Description
Book SynopsisExamines a rare set of family documents from central Mexico, originally written in Nahuatl, from the seventeenth to the early nineteenth century. Illustrates a complex indigenous world, with the challenges and opportunities of life within the Spanish colonial system.
Trade Review“Indigenous Life After the Conquest has the potential to introduce students and scholars to a language of singular importance for the field of Mesoamerican studies and to some of the primary historical sources that are its stock-in-trade.”
—Pablo García Loaeza,coeditor of The Improbable Conquest: Sixteenth-Century Letters from the Río de la Plata
“While Nahuatl texts created for use within the Indigenous communities have now been extensively studied, the De la Cruz papers are particularly valuable for their abundant references to specific individuals and their concerns. The detail on religious life, including funding sources and expenditures on rituals, musical instruments, and church décor, including exactly what don Pedro or others paid for various items, is unparalleled.”
—Louise M. Burkhart,coauthor of Painted Words: Nahua Catholicism, Politics, and Memory in the Atzaqualco Pictorial Catechism
“Renowned experts, Pizzigoni and Townsend bring their knowledge of colonial Nahuatl as well as Nahua cultural and social history to these unique sources.”
—Amber Brian Hispanic American Historical Review
Table of ContentsForeword
Preface
Acknowledgements
Maps
Introduction
Document 1: The De la Cruz Family Record Book
Nahuatl text
English text
Document 2: The Tepemaxalco Tribute Notebook in 1658
Document 3: Parish Records of the Birth of Don Juan de la Cruz’s Siblings (1640s)
Document 4: The Will of Don Pedro de la Cruz
Document 5: The Will of Don Juan de la Cruz
Epilogue
Appendix: A Brief Note on Language and Orthography
Glossary
Bibliography
Index
