The Departed

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Turquoise mosaic mask: Mixtec-Aztec, 1400-1521 CE: photo by Gryffindor, 17 January 2009 (British Museum)

Watched through empty eyesockets by ghosts the souls move wraithlike through the deserted streets in fog with no gods to hear nor book to record their silent cries

Fog settles on the deserted streets of San Miguel Cuevas, a Mixtec village in the highlands of Oaxaca; over 80% of its population has emigrated to the United States, leaving it little more than a ghost town: photo by Matt Black

Pre-Columbian Mixtec writing from Codex Zouche-Nuttall: photo by Kaihsu Tai, 2005 (British Museum)



Mixtec King and warlord Eight Deer Claw meeting with Four Jaguar, in a depiction from the Pre-Columbian Codex Zouche-Nuttall, a 14th-century codex recording genealogies, alliances and conquests of several 11th- and 12th-century rulers of a small city-state in highland Oaxaca: image by Ek Balam, 13 May 2006 (British Museum)



Monte Albán, Zapotec/Mixtec site, highland Oaxaca: photo by Reinhard Jahn, 26 December 2003

Left behind by his migrant children, an ailing man lies in his yard, San Miguel Cuevas, Oaxaca, Mexico: photo by Matt Black