Mexican Legends

Discover a new and exciting way to immerse yourself in the Spanish language through the tales and traditions of Mexico. "Learn Spanish Reading Mexican Myths and Legends" will transport you to a world of magic, adventure, and culture as you hone your language skills.

Long before Superman or Batman made their first appearances, there was Zorro. Born on the pages of the pulps in 1919, Zorro fenced his way through the American popular imagination, carving his signature letter Z into the flesh of evildoers in Old Spanish California. Zorro is the original caped crusader, the first hero to have a band called the Avengers, and the character who laid the blueprint for the modern American superhero. In Zorro's Shadow, historian and Latin American studies expert Stephen J. C. Andes investigates the legends behind the mask of Zorro.

Si todos los pueblos tienen leyendas, cuentos e historias, México es prolija en ello, por su enorme cultura y tradición. Algunas muy antiguas, desde mucho antes de que vinieran los conquistadores hispanos. Historias de nuestras costumbres indígenas y de la formación de nuestras ciudades. Así, Quetzalcóatl, Popocatepetl, Ixtla, son personajes de la mitología azteca y maya y Uxmal, Teotihuacán, Monte Albán o Chichén Itzá eran ciudades mexicanas.

La leyenda de Francisco "Pancho" Villa está saturada de heroísmo, tragedia y romanticismo; es la historia de un campesino pobre que se convierte en bandolero por necesidad, por haber vengado una injusticia sobre su familia; la del genio militar que primero huye del gobierno opresor, y después, frente al ejército revolucionario más grande en la historia de su país, lo derrota y se convierte en el liberador de México, sólo para volver a caer en la desgracia cuando sus tropas lo abandonan o son liquidadas por el enemigo.

At a time in antiquity when most of Europe was covered with forests and wandering tribes, Mexico had already developed complex civilizations, beginning with the Olmecs and followed by the Maya, a civilization with advanced knowledge of medicine, engineering and astronomy. The Maya calculated the precession of the equinoxes and cycles of the Pleiades, on which they based their year, since they believed they had come from that constellation.