"La Constitución ha muerto" protest at El Hijo del Ahuizote (1903)
Sepia photograph of a two-storey building front under a signboard reading 'El Hijo del Ahuizote': a black-draped placard 'La Constitución ha muerto....' hangs between the windows in a wreath, black bows and wreaths hang either side, tricolour bunting is draped over the balconies, and about a dozen men look out from the windows. The tell is the staged funeral: mourning insignia and the national colours are laid over the office front to declare the constitution dead.
- Date
- 1903
- Period
- Pre-1914
- Made by
- El Hijo del Ahuizote (Mexico City opposition weekly)
- Region
- Latin America
- Country
- Mexico
- Medium
- Photograph
- Issuer type
- Media
- Regime
- Diaz Government
- Leader
- Porfirio Diaz
- Audience
- Domestic public
- Purpose
- Persuade or win support
- Themes
- Elections and party politics, Media and information
- Techniques
- Transfer
- Source
- Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- Source
- Wikimedia Commons (credit: latinamericanstudies.org), retrieved September 29, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain (photograph of 1903, unknown author; Commons: PD-old, no restrictions flagged)
Unknown photographer, protest at the offices of El Hijo del Ahuizote, Mexico City, 1903; via Wikimedia Commons (credit: latinamericanstudies.org).
Text on the object
EL HIJO DEL AHUIZOTE [signboard] LA CONSTITUCION HA MUERTO.... [placard in the black-draped wreath]
THE SON OF THE AHUIZOTE [signboard] THE CONSTITUTION IS DEAD.... [placard in the black-draped wreath]
'Ahuizote' is a Nahuatl-derived word, the name of a legendary water creature that is also used in Mexican Spanish for a nuisance. The placard is small in the 960-pixel rendering but legible. Translation is by Claude and unverified by a fluent reader.
