El Día de Muertos (Day of the Dead) is a Mexican festival celebrated throughout Mexico, particularly in the central and southern regions, and by people of Mexican heritage elsewhere. Multi-day vacations involve gathering family and friends to pray and remember friends and family who died, and assist support their spiritual journey. In Mexican culture, death is seen as a natural part of the human cycle. Mexicans don’t see it as a day of sadness, nevertheless as a day of celebration because their loved ones wake up and celebrate with them. In 2008, UNESCO inscribed tradition in the representative list of the intangible cultural heritage of Humanity.
The festival is sometimes called Day of the Dead in the Anglophone countries, a late translation of its original name, Day of the Dead. It is celebrated particularly in Mexico, where the day is a public holiday. Before Spanish colonization in the 16th century, the celebration took place in early summer. Gradually, he teamed up with 31 October, 1 November and 2 November to coincide with Allhallowtide Western Christian Triduum: All Saints’ Eve, All Saints’ Eve, All Souls Day, and All Souls Day. Traditions related to the festival include altars of private buildings called offerings, perfecting the deceased using Skulls, Marigolds Aztecs, and favorite food and beverage festivals, and visiting tombs with them as gifts. Visitors also leave the deceased’s possessions in the graves.
Scholars trace the origins of modern Mexican festival to indigenous celebrations dating back hundreds of years and to an Aztec festival dedicated to the goddess Micacitechuatl. It has become a national symbol and, as such, is taught (for educational purposes) in the country’s schools. Many families celebrate a traditional “All Saints’ Day” associated with the Catholic Church.
Originally, the Day of the Dead as such was not celebrated in northern Mexico, where it was unknown until the twentieth century, because its indigenous peoples had various traditions. The people and the church rejected it as a day related to the process of pagan elements with Catholic Christianity. They performed the traditional ‘All Saints’ Day in the alike way as other Christians in the world. There was a limited Mesoamerican influence in this region, and relatively few indigenous inhabitants of the southern regions of Mexico, where the festival was held. At the beginning of the 21st century, in northern Mexico, the Day of the Dead was celebrated because the Mexican government turned it into a national holiday based on educational policies of the 1960s; He introduced this festival as a national unifying tradition based on indigenous traditions.
