Huautla de Jiménez Huehuentones

In the Mazateca Sierra town of Huautla de Jiménez, the Huehuentones dance carries the region's Día de Muertos observance, known in Mazatec as S'ui K'ien. From October 27 through November 5, men wearing masks carved from jonote wood and woven wicker hats — believed to lend their bodies to visiting ancestral spirits — form groups that dance house to house through town to violin, guitar and the teponaxtle drum. The observance opens with a ceremony at the municipal cemetery, lit by more than 50 candles, asking permission for the dead to cross back into the world of the living before returning to the underworld on November 5.