Ninín 2026: the Totonac Día de Muertos in Papantla

The Totonac calendar of the dead opens on October 18, the feast of San Lucas, the saint who in the Totonacapan took the place of the old Thunder deity. From that day families set off rockets or ring bells three times a day to guide the souls home. The first to arrive, according to the accounts gathered by Universidad Veracruzana anthropologist Crescencio García Ramos and others, are those who died by violence or by drowning. Between October 18 and 30 households prepare the altar and fire up the ovens; on October 30 and 31 the altars and flower arches go up.

The children's souls arrive at midday on October 31. At midday on November 1 they leave and the adults take their place, and on November 2 the adults go, accompanied to the cemetery, after which relatives, godparents and friends exchange offerings. A week later, on November 8 and 9, the aktumajat or octava says goodbye with a rosary to those who died a natural death. The souls of those who died violently stay longest: they are seen off on November 30, San Andrés, with offerings, rockets, music and dance, and then people go back to sowing the sacred maize. In Zozocolco de Hidalgo, in the Totonac sierra, paper lanterns are released that night to light their way.

The Totonac altar is called the puchaw, and the food set on it is the chaw. Unlike the stepped altars of central Mexico it hangs from the roof beams, because the dead must not touch the ground or they would be enchanted; they arrive floating on the air currents of the house. The puchaw is a square board that stands for the earth, covered with a white cloth sometimes embroidered with flowers and animals. Over it rises an arch braided from palm leaves, dressed with cempasúchil and terciopelo flowers and fruit, and hung with thirteen stars woven from coyol palm, the vault of the sky. Five candles burn on it, one at each corner and one in the middle, and thirteen yellow candles stand on the floor. Below go a washbasin, a towel, a chair and a petate, so the visitors can wash and rest.

The meals change three times a day, because the souls take the flavor from the steam: coffee and bread in the morning, tamales de cuchara filled with pork or picadillo at midday, chocolate and bread at night, soup for the children and tamales for the adults, with mole, rice, tortillas, cacao, chicharrones, totopos and fruit, cigarettes and aguardiente for the grown-ups and sweets or toys for the little ones. In the main house of the family, the k'antiyán, the children also dress a separate altar for the ánimas solas, the souls that no one remembers. Groups of alabanceros sing to open and close the portal through which the dead come.

Papantla's town hall wraps the season in a Festival Ninín, and in 2026, under the motto "Donde la memoria florece" (where memory blooms), it started on the ritual date itself, Sunday, October 18. That afternoon there was a free workshop on crowns and papel picado at 4 pm in the small loop of the Parque Dr. Israel C. Téllez, a procession of the Huehues de Paso de Valencia from the municipal cemetery of the Santísima Trinidad to the central park, a San Lucas ceremony, the first of four "portales" in the program, the Ritual del Matarachín danced by the Huehues, and a videomapping projected on the mural of Totonac culture. The program for the main days had not been published when we checked on October 12.

Last year's gives the shape. In 2025 the festival ran from October 29 to November 2: on October 30 the Nitat Latamat walk left the Santísima Trinidad cemetery at 6 pm for the historic center, and at 7:30 pm the monumental altar was inaugurated on the esplanade of the municipal palace with the Danza de la Viejada; on November 1 there were prayers for the souls at 11 am in the Santísima Trinidad cemetery and alabanceros at night; on November 2 masses at 6 am in the Santísima Trinidad and 8 am in the Pujaxni cemetery; and on November 8 the walk went back from the center to the panteón. For flowers, candles and the rest of the altar, the streets along Paseo Reforma fill with cempasúchil and candle sellers in the days before the altars go up.

Fill the daytime with El Tajín, the city of the thunder, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1992 and one of the great cities of ancient Mesoamerica, fifteen minutes from the center of Papantla. The Pyramid of the Niches and the ball courts are best early, before the heat; the INAH lists the site as open every day from 9 am, with closing given as 5 pm or 6 pm depending on the source, and entry is free for children under 13, students and teachers with ID, and seniors. Papantla itself is the heart of Mexico's vanilla country, so buy the cured pods and vanilla figures in the market.

In town, the Danza de los Voladores, inscribed by UNESCO as intangible heritage in 2009, is performed in front of the church of Nuestra Señora de la Asunción, built by the Franciscans between 1570 and 1590: four flyers spin down on ropes from the top of a pole while a fifth plays flute and drum on the summit. The Monument to the Volador looks over the town from the hill above the center.

The puchaw lives inside the house and is a family's business; look at the altars the town sets out in public, and enter a home only if you are invited. If you are, do not touch the hanging altar or the food, which is for the souls, and accept whatever you are offered afterwards, because sharing the offering is part of the ritual. At the cemetery masses and the Nitat Latamat walk, keep a respectful distance, ask before photographing people and never use flash during prayers. Totonac custom holds that breaking the rules of the season brings misfortune, so follow the lead of the people around you. Late October in the Totonacapan is warm and humid with a chance of rain and of the first cool northers: bring light clothes, a rain shell and mosquito repellent. When the Voladores finish, they pass a hat; tip them.