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Articles

Threefold manuscripts: the nine texts of the Florentine Codex

 

ABSTRACT

To understand the manuscript creation process practiced by Indigenous intellectuals in the Americas this essay examines the work of the Nahua scholars who, along with Bernardino de Sahagún, created the Florentine Codex (1575–1577). Now fundamental to studies of the Codex is an evaluation of its three ‘texts’: the Nahuatl-language alphabetic text, the Spanish-language annotations including loose translations, and its bountiful images. Two sources served as iterative kinds of drafts for the Codex project: the Primeros memoriales (1558–1561) and the Manuscrito de Tlatelolco (1561–1566). Each of the manuscripts contains its own three texts, thus they are threefold, that enable an examination of nine separate but interrelated source texts. In considering the differences among the cumulative nine texts, this article uncovers new insights into an unstudied process of negotiation between the Nahua scholars, the elders whom they consulted, and their Spanish colleagues. As sites of mediation among colonial actors, the threefold manuscripts manifest on their folios the competing interests and agendas that shaped the production of knowledge in New Spain.

Acknowledgements

My gratitude goes to Kevin Terraciano, Louise Burkhart, Mary Terrall, Dana Leibsohn, Jeanette Favrot Peterson, Kim Richter, Pamela Munro, Cecelia Klein, Berenice Alcántara Rojas, Lisa Regan, Amara Solari, Dana Velasco Murillo, Marina Garone Gravier, Yve Chavez, Kathryn Renton and the anonymous CLAR reviewers for their generous support and comments. I also thank the various people and institutions that made this research possible, in particular the Getty Research Institute. In Florence, I am grateful for the time and access to the Florentine Codex manuscript at the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana granted by Silvia Scipioni. At the Real Academia de la Historia in Madrid, I appreciate the support from Dr. Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada, Dr. Jaime Olmedo Ramos, Carmen Iglesias Cano, and María del Pilar Cuesta Domingo to review their portion of the Codices Matritenses. Also in Madrid, I thank María Luisa López-Vidriero Abello, the Director at the Biblioteca del Palacio Real, for allowing manuscript consultation of their section of the Codices Matritenses. Finally, I need to thank the audience of my 2015 paper at the meeting of the American Society for Ethnohistory, out of which this article grew, for encouraging my comparative research on the multiple manuscripts linked to the Florentine Codex.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Hereafter, the manuscripts are referred to as: Primeros, Manuscrito, and Florentine. Although the Florentine is often called the Historia general de las cosas de Nueva España this title is not used here to distinguish it from the previous manuscripts. To refer to the entirety of the iterative process that includes all three manuscripts, this essay relies on the term Florentine Project. Modern editions of Sahagún’s texts are listed in the bibliography under the name of the editor(s).

2 All translations from Nahuatl to English are my own. Regarding texts with previous translations, I used them to supplement my own work. All translations from Spanish to English are my own. Brackets are used to clarify the subject in many translations. For more on the practice of parsing separate alphabetic and visual texts from the Florentine, see Johansson Citation2002; Terraciano Citation2010, 51–72; Citation2019b, 45; Dufendach Citation2017, 206–10.

3 This essay is a portion of my larger project that compares the manuscripts of the Florentine Project. My research analyzes the writer’s calligraphic ductus, format, and structure of the Manuscrito and its relationship to the Memoriales and Florentine for insight into their Indigenous authorship.

4 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 2: bk. II, f. 2. This essay refers to both the ‘grammarians/colegiales/trilinguales’ and ‘scribes’ as scholars in recognition of their skills and contributions to the Florentine Project. See also Cárdenas and Yannakakis Citation2014.

5 This research owes a great debt to the voluminous body of research on this corpus, in particular works that explore the creation process of colonial manuscripts; see Garibay Kintana Citation1952; Citation1969, 1:11; León-Portilla Citation1958, 18; Cline Citation1973; Glass Citation1978, 34; Dibble Citation1982, 13; Citation1999; Anderson Citation1982b, 8; Bustamante García Citation1990, 238–39; García Quintana Citation2002; Ruz Barrio Citation2010; López Austin Citation2011, 358–62; Garone Gravier Citation2011, 185, 197; Hidalgo Brinquis Citation2013; Ríos Castaño Citation2014, 224; Lockhart Citation1993, 5–11; Citation1995, 126; Terraciano Citation2019a, 6. For a fuller history of Florentine Codex scholarship, see León-Portilla 2002; Terraciano Citation2019a.

6 See Boone; Peterson; Magaloni Kerpel; Baird; Quiñones Keber; Leibsohn; Bleichmar; Escalante Gonzalbo; Montero Sobrevilla. This article designates the images to be visual texts as an acknowledgement of them as a separate narrative.

7 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 2: bk. IIX: prologue, unnumbered folio, ‘Segun, que affirman los viejos, en cuyo poder, estauan las pinturas, y memorias de las cosas antiguas’; see also Boone Citation2000, 5–8.

8 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk. II, f. 2; the Florentine names only one elder: Diego de Mendoza.

9 Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], f. 253v; Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk. II, fs. 108–9v; ibid., f. 1v, ‘los mexicanos emendaron, y añadieron muchas cosas, a los doce libros … .

10 The Florentine Codex is also considered a draft because it contains many alterations and corrections on the folios. See Dufendach and Peterson Citation2022, 72; Cline and D’Olwer Citation1973, 197.

11 Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], Manuscrito; Sahagún et al. Citation1993; Sullivan and Nicholson Citation1997. The first two draft manuscripts often are referred to collectively as the Codices Matritenses for their location in repositories in Madrid. In his compilations of the texts during the twentieth century, Francisco Paso y Troncoso identified the older set of folios from the Codices Matritenses that he titled the Primeros memoriales (Citation1905Citation1907, v. 6); Sahagún et al. 1964.

12 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk. II, f. 1v; Sahagún et al. 1997, 13; for location of Tepepolco, or Tepepulco, see Borah and Cook 1963, 159, map section 20, town 7. In his prologue to Book II, Sahagún explains that the town was in the province of Acolhuacan or Texcoco, which shared similar socio-cultural practices with the centrally located Nahuas; see Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk. II, f. 1.

13 Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], f. 283r; see also . Another note in the Primeros adds to the evidence that these types of explanatory glosses on the content were written in 1560. A Nahua scholar, it is not Sahagún’s handwriting, wrote next to the divinatory almanac sign of Nine Wind that ‘Today, Nine Wind, is on Wednesday the 25th of September, 1560’ (‘Setiembre XXV. De 1560 as. Jn axcã cemilhuitl chiucnauj ecatl ypã miercoles cẽpoali õmacuillia ypã Setie de 1560 as. —’), Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], f. 289r; see also Sullivan and Nicholson Citation1997, 166 n.10.

14 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 2: bk. VII, f. 21v; Schwaller Citation2003, 269; Dibble Citation1982, 1:15.

15 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk II, fs. 1v–2, ‘De manera que que el primer cedaço, por donde mis obras se cernieron, fueron los de tepepulco: el segundo, los del tlatilulco: el tercero, los de mexico: y en todos estos escrutianios, vuo gramaticos colegiales. El principal y mas sabio, fue antonio valeriano … .

16 According to the Florentine Codex text, between 43 and 48 Nahuas worked on the manuscript. It named four or five Nahua grammarians, three scribes, ten to twelve Tepepolco elders, ten to twelve Tlatelolco elders, eight Mexica healers, and eight Tlatelolcan healers. Diana Magaloni Kerpel determines that twenty-two artists worked on the images of the Codex. Although unlikely, if we consider the artists as a separate group from the scholars, then between 65 and 70 Nahuas worked on the project; see Magaloni Kerpel Citation2014, 27; Glass Citation1978, 4–5.

17 Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], fs. 69v, 82r, f. 283r; see also Montero Sobrevilla for an analysis of the changes between the Primeros and the Florentine in the representations of Huitzilopochtli (Citation2020, 433–37).

18 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk. II, f. 1v, ‘Auiendo hecho lo dicho, en el tlatilulco: vine a morar, a sanct francisco, de mexico, con todas mis escripturas: donde por espacio, de tres años, pase, y repase, a mis solas todas mis escripturas: y las torne a emendar: y diuidilas por libros, en doze libros, y cada libro por capitulos: y algunos libros, por capitulos, y parraphos.’; see also Dibble Citation1982, 13.

19 Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], f. 82.

20 Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], f. 82, ‘aynyanj. vevezca, muyma. telpuchtlaveliloc, tecamanalhuya, tetaza cuilonj. tecuilontiaj. patlachpul. tetlanochilianj’; see Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. X, fs. 24v, 40v, and 69v.

21 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk. 1, fs. [i–iii].

22 Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], fs. 58–59r.

23 See also Penyak Citation1993, ch. 5; Tortorici Citation2007, 50–55.

24 Sahagún et al. [Citation1561Citation1565], fs. 88–96, 104–10.

25 desuaziada [desjuiciada]

26 Sahagún et al. [Citation1561Citation1565], fs. 121–23.

27 Sahagún et al. [Citation1561Citation1565], f. 121v, ‘xoxouhcaoctli quitinemi […] monanacauitinemi […] tlaçollo […] auilnenqui.

28 Real Academia Española 1780, s.v. rufián: El que trata y vive deshonestamente con mugeres, solicitándolas, ó consitiéndolas el trato con otros hombres. Llámase así tambien el que por causas torpes riñe sus pendencias (https://apps2.rae.es/ntllet/); see also Real Academia Española, Diccionario de la lengua española, 23rd ed. (https://dle.rae.es).

29 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. X, f. 8.

30 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. X, f. 24v.

31 Molina [1571], f. 55 [second numeration], ‘Mecatia. nino. Amancerbarse … .’

32 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. X, f. 8.

33 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. X, f. 24v.

34 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 2: bk. VII, fs. 16v–21v.

35 This section is not intended to serve as a comprehensive review of Mesoamerican calendrical research, of which there are many quality studies, as it is beyond the present scope and topic. See Tena Citation1987; Hassig Citation2001; Boone Citation2007.

36 Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], f. 283, ‘Este año de 1560 se cũplierõ los cincuẽta y dos años con este caracter q̃ se llama vmacatl y comjença el primero para otros 52 sobre este caracter que se llama ey tecpatl.

37 Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], f. 286r.

38 Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], f. 283r.

39 Sahagún et al. [Citation1561Citation1565], f. 189, ‘toximmolpilia .52.as.’

40 Sahagún et al. [Citation1561Citation1565], fs. 178–89r; Ibid., fs. 160–70r; Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 2: bk. VII, fs. 31–81.

41 Sahagún et al. [Citation1561Citation1565], fs. 189v, 242v.

42 Dufendach and Peterson, Citation2022: 71–73.

43 Sahagún et al. [Citation1561Citation1565], f. 53v, ‘Esta es vna respuesta de una pregunta que po[…] a padro de san buena ventura vezino de q[…] sobre el principio del año delqual dibersament[…]inan.’ The ellipsis in the transcription represent portions of the note missing due to tearing at the corner of the folio.

44 Sahagún et al. [Citation1561Citation1565], f. 53, ‘Ca niq’ttac nicmaviço y’ mihiyotzi’ initechcopa y’ cani’ Auh i’ yquin tiaya quipeualtiaya y’ ueuetq’ ╫ [rubric referring to marginal note that reads]: ╫ yn ce xiuitl … .

45 Sahagún et al. [Citation1561Citation1565], f. 53, ‘onitlatlala’ auh niq’uittac y’ imamauh in … .

46 Sahagún et al. [Citation1561Citation1565], f. 53, ‘Auh quitoa vel hiquac peva in xivitl iniqualquiça tonatiuh. Ic mochitlacatl ate’co motlalia y’oc Youatzi’co mochixtoc in que’ma’ valq’çaz tonatiuh xiuitl temac tehtemi. Auh inomomanaco tonatiuh. moch tlacatl yviga yvicpa coniava y’ xjuitl y’ tonatiuh. Nima’ ye ic nealtilo.

47 Sahagún et al. [Citation1561Citation1565], f. 53, ‘Catel mexico in timoyetztica hayc o’pa vel melauac macho’; for counsel on this translation, I am indebted to Louise Burkhart (personal communication 7/14/23).

48 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 2: bk. VII, f. 21v.

49 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 2: bk. VII, f. 22, ‘Esta tabla, arriba puesta: es la cuenta de los años … .’

50 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 2: bk. VII, f. 22, ‘I desta manera, dando vueltas; dan treze años, a cada uno de los caracteres, o a cada una, de las quatro partes, del mundo. I entonce, se cumplen. 52. Años, que es una gavilla de años; donde se celebra, el Iubileo, y se saca lumbre nueva, en la forma arriba puesta; Luego vuelven a contar como de principio.

51 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 2: bk. VII, f. 22, ‘Es de notar, que discrepan mucho, en diuersos lugares del principio del año … .

52 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 2: bk. VII, f. 22, ‘junte muchos viejos: los mas diestros, que yo pude aver, y juntamente, con los mas hábiles de los colegiales, se alterco esta materia por muchos dias … .

53 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 2: unnumbered prologue folio, ‘los mismos naturales dieron la relacion de las cosas, que en este libro se tratan muy baxamente […] en baxo lenguaje.

54 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk. IV, f. 80v, ‘La ultima solemnidad, que hizieron deste fuego nuevo: fue el año de mill y quinientos, y siete; hizieron Le, con toda solemnidad, porque no avian venido Los españoles, aesta tierra.

55 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk. IV, f. 80v, ‘no hizieron solemnjdad publica: porque ya los españoles, y relgiosos estauan en esta tierra.

56 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk. IV, f. 80v, ‘Quando sacauan fuero nueuo, y hazian esta solenmidad, reoauauan el pacto que tenian con el demonio de servirle … .

57 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk. I, Prologue, fs. [i–iii], ‘Los Peccados de la ydolatria, y ritos ydolatricos […] no son aun perdidas del todo […] en esta obra como una red barredera para sacar a luz […] sus antigualla buenas y malas … .

58 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk. IV, f. 78.

59 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 2: bk. VII, f. 77, ‘para que donde qujera que alguno le viere, sepa que es cosa muy prejudicial, a nuestra sancta fe catholica, y sea destruydo, y quemado.

60 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk. IV, f. 76v.

61 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk. IV, unnumbered folio, ‘Al Sincero Lector’ ‘Tienes en el presente volumen: amjgo lector, todas las fiestas movjbles, del año […] donde se podra tomar indicio, y aujso: para conocer, si agora se hazen del todo, o en parte […] será dificultuoso, de caer en ellas.

62 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 2: bk. VII, f. 12r; see also Hamann Citation2008: 804–8; Olivier Citation2019.

63 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk. IV, f. 73v, ‘veventoton, vevenpipil, tlahelvevetq̃, avilvevetque, aoc quimati vevetque, nextecuilvevetque, totumputlavevetque … .

64 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 1: bk. IV, f. 75, ‘ca tel vncah in tetlalnamiquiliz, yn oc neciz, yn oc motlatitica, yn oc tlapachiuhtica … .

65 Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], f. 69r/v, cvculistli; see also Ruz Barrio Citation2010, 199.

66 Molina [1571], f. 150v [second numeration]. ‘Totomoni. Hazerse me bexigas o ampollas’; see also f. 159v, ‘Xittomonalli. bexiga o ampolla.

67 Molina [1571], f. 63 [second numeration].

68 Molina [1571], f. 10r [first numeration], ‘Ampolla o bexiga. xittomoniliztli.’

69 Molina [1571], f. 117v [first numeration], ‘Virguelas. Çauatl’; Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], f. 69v; also spelled zahuatl or çahuatl.

70 Malvido Citation1973, 96–101; Prem Citation1991; León Citation1992; Ocaranza Citation1995, 176–78; Marr and Kiracofe Citation2000; Acuña-Soto et al. Citation2000; Pardo-Tomás Citation2014; Hughes Citation2021.

71 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. XII, f. 53r/v, ‘vei cocoliztli, totomonaliztli […] in çavatl.

72 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. XII, f. 53v, ‘in tetech motecac veveu tepopul […] vel miequintin ic micque […] uncan vel caxavaque in Mexica, in tiacaoan.

73 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. XI, f. 238v, ‘en toda esta nueua españa murio la mayor parte de la gente en que en ella via […] enterre mas de diz mjll cuerpos: y al cabo de la pestilencia diome a mj la enfermedad, y estuue muy al cabo.

74 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. X, f. 83r, ‘esta pestilencia deste año de mjll, y qujnjentos y setenta y seis, que casi no esta y a nadie en el colegio muertos, y enfermos, casi todos son salidos.

75 Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], f. 69v.

76 Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], f. 69v. Depending on the context, it could either be command form or third person present tense during the Siglo de Oro (personal communication with Aaron Alejandro Olivas, 6/29/21). The traditional and the archaic article usage is found throughout Solís, Historia, for example (emphasis mine) p. 17: ‘Y sin esperar el agradecimiento de Grijalva, le dió à entender el Cacique, por medio de los interpretes: Que su fin era la paz; y el intento de aquel regalo, despedir à los Huespedes, para poder mantenerlas. (4) Respondióle: Qua hacía toda estimación de su liberalidad … .’

77 ‘Pàchīhuia nicno […] me aprouecho de algo, como de medicina’, Carochi [1645] f. 127v; Pahchīhuiā vt to avail oneself of something as medicine … . This takes a direct object plus an oblique reflexive object (Karttunen Citation1992, 183; see also, 51). Lockhart explains that this type of verb, labeled with ‘nicno’ allows the reflexive prefix to represent a second or indirect object, in this case mo as the third person plural reflexive, but in rare cases the reflexive prefix should represent the direct object (Citation2002, 11).

78 Sahagún et al. [Citation1558Citation1561], f. 69v; Molina [1571], f. 78v [second numeration].

79 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 2: bk. I, unnumbered folio, prologue. Sahagún hoped that his fellow Franciscans could use the codex as a demonstrative dictionary to better access the terms and concepts of the Nahuatl-speaking populace. See Hernández de León-Portilla Citation2002, 43–44.

80 Another element to consider is the lack of a question mark at the end of Sahagún’s phrases in the illness section. Had he intended the section to be a guide for the reader to make inquiries instead of statements about efficacy in front of a Nahuatl-speaking audience, he might have included a question mark. On the other hand, the absence of such a mark is not conclusive because of the lackadaisical approach to punctuation in sixteenth-century Castilian texts.

81 Sahagún et al. [Citation1561Citation1565], f. 172r/v, ‘Tehoantin ynoquic xitocaque ynhin ticiamatl mochinti¯ mexica.

82 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. X, f. 113v, ‘Lo sobre dicho fue examjnado los médicos mexicanos cuyos nombres siguen.

83 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk XI, f. 180v–81; Sahagún et al. [Citation1561Citation1565], f. 172r/v. The healer Miguel García cited in Book XII was from San Sebastián; in the Manuscrito de Tlatelolco he was from San Toribio, indicating that they were different people with the same name.

84 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk XI, f. 180v.

85 Molina [1571], f. 108 [first numeration], ‘sarna. çahuatl’; ‘Sarna’ is often translated as scabies or mange but in the most basic sense refers to itchy raised lesions; ibid., f. 22 [first numeration], ‘Buua o buuas [buba o bubas] […] nanauatl.

86 Cruz [1552], f. 1v, ‘Non emm alia de caussa ut ego quidem supicor hunc libellum herbarium & medicamentarium fanto pere efflagitas, quam ut Jindos apud Sacram Cęsaream Catholicam regiâ maiestatem & si inmeritos commendes.

87 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk X, f. 109v.

88 Molina [1571], f. 124v [second numeration], ‘Ttalquequetzal. culantrillo de pozo.

89 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. X, f. 38.

90 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. X, f. 20.

91 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. X, f. 20, ‘In qualli ticitl tlanemiliani, tlaixmatini, xiuiximatqui, teixmatqui, quahiximatqui … ’; ibid, f. 38, ‘in ticitl, xiuiximatini tlaneloaioiximatini, quauhimatini, teiximati … .

92 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. X, fs. 100r/v, 105r [two images], 106v, 109r/v.

93 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. X, fs. 105r, 100r, 106r, 109r/v.

94 Sahagún et al. [Citation1575Citation1577], 3: bk. X, f. 100v.

95 Few Citation2002, chs. 4 and 5.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Rebecca Dufendach

Rebecca Dufendach is the Visiting Assistant Professor in Latin American History with the Department of History at Loyola University Maryland. She is the editor for a special volume of the journal of Ethnohistory (66.4) that presents five essays on Mesoamerican experiences of illness. She received her PhD from the University of California, Los Angeles, where her dissertation focused on Nahua and Spanish concepts of sickness and health in sixteenth-century New Spain. Her work investigates how Indigenous peoples remembered the terrible, recurring diseases that wiped out about ninety percent of their population over the course of a century. It contributes to the research of ethnohistorians who seek to recover Indigenous perspectives of history by reading different types of historical sources, including pictorial writing systems and native-language alphabetic documents.

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