing
lime (calcium oxide) for sale in the city of Oaxaca. In 1926, much of the municipality was made
ejido
An ''ejido'' (, from Latin ''exitum'') is an area of communal land used for agriculture in which community members have usufruct rights, which in Mexico is not held by the Mexican state. People awarded ejidos in the modern era farm them indiv ...
land, and much of the population became farmers, growing corn, beans,
chickpeas
The chickpea or chick pea (''Cicer arietinum'') is an annual legume of the family Fabaceae, subfamily Faboideae, cultivated for its edible seeds. Its different types are variously known as gram," Bengal gram, garbanzo, garbanzo bean, or Egypt ...
and
alfalfa
Alfalfa () (''Medicago sativa''), also called lucerne, is a perennial plant, perennial flowering plant in the legume family Fabaceae. It is cultivated as an important forage crop in many countries around the world. It is used for grazing, hay, ...
, mostly during the rainy season in the summer.
Over the centuries, the area has dried with the lake and marshes gone.
More recently, increased urbanization and irrigated farming has put pressure on aquifers here. During the dry season, the water table decreases more than six meters. This drop in water tables threatens the survival of the remaining cypress trees in the area.
The town
The small town of Santa María del Tule appears to be built around one particularly large cypress tree with its crafts market, church and town plaza all next to it.
The La Guadalupana Market serves traditional Oaxacan dishes of the area including barbacoa and empanadas de Amarillo. The area is also noted for its ice cream which includes flavors such as cactus fruit, leche quemada (literally burnt milk) as well as specialties known as Beso de Angel (angel kiss) and Beso Oaxaqueño (Oaxacan kiss).
The town's
Baroque
The Baroque ( , , ) is a Western Style (visual arts), style of Baroque architecture, architecture, Baroque music, music, Baroque dance, dance, Baroque painting, painting, Baroque sculpture, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished from ...
-style church is called ''El Templo de Santa María de la Asunción'' (Temple of the
Virgin Mary of the Assumption) and dates from the 18th century.
The interior is graced by a number of very fine pre-colonial ''santos'' (statues of saints), many executed in a sumptuous polychrome and beautifully preserved.
[http://www.aug.edu/augusta/santos/tule/index.html Santos in Oaxaca's Ancient Churches: El Tule. Retrieved 2012-04-16.] It was built of stone over an ancient pagan shrine, and is surrounded by other buildings and areas belonging to the parish. A large walled plaza lies in front of the church.
Major celebrations here include Candelaria on 2 February, the Feast of the Assumption of Mary on 15 August and the Festival of the Tule Tree on the second Monday of October.
The Tule Tree

This tree is one of a number of old Montezuma cypress (''
Taxodium mucronatum
''Taxodium mucronatum'', commonly known as Montezuma bald cypress, Montezuma cypress, or ahuehuete, is a species of ''Taxodium'' that is primarily native to Mexico and Guatemala, with a few populations in the southwestern United States. Ahuehue ...
'') trees that grow in the town.
This particular tree is found in the town's center growing in both the town's main plaza and the atrium of the church of Santa María de la Asunción.
The tree is one of the oldest and largest in the world and has the widest girth.
It has an age of at least 2,000 years, with its existence chronicled by both the
Aztecs
The Aztecs ( ) were a Mesoamerican civilization that flourished in central Mexico in the post-classic period from 1300 to 1521. The Aztec people included different ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the ...
and the Spanish that founded the city of Oaxaca.
It has a height of forty meters, a volume of between , an estimated weight of 630 tons and a circumference of about forty meters.
The trunk is so wide that thirty people with arms extended joining hands are needed to encircle it.
The tree dwarfs the town's main church and is taller than its spires,
and it is still growing.
To the indigenous peoples of this area, the tree was sacred.
According to
Mixtec
The Mixtecs (), or Mixtecos, are Indigenous Mesoamerican peoples of Mexico inhabiting the region known as La Mixteca of Oaxaca and Puebla as well as La Montaña Region and Costa Chica of Guerrero, Costa Chica Regions of the state of Guerre ...
myth, people originated from cypress trees, which were considered sacred and a genus. This particular tree was the site of a ritual which included the sacrifice of a dove and was realized for the last time in 1834.
According to
Mixe myth, the origin of this particular tree is the walking stick of a god or a king by the name of Conday, who stuck his walking stick, supposedly weighing , into the ground on which he rested. From that point on, the tree began to grow, and according to the king version of the story, the king died the same day the tree began to grow.
The tree has gnarled branches and trunk, and various local legends relate to what appear to be animals and other shapes growing in the tree.
Today, these forms have names such as “the elephant,” “the lion,” “the Three Kings,” “the deer”, “the pineapple,” “the fish,”
“the squirrel’s tail” and “Carlos Salinas’ ears.” Local guides point out the shapes using pocket mirrors to reflect the sun.
This kind of cypress is known in Spanish as a sabino, in Nahuatl as an ahuehuete and in
Zapotec as Yagaguichiciña, and it is Mexico's national tree.
This particular tree was photographed for the first time by Désiré Charney in 1856 and was described and measured by José Acosta in “Historia Natural y Moral de las Indias” in 1856.
The tree has been nominated by SEMARNAP as the most notable tree in Oaxaca,
and is listed with the Lista Indicative del Patrimonio de Mexico (Indicative List of the Patrimony of Mexico).
The tree was in danger of drying out in the late 19th century but since then it has been regularly watered.
The municipality
As municipal seat, Tule has governing authority over the following communities: Güendulain, Kilómetro Dieciséis Punto Cinco, and Paraje el Corralito,
which cover an area of .
The total population of the municipality is 8,259, of which 7,831 or 95% live in the town proper.
The municipality borders the municipalities of
Tlalixtac de Cabrera,
Rojas de Cuauhtémoc,
San Francisco Lachigoló
San Francisco Lachigoló is a town and municipality in Oaxaca in south-western Mexico
Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States ...
,
Teotitlán del Valle
Teotitlán del Valle is a small village and municipality located in the Tlacolula District in the east of the Valles Centrales Region, 31 km from the city of Oaxaca in the foothills of the Sierra Juárez mountains. It is part of the Tlacolul ...
and
Santa Cruz Amilpas
Santa Cruz Amilpas is a town and municipality in Oaxaca in southeastern Mexico and is the second smallest municipality in Oaxaca, only being bigger than Natividad. However, it is also the most densely populated municipality in Oaxaca. The munic ...
. The main river here is the
Atoyac and the area has a mild climate with little seasonal variation in temperatures. Vegetation is principally
mesquite
Mesquite is a common name for some plants in the genera ''Neltuma'' and '' Strombocarpa'', which contain over 50 species of spiny, deep-rooted leguminous shrubs and small trees. They are native to dry areas in the Americas. Until 2022, these ge ...
and
leucaena
''Leucaena'' is a genus of flowering plants in the mimosoid clade of the subfamily Caesalpinioideae of the family Fabaceae. It contains about 24 species of trees and shrubs, which are commonly known as leadtrees. They are native to the Americas ...
as well as the famous cypress trees in the municipal seat. Animal life is mostly small mammals such as the red squirrel, field mouse and
opossum
Opossums () are members of the marsupial order Didelphimorphia () endemic to the Americas. The largest order of marsupials in the Western Hemisphere, it comprises 126 species in 18 genera. Opossums originated in South America and entered North A ...
and birds such as the buzzard and duck.
The main economic base is tourism based on the Tule tree, employing nearly 75% of the municipality's population. The main agriculture product today is the
guava
Guava ( ), also known as the 'guava-pear', is a common tropical fruit cultivated in many tropical and subtropical regions. The common guava '' Psidium guajava'' (lemon guava, apple guava) is a small tree in the myrtle family (Myrtaceae), nativ ...
fruit, with some corn and beans still grown, but this employs only nine percent of the population. Some processing of the guava fruit occurs here, as well as crafts such as pottery.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Santa Maria Del Tule, Oaxaca
Municipalities of Oaxaca