Aztec codices ( , sing. ''codex'') are Mesoamerican manuscripts made by the

pre-Columbian In the history of the Americas, the pre-Columbian era, also known as the pre-contact era, or as the pre-Cabraline era specifically in Brazil, spans from the initial peopling of the Americas in the Upper Paleolithic to the onset of European col ...

Aztec The Aztecs ( ) were a Mesoamerican civilization that flourished in central Mexico in the Post-Classic stage, post-classic period from 1300 to 1521. The Aztec people included different Indigenous peoples of Mexico, ethnic groups of central ...

, and their

Nahuatl Nahuatl ( ; ), Aztec, or Mexicano is a language or, by some definitions, a group of languages of the Uto-Aztecan language family. Varieties of Nahuatl are spoken by about Nahuas, most of whom live mainly in Central Mexico and have smaller popul ...

-speaking descendants during the colonial period in

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

. Most of their content is pictorial in nature and they come from the multiple Indigenous groups from before and after Spanish contact. Differences in styles indicate regional and temporal differences. The types of information in manuscripts fall into several broad categories: calendar or time, history, genealogy, cartography, economics/tributes, census and cadastral, and property plans.

Codex Mendoza The Codex Mendoza is an Aztec codices, Aztec codex, believed to have been created around the year 1541. It contains a history of both the Aztec rulers and their conquests as well as a description of the daily life of pre-conquest Aztec society. ...

and the Florentine Codex are among the important and popular colonial-era codices. The Florentine Codex, for example is known for providing a Nahuatal narrative of the Spanish Conquest from the viewpoint of the Indigenous people, instead of Europeans.

History

Before the start of the

Spanish colonization of the Americas The Spanish colonization of the Americas began in 1493 on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola (now Haiti and the Dominican Republic) after the initial 1492 voyage of Genoa, Genoese mariner Christopher Columbus under license from Queen Isabella ...

, the Mexica and their neighbors in and around the Valley of Mexico relied on painted books and records to document many aspects of their lives. Painted manuscripts contained information about their history, science, land tenure, tribute, and sacred rituals. According to the testimony of

Bernal Díaz del Castillo Bernal Díaz del Castillo ( 1492 – 3 February 1584) was a Spanish conquistador who participated as a soldier in the conquest of the Aztec Empire under Hernán Cortés and late in his life wrote an account of the events. As an experienced ...

Moctezuma Montezuma or Moctezuma may refer to: People * Moctezuma I (1398–1469), the second Aztec emperor and fifth king of Tenochtitlan * Moctezuma II (c. 1460–1520), ninth Aztec emperor ** Pedro Moctezuma, a son of Montezuma II ** Isabel Moctezuma ...

had a library full of such books, known as ''amatl'', or ''amoxtli,'' kept by a ''calpixqui'' or nobleman in his palace, some of them dealing with tribute. After the conquest of Tenochtitlan, Indigenous nations continued to produce painted manuscripts, and the Spaniards came to accept and rely on them as valid and potentially important records. The native tradition of pictorial documentation and expression continued strongly in the Valley of Mexico several generations after the arrival of Europeans, its latest examples reaching into the early seventeenth century.Boone, Elizabeth H. "Central Mexican Pictorials." In Davíd Carrasco (ed). ''The Oxford Encyclopedia of Mesoamerican Cultures''. : Oxford University Press, 2001.

Formats

Since the 19th century, the word ''

codex The codex (: codices ) was the historical ancestor format of the modern book. Technically, the vast majority of modern books use the codex format of a stack of pages bound at one edge, along the side of the text. But the term ''codex'' is now r ...

'' has been applied to all Mesoamerican pictorial manuscripts, regardless of format or date, despite the fact that pre-Hispanic Aztec manuscripts were (strictly speaking) non-codical in form. Aztec codices were usually made from long sheets of fig-bark paper (

amate Amate ( from ) is a type of bark paper that has been manufactured in Mexico since the precontact times. It was used primarily to create codices. Amate paper was extensively produced and used for both communication, records, and ritual during t ...

) or stretched deerskins sewn together to form long and narrow strips; others were painted on big cloths. Thus, usual formats include screenfold books, strips known as ''tiras'', rolls, and cloths, also known as lienzos. While no Aztec codex preserves its covers, from the example of Mixtec codices it is assumed that Aztec screenfold books had wooden covers, perhaps decorated with mosaics in turquoise, as the surviving wooden covers of Codex Vaticanus B suggests.

Writing and pictography

Aztec codices differ from European books in that most of their content is pictorial in nature. In regards to whether parts of these books can be considered as writing, current academics are divided in two schools: those endorsing grammatological perspectives, which consider these documents as a mixture of iconography and writing proper, and those with semasiographical perspectives, which consider them a system of graphic communication which admits the presence of glyphs denoting sounds (glottography). In any case, both schools coincide in the fact that most of the information in these manuscripts was transmitted by images, rather than by writing, which was restricted to names.

Style and regional schools

According to Donald Robertson, the first scholar to attempt a systematic classification of Aztec pictorial manuscripts, the pre-Conquest style of Mesoamerican pictorials in Central Mexico can be defined as being similar to that of the

Mixtec The Mixtecs (), or Mixtecos, are Indigenous Mesoamerican peoples of Mexico inhabiting the region known as La Mixteca of Oaxaca and Puebla as well as La Montaña Region and Costa Chica of Guerrero, Costa Chica Regions of the state of Guerre ...

. This has historical reasons, for according to

Codex Xolotl The ''Codex Xolotl'' (also known as ''Códice Xolotl'') is a postconquest cartographic Aztec codex, thought to have originated before 1542. The text is primarily graphic, but it is also annotated in Nahuatl. It details the preconquest history o ...

and historians like Ixtlilxochitl, the art of ''tlacuilolli'' or manuscript painting was introduced to the Tolteca-Chichimeca ancestors of the Tetzcocans by the Tlaoilolaques and Chimalpanecas, two

Toltec The Toltec culture () was a Pre-Columbian era, pre-Columbian Mesoamerican culture that ruled a state centered in Tula (Mesoamerican site), Tula, Hidalgo (state), Hidalgo, Mexico, during the Epiclassic and the early Post-Classic period of Mesoam ...

tribes from the lands of the Mixtecs. The Mixtec style would be defined by the usage of the native "frame line", which has the primary purpose of enclosing areas of color. as well as to qualify symbolically areas thus enclosed. Colour is usually applied within such linear boundaries, without any modeling or shading. Human forms can be divided into separable, component parts, while architectural forms are not realistic, but bound by conventions. Tridimensionality and perspective is absent. In contrast, post-Conquest codices present the use of European contour lines varying in width, and illusions of tridimensionality and perspective. Later on, Elizabeth Hill-Boone gave a more precise definition of the Aztec pictorial style, suggesting the existence of a particular Aztec style as a variant of the Mixteca-Puebla style, characterized by more naturalism and the use of particular calendrical glyphs that are slightly different from those of the Mixtec codices. Regarding local schools within the Aztec pictorial style, Robertson was the first to distinguish three of them: * School of Mexico Tenochtitlan: Based at the imperial capital of Tenochtitlan, it comprises two stages, an early one which would include the Matrícula de Tributos,

Plano en Papel de Maguey Plano may refer to: Native Americans * Plano cultures, the Late Paleo-Indian hunter-gatherer societies of the Great Plains of North America ** Plano point, the chipped stone tools of the Plano cultures Places in the United States * Plano, Illino ...

Codex Boturini Codex Boturini, also known as the ''Tira de la Peregrinación de los Mexica'' (Tale of the Mexica Migration), is an Aztec codex, which depicts the migration of the Azteca, later Mexica, people from Aztlán. Its date of manufacture is unknown, bu ...

and the

Codex Borgia The Codex Borgia ( The Vatican, Bibl. Vat., Borg.mess.1), also known as ''Codex Borgianus'', ''Manuscrit de Veletri'' and ''Codex Yohualli Ehecatl'', is a pre-Columbian Middle American pictorial manuscript from Central Mexico featuring calendric ...

; and a later one, which would comprise

Codex Telleriano-Remensis The ''Codex Telleriano-Remensis'', produced in sixteenth-century New Spain, Mexico on European paper, is one of the finest surviving examples of Aztec manuscript painting. It holds the earliest written evidence of earthquakes in Americas, the Ame ...

Codex Osuna ''Codex Osuna'' is an Aztec codex on European paper, with indigenous pictorials and alphabetic Nahuatl text from 1565. It has seven parts, with most being economic in content, particularly tribute, with one part having historical content. It wa ...

Codex Mexicanus The Codex Mexicanus is an early colonial Mexican pictorial manuscript. The Codex can be divided into several sections: #The saints, the European calendar and zodiac. #The Aztec calendar. #Accounts in the Aztec pictographic writing system. #A fam ...

and the Magliabechiano Group. * School of Texcoco: Based at the Texcoco polity (''altepetl''), this school comprises documents related to the court of Nezahualcoyotl. Its foremost representativese are the

Mapa Quinatzin The Mapa Quinatzin is a 16th-century Nahua pictorial document, consisting of three sheets of amatl paper that depict the history of Acolhuacan. See also *Aztec codices *Codex Xolotl The ''Codex Xolotl'' (also known as ''Códice Xolotl'') is ...

Mapa Tlotzin Mapa or MAPA may refer to: People * Alec Mapa (born 1965), American actor, comedian and writer * Dennis Mapa (born 1969), Filipino economist and statistician * Jao Mapa (born 1976), Filipino actor * Placido Mapa Jr. (born 1932), Filipino business ...

, Codex en Cruz, the Boban Calendar Wheel, and the Relaciones Geográficas de Texcoco. * School of Tlatelolco: Based at the sister-city of Tenochtitlan, Tlatelolco, this school is associated with the Badianus herbal, the

Mapa de Santa Cruz The Santa Cruz Map (Also known as the Uppsala map) is the earliest known city map of Mexico City as the capital of New Spain. The map depicts the city’s layout with its buildings, streets, and waterways surrounded by the lakes of the basin of the ...

, the

Codex of Tlatelolco The Codex of Tlatelolco is a pictorial central Mexican manuscript containing a history of events occurring in Tlatelolco, from before 1550 to after 1564, in the period before and after the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire. Due to its name, i ...

and the Florentine Codex.

Survival and preservation

A large number of prehispanic and colonial Indigenous texts have been destroyed or lost over time. For example, when Hernan Cortés and his six hundred conquistadores landed on the Aztec land in 1519, they found that the Aztecs kept books both in temples and in libraries associated to palaces such as that of Moctezuma. For example, besides the testimony of Bernal Díaz quoted above, the conquistador Juan Cano de Saavedra describes some of the books to be found at the library of Moctezuma, dealing with religion, genealogies, government, and geography, lamenting their destruction at the hands of the Spaniards, for such books were essential for the government and policy of Indigenous nations. Further loss was caused by Catholic priests, who destroyed many of the surviving manuscripts during the early colonial period,

burning Combustion, or burning, is a high-temperature exothermic redox chemical reaction between a fuel (the reductant) and an oxidant, usually atmospheric oxygen, that produces oxidized, often gaseous products, in a mixture termed as smoke. Combust ...

them because they considered them idolatrous. The large extant body of manuscripts that did survive can now be found in museums, archives, and private collections. There has been considerable scholarly work on the classification, description, and analysis of these codices. A major publication project by scholars of Mesoamerican ethnohistory was brought to fruition in the 1970s: volume 14 of the ''

Handbook of Middle American Indians ''Handbook of Middle American Indians'' (HMAI) is a sixteen-volume compendium on Mesoamerica, from the prehispanic to late twentieth century. Volumes on particular topics were published from the 1960s and 1970s under the general editorship of Rob ...

, Guide to Ethnohistorical Sources: Part Three'' is devoted to

Middle American pictorial manuscripts Middle or The Middle may refer to: * Centre (geometry), the point equally distant from the outer limits. Places * Middle (sheading), a subdivision of the Isle of Man * Middle Bay (disambiguation) * Middle Brook (disambiguation) * Middle Creek ...

, including numerous reproductions of single pages of important pictorials. This volume includes John B. Glass and Donald Robertson's survey and catalogue of Mesoamerican pictorials, comprising 434 entries, many of which originate in the Valley of Mexico. Three Aztec codices have been considered as being possibly pre-Hispanic: , the and the

. According to Robertson, no pre-Conquest examples of Aztec codices survived, for he considered the and the Codex Boturini as displaying limited elements of European influence, such as the space apparently left to add Spanish glosses for calendric names in the and some stylistic elements of trees in Codex Boturini. Similarly, the seems to imitate European paper proportions, rather than native ones. However, Robertson's views, which equated Mixtec and Aztec style, have been contested by Elizabeth-Hill Boone, who considered a more naturalistic quality of the Aztec pictorial school. Thus, the chronological situation of these manuscripts is still disputed, with some scholars being in favour of them being pre-Hispanic, and some against.

Classification

The types of information in manuscripts fall into several categories: calendrical, historical, genealogical, cartographic, economic/tribute, economic/census and cadastral, and economic/property plans. A census of 434 pictorial manuscripts of all of Mesoamerica gives information on the title, synonyms, location, history, publication status, regional classification, date, physical description, description of the work itself, a bibliographical essay, list of copies, and a bibliography. Indigenous texts known as Techialoyan manuscripts are written on native paper (''

amatl Amate ( from ) is a type of bark paper that has been manufactured in Mexico since the Mesoamerican chronology, precontact times. It was used primarily to create Maya codices, codices. Amate paper was extensively produced and used for both comm ...

'') are also surveyed. They follow a standard format, usually written in alphabetic Nahuatl with pictorial content concerning a meeting of a given Indigenous pueblo's leadership and their marking out the boundaries of the municipality. A type of colonial-era pictorial religious texts are catechisms called

Testerian Testerian is a pictorial writing system that was used until the 19th century to teach Christian doctrine to the indigenous peoples of Mexico, who were unfamiliar with alphabetic writing systems. Its invention is attributed to Jacobo de Testera, a ...

manuscripts. They contain prayers and mnemonic devices, some of which were deliberately falsified. John B. Glass published a catalog of such manuscripts that were published without the forgeries being known at the time. Another mixed alphabetic and pictorial source for Mesoamerican ethnohistory is the late sixteenth-century

Relaciones geográficas were a series of elaborate questionnaires distributed to the lands of King Philip II of Spain in the Viceroyalty of New Spain in North America. They were done so, upon his command, from 1579–1585. This was a direct response to the reforms impos ...

, with information on individual Indigenous settlements in colonial Mexico, created on the orders of the Spanish crown. Each ''relación'' was ideally to include a pictorial of the town, usually done by an Indigenous resident connected with town government. Although these manuscripts were created for Spanish administrative purposes, they contain important information about the history and geography of Indigenous polities.

Important codices

Particularly important colonial-era codices that are published with scholarly English translations are

, the Florentine Codex, and the works by

Diego Durán Diego Durán (c. 1537 – 1588) was a Dominican friar best known for his authorship of one of the earliest Western books on the history and culture of the Aztecs, ''The History of the Indies of New Spain'', a book that was much criticised in ...

. Codex Mendoza is a mixed pictorial, alphabetic Spanish manuscript. Of supreme importance is the Florentine Codex, a project directed by Franciscan friar

Bernardino de Sahagún Bernardino de Sahagún ( – 5 February 1590) was a Franciscan friar, missionary priest and pioneering ethnographer who participated in the Catholic evangelization of colonial New Spain (now Mexico). Born in Sahagún, Spain, in 1499, he jour ...

, who drew on Indigenous informants' knowledge of Aztec religion, social structure, natural history, and includes a history of the

Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire The Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire was a pivotal event in the history of the Americas, marked by the collision of the Aztec Triple Alliance and the Spanish Empire. Taking place between 1519 and 1521, this event saw the Spanish conquistad ...

from the Mexica viewpoint. The project resulted in twelve books, bound into three volumes, of bilingual Nahuatl/Spanish alphabetic text, with illustrations by native artists; the Nahuatl has been translated into English. Also important are the works of Dominican

, who drew on Indigenous pictorials and living informants to create illustrated texts on history and religion. The colonial-era codices often contain Aztec pictograms or other pictorial elements. Some are written in alphabetic text in

Classical Nahuatl Classical Nahuatl, also known simply as Aztec or Codical Nahuatl (if it refers to the variants employed in the Mesoamerican Codices through the medium of Aztec Hieroglyphs) and Colonial Nahuatl (if written in Post-conquest documents in the Lat ...

(in the

Latin alphabet The Latin alphabet, also known as the Roman alphabet, is the collection of letters originally used by the Ancient Rome, ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered except several letters splitting—i.e. from , and from � ...

) or

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many countries in the Americas **Spanish cuisine **Spanish history **Spanish culture ...

, and occasionally

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

. Some are entirely in Nahuatl without pictorial content. Although there are very few surviving prehispanic codices, the ' (codex painter) tradition endured the transition to colonial culture; scholars now have access to a body of around 500 colonial-era codices. Some prose manuscripts in the Indigenous tradition sometimes have pictorial content, such as the Florentine Codex,

, and the works of Durán, but others are entirely alphabetic in Spanish or Nahuatl.

Charles Gibson Charles deWolf Gibson (born March 9, 1943) is an American Terrestrial television, broadcast television news presenter, anchor, journalist, and podcaster. Gibson was a host of ''Good Morning America'' from 1987 to 1998 and again from 1999 to 2006, ...

has written an overview of such manuscripts, and with John B. Glass compiled a census. They list 130 manuscripts for Central Mexico. A large section at the end has reproductions of pictorials, many from central Mexico.

List of Aztec codices

* Anales de Cuauhtitlan, a 16th century text in Nahuatl, is one part of

Codex Chimalpopoca ''Codex Chimalpopoca'' or ''Códice Chimalpopoca'' is a postconquest cartographic Aztec codex which is officially listed as being in the collection of the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia located in Mexico City under "Collección An ...

Anales de Tlatelolco The ''Anales de Tlatelolco'' (''Annals of Tlatelolco'') is a codex manuscript written in Nahuatl, using Latin characters, by anonymous Aztec authors. The text has no pictorial content. Although there is an assertion that the text was a copy of on ...

, an early colonial era set of annals written in Nahuatl, with no pictorial content. It contains information on Tlatelolco's participation in the

Spanish conquest The Spanish Empire, sometimes referred to as the Hispanic Monarchy or the Catholic Monarchy, was a colonial empire that existed between 1492 and 1976. In conjunction with the Portuguese Empire, it ushered in the European Age of Discovery. It ...

. *'' Badianus Herbal Manuscript'' is formally called Libellus de Medicinalibus Indorum Herbis (

for "Little Book of the Medicinal Herbs of the Indians") is a herbal manuscript, describing the

medicinal properties Evidence-based medicine (EBM) is "the conscientious, explicit and judicious use of current best evidence in making decisions about the care of individual patients. It means integrating individual clinical expertise with the best available exte ...

of various plants used by the Aztecs. It was translated into Latin by

Juan Badiano Juan Badiano (1484-after 1552) was the translator of Libellus de Medicinalibus Indorum Herbis ca. 1552, from Nahuatl to Latin. The book was a compendium of 250 medicinal herbs used by the Aztecs. This compilation was originally done by Martin de l ...

, from a

original composed in the

Colegio de Santa Cruz de Tlatelolco The Colegio de Santa Cruz in Tlatelolco, Mexico City, is the first and oldest European school of higher learning in the Americas and the first major school of interpreters and translators in the New World. It was established by the Franciscans on ...

in 1552 by Martín de la Cruz that is no longer extant. The ''Libellus'' is better known as the Badianus Manuscript, after the translator; the Codex de la Cruz-Badiano, after both the original author and translator; and the Codex Barberini, after

Cardinal Cardinal or The Cardinal most commonly refers to * Cardinalidae, a family of North and South American birds **''Cardinalis'', genus of three species in the family Cardinalidae ***Northern cardinal, ''Cardinalis cardinalis'', the common cardinal of ...

Francesco Barberini, who had possession of the manuscript in the early 17th century. * Chavero Codex of Huexotzingo is a codex on late 16th century tax collecting in Huexotzingo *

Codex Azcatitlan The Codex Azcatitlan is an Aztec codex detailing the history of the Mexica and their migration journey from Aztlán to the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire. The exact date when the codex was produced is unknown, but scholars speculate it was ...

, a pictorial history of the Aztec empire, including images of the conquest *

Codex Aubin The Aubin Codex is an 81-leaf Aztec codices, Aztec codex written in alphabetic Nahuatl on paper from Europe. Its textual and pictorial contents represent the history of the Aztec peoples who fled Aztlán, lived during the Spanish conquest of th ...

is a pictorial history or

annal Annals (, from , "year") are a concise historical record in which events are arranged chronologically, year by year, although the term is also used loosely for any historical record. Scope The nature of the distinction between annals and histo ...

of the Aztecs from their departure from Aztlán, through the

, to the early Spanish colonial period, ending in 1608. Consisting of 81 leaves, it is two independent manuscripts, now bound together. The opening pages of the first, an annals history, bear the date of 1576, leading to its informal title, Manuscrito de 1576 ("The Manuscript of 1576"), although its year entries run to 1608. Among other topics, Codex Aubin has a native description of the massacre at the temple in Tenochtitlan in 1520. The second part of this codex is a list of the native rulers of Tenochtitlan, up to 1607. It is held by the British Museum and a copy of its commentary is at the

Bibliothèque Nationale de France The (; BnF) is the national library of France, located in Paris on two main sites, ''Richelieu'' and ''François-Mitterrand''. It is the national repository of all that is published in France. Some of its extensive collections, including bo ...

. A copy of the original is held at the

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...

library in the Robert Garrett Collection. The Aubin Codex is not to be confused with the similarly named

Aubin Tonalamatl The Aubin Tonalamatl is a Nahuatl screenfold manuscript painted on native paper. It was made sometime in the early 16th century, but after 1520. The word "tonalamatl" is made up of two Nahuatl words, "tonalli" meaning day, and "amatl" referring to ...

. *

Codex Borbonicus The Codex Borbonicus is an Aztec codices, Aztec codex written by Aztec priests shortly before or after the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire. It is named after the Palais Bourbon in France and kept at the Bibliothèque de l'Assemblée National ...

is written by Aztec priests sometime after the

Spanish conquest of Mexico The Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire was a pivotal event in the history of the Americas, marked by the collision of the Aztec Triple Alliance and the Spanish Empire. Taking place between 1519 and 1521, this event saw the Spanish conquistad ...

. Like all pre-Columbian Aztec codices, it was originally pictorial in nature, although some Spanish descriptions were later added. It can be divided into three sections: An intricate ''

tonalamatl The ''tonalamatl'' is a divinatory almanac used in central Mexico in the decades, and perhaps centuries, leading up to the Spanish conquest. The word itself is Nahuatl in origin, meaning "pages of days". The ''tonalamatl'' was structured aroun ...

'', or divinatory calendar; documentation of the Mesoamerican 52-year cycle, showing in order the dates of the first days of each of these 52 solar years; and a section of rituals and ceremonies, particularly those that end the 52-year cycle, when the " new fire" must be lit. Codex Bornobicus is held at the Library of the

National Assembly of France The National Assembly (, ) is the lower house of the Bicameralism, bicameral French Parliament under the French Fifth Republic, Fifth Republic, the upper house being the Senate (France), Senate (). The National Assembly's legislators are known ...

. *

– pre-Hispanic ritual codex, after which the group

Borgia Group The Borgia Group is the scholarly designation of a number of mostly pre-Columbian documents from central Mexico. In 1830–1831, they were first published in their entirety as colored lithographs of copies made by an Italian artist, Agustino Agli ...

is named. The codex is itself named after Cardinal

Stefano Borgia Stefano Borgia (3 December 1731 – 1804) was an Italian Cardinal, theologian, antiquarian, and historian. Life Cardinal Borgia belonged to a well-known family of Velletri, where he was born, and was a member of the collateral branch of House ...

, who owned it before it was acquired by the

Vatican Library The Vatican Apostolic Library (, ), more commonly known as the Vatican Library or informally as the Vat, is the library of the Holy See, located in Vatican City, and is the city-state's national library. It was formally established in 1475, alth ...

. *

or Tira de la Peregrinación was painted by an unknown author sometime between 1530 and 1541, roughly a decade after the

. Pictorial in nature, it tells the story of the legendary Aztec journey from

Aztlán Aztlán (from or romanized ''Aztlán'', ) is the ancestral home of the Aztec peoples. The word "Aztec" was derived from the Nahuatl a''ztecah'', meaning "people from Aztlán." Aztlán is mentioned in several ethnohistorical sources dating from t ...

to the

Valley of Mexico The Valley of Mexico (; ), sometimes also called Basin of Mexico, is a highlands plateau in central Mexico. Surrounded by mountains and volcanoes, the Valley of Mexico was a centre for several pre-Columbian civilizations including Teotihuacan, ...

. Rather than employing separate pages, the author used one long sheet of

, or fig bark, accordion-folded into 21½ pages. There is a rip in the middle of the 22nd page, and it is unclear whether the author intended the manuscript to end at that point or not. Unlike many other Aztec codices, the drawings are not colored, but rather merely outlined with black ink. Also known as "Tira de la Peregrinación" ("The Strip Showing the Travels"), it is named after one of its first European owners,

Lorenzo Boturini Benaduci Lorenzo Boturini Benaducci (also Botterini) 1698, Como, Sondrio, Italy – 1749, Madrid) was a historian, antiquary and ethnographer of New Spain, the Spanish Empire, Spanish Empire's dominions in North America. Early life Born in Italy of ...

(1702 – 1751). It is now held in the

Museo Nacional de Antropología The National Museum of Anthropology (, MNA) is a national museum of Mexico. It is the largest and most visited museum in Mexico. Located in the area between Paseo de la Reforma and Mahatma Gandhi Street within Chapultepec Park in Mexico City, t ...

in Mexico City. *Codex Chimalpahin, a collection of writings attributed to colonial-era historian

Chimalpahin Domingo Francisco de San Antón Muñón Chimalpahin Quauhtlehuanitzin (1579, Amecameca, Chalco1660, Mexico City), usually referred to simply as Chimalpahin or Chimalpain, was a Nahua annalist from Chalco. His Nahuatl names () mean "Runs Swiftl ...

concerning the history of various important city-states. *

contains stories of the hero-god Quetzalcoatl *

Codex Cospi The Codex Cospi (or Codex Bologna) is a pre-Columbian Mesoamerican pictorial manuscript, included in the Borgia Group. It is currently located in the library of the University of Bologna. Like other manuscripts in the Codex Borgia, the Codex Co ...

, part of the

. *Codex Cozcatzin, a post-conquest, bound manuscript consisting of 18 sheets (36 pages) of European paper, dated 1572, although it was perhaps created later than this. Largely pictorial, it has short descriptions in Spanish and Nahuatl. The first section of the codex contains a list of land granted by

Itzcóatl Itzcoatl ( , "Obsidian Serpent", ) (c. 1380–1440) was the fourth king of Tenochtitlan, and the founder of the Aztec Empire, ruling from 1427 to 1440. Under Itzcoatl the Mexica of Tenochtitlan threw off the domination of the Tepanecs and establ ...

in 1439 and is part of a complaint against Diego Mendoza. Other pages list historical and genealogical information, focused on Tlatelolco and

Tenochtitlan , also known as Mexico-Tenochtitlan, was a large Mexican in what is now the historic center of Mexico City. The exact date of the founding of the city is unclear, but the date 13 March 1325 was chosen in 1925 to celebrate the 600th annivers ...

. The final page consists of astronomical descriptions in Spanish. It is named for Don Juan Luis Cozcatzin, who appears in the codex as ''"alcalde ordinario de esta ciudad de México"'' ("ordinary mayor of this city of Mexico"). The codex is held by the

Bibliothèque Nationale A library is a collection of books, and possibly other materials and media, that is accessible for use by its members and members of allied institutions. Libraries provide physical (hard copies) or digital (soft copies) materials, and may be a p ...

in Paris. * Codex en Cruz - a single piece of ''amatl'' paper, it is currently held by the

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

. *

Codex Fejérváry-Mayer The Codex Fejérváry-Mayer is an Aztec codices, Aztec Codex of central Mexico. It is one of the rare Native American manuscripts that have survived the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire. As a typical calendar codex ''tonalamatl'' dealing with ...

– pre-Hispanic calendar codex, part of the

. * Codex Florentine is a set of 12 books created under the supervision of Franciscan friar

between approximately 1540 and 1576. The Florentine Codex has been the major source of Aztec life in the years before the

. Charles Dibble and Arthur J.O. Anderson published English translations of the Nahuatl text of the twelve books in separate volumes, with redrawn illustrations. A full color, facsimile copy of the complete codex was published in three bound volumes in 1979. *

Codex Ixtlilxochitl ''Codex Ixtlilxochitl'' (Nahuatl for "black-faced flower") is a pictorial Aztec codex, Aztec Codex created between 1580 and 1584, during the Spanish colonial era in New Spain, Mexico. It depicts past ceremonies and holidays observed at the Grea ...

, an early 17th-century codex fragment detailing, among other subjects, a calendar of the annual festivals and rituals celebrated by the Aztec ''teocalli'' during the Mexican year. Each of the 18 months is represented by a god or historical character. Written in Spanish, the Codex Ixtlilxochitl has 50 pages comprising 27 separate sheets of European paper with 29 drawings. It was derived from the same source as the Codex Magliabechiano. It was named after

Fernando de Alva Cortés Ixtlilxochitl Fernando is a Spanish and Portuguese given name and a surname common in Spain, Portugal, Italy, France, Switzerland, and former Spanish or Portuguese colonies in Latin America, Africa and Asia (like the Philippines, India, and Sri Lanka). It is e ...

(between 1568 & 1578 - c. 1650), a member of the ruling family of Texcoco, and is held in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris and published in 1976. Page by page views of the manuscript are available online. *

Codex Laud The Codex Laud, or Laudianus, (catalogued as ''MS. Laud Misc. 678'', Bodleian Library in Oxford) is a sixteenth-century Mesoamerican codex named for William Laud, an English archbishop who was the former owner. It is from the Borgia Group, and i ...

, part of the

. *

Codex Magliabechiano The Codex Magliabechiano is a pictorial Aztec codex created during the mid-16th century, in the early Spanish colonial period. It is representative of a set of codices known collectively as the ''Magliabechiano Group (others in the group include ...

was created during the mid-16th century, in the early Spanish colonial period. Based on an earlier unknown codex, the Codex Magliabechiano is primarily a religious document, depicting the 20 day-names of the '' tonalpohualli'', the 18 monthly feasts, the 52-year cycle, various deities, Indigenous religious rites, costumes, and cosmological beliefs. The Codex Magliabechiano has 92 pages made from

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

a paper, with drawings and Spanish language text on both sides of each page. It is named after

Antonio Magliabechi Antonio di Marco Magliabechi (or Magliabecchi; 29 October 1633 - 4 July 1714) was an Italian librarian, scholar and bibliophile. Biography He was born at Florence, the son of a burgher named Marco Magliabechi, and Ginevra Baldorietta. His father ...

, a 17th-century Italian manuscript collector, and is held in the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale,

Florence Florence ( ; ) is the capital city of the Italy, Italian region of Tuscany. It is also the most populated city in Tuscany, with 362,353 inhabitants, and 989,460 in Metropolitan City of Florence, its metropolitan province as of 2025. Florence ...

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

. *

is a pictorial document, with Spanish annotations and commentary, composed circa 1541. It is divided into three sections: a history of each Aztec ruler and their conquests; a list of the tribute paid by each tributary province; and a general description of daily Aztec life. It is held in the

Bodleian Library The Bodleian Library () is the main research library of the University of Oxford. Founded in 1602 by Sir Thomas Bodley, it is one of the oldest libraries in Europe. With over 13 million printed items, it is the second-largest library in ...

at the

University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...

. *

a pictorial manuscript of Aztec calendar, writing system, history of the Mexica and other cultural facets *

is a mixed pictorial and Nahuatl alphabetic text detailing complaints of particular Indigenous against colonial officials. *

Codex Porfirio Díaz The Codex Porfirio Díaz or ''Códice de Tututepetongo'' is a colonial Mesoamerican pictorial manuscript, consisting of a 10-page vellum Vellum is prepared animal skin or membrane, typically used as writing material. It is often distinguish ...

, sometimes considered part of the

* Codex Ramírez manuscript created by Juan de Tovar contains history of the Aztecs and is presumably a draft of Codex Tovar *Codex Reese - a map of land claims in Tenotichlan discovered by the famed manuscript dealer William Reese. *

Codex Ríos Codex Ríos, originally titled and also known as Codex Vaticanus A, is a 16th-century Italian translation and augmentation of an Aztec codex, the precise identity of which remains uncertain. Its source may have been either Codex Telleriano-Reme ...

- an Italian translation and augmentation of the

. * Codex Santa Maria Asunción - Aztec census, similar to Codex Vergara; published in facsimile in 1997. *

- calendar, divinatory almanac and history of the Aztec people, published in facsimile. *

is a pictorial codex, produced around 1560. * Codex Tovar - a history by Juan de Tovar. *

Codex Vaticanus B Codex Vaticanus B, ( The Vatican, Bibl. Vat., Vat.Lat.773) also known as ''Codex Vaticanus 3773'', ''Codice Vaticano Rituale'', and ''Códice Fábrega'', is a pre-Columbian Middle American pictorial manuscript, probably from the Puebla part of t ...

, part of the

*Codex Vergara - records the border lengths of Mesoamerican farms and calculates their areas. *

- a pictorial codex recounting the history of the

, and Texcoco in particular, from Xolotl's arrival in the Valley to the defeat of

Azcapotzalco Azcapotzalco ( ; ; from ''wikt:azcapotzalli, āzcapōtzalli'' “anthill” + ''wikt:-co, -co'' “place”; literally, “In the place of the anthills”) is a Boroughs of Mexico City, borough (''demarcación territorial'') in Mexico City. Azcap ...

in 1428. *

Crónica Mexicayotl Crónica may refer to: * ''Crónica'' (newspaper), Buenos Aires newspaper * Crónica Electrónica or Crónica, independent media label based in Porto, Portugal * Crónica TV, Argentine news cable channel * Crônica, Portuguese-language form of sh ...

Hernando Alvarado Tezozomoc Hernando is a common Spanish given name, equivalent to Fernando and the English Ferdinand. It may refer to: Places ;Argentina * Hernando, Córdoba ;Canada * Hernando Island, British Columbia ;United States * Hernando, Florida * Hernando County, F ...

, prose manuscript in the native tradition. * Huexotzinco Codex,

Nahua The Nahuas ( ) are a Uto-Nahuan ethnicity and one of the Indigenous people of Mexico, with Nahua minorities also in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica. They comprise the largest Indigenous group in Mexico, as well as ...

pictorials that are part of a 1531 lawsuit by Hernán Cortés against

Nuño de Guzmán Nuño Beltrán de Guzmán (1558) was a Spanish conquistador and colonial administrator in New Spain. He was the governor of the province of Pánuco (province), Pánuco from 1525 to 1533 and of Nueva Galicia from 1529 to 1534, and president of the ...

that the Huexotzincans joined. * Mapa de Cuauhtinchan No. 2 - a post-conquest Indigenous map, legitimizing the land rights of the Cuauhtinchantlacas. *

is a sixteenth-century mixed pictorial and alphabetic manuscript concerning the history of Texcoco. It has valuable information on the Texcocan legal system, depicting particular crimes and the specified punishments, including adultery and theft. One striking fact is that a judge was executed for hearing a case that concerned his own house. It has name glyphs for Nezahualcoyotal and his successor

Nezahualpilli Nezahualpilli (Nahuatl for "fasting prince"; 1464–1515, ) was king (''tlatoani'') of the Mesoamerican city-state of Texcoco, elected by the city's nobility after the death of his father, Nezahualcoyotl, in 1472. Nezahuapilli's mother was Azca ...

. *Matrícula de Huexotzinco. Nahua pictorial census and alphabetic text, published in 1974. *

Oztoticpac Lands Map of Texcoco The Oztoticpac Lands Map of Texcoco is a pictorial Aztec codex on native paper (''amatl'') from Texcoco ca. 1540. It is held by the manuscript division of the Library of Congress, measuring and now on display in the Library of Congress as part o ...

, 1540 is a pictorial on native amatl paper from Texcoco ca. 1540 relative to the estate of Don Carlos Chichimecatecatl of Texcoco. *

Romances de los señores de Nueva España The ''Romances de los señores de Nueva España'' ( Spanish for "Ballads of the Lords of New Spain") is a 16th-century compilation of Nahuatl songs or poems preserved in the Benson Latin American Collection at the University of Texas The Uni ...

- a collection of Nahuatl songs transcribed in the mid-16th century * Santa Cruz Map. Mid-sixteenth-century pictorial of the area around the central lake system. * Codices of San Andrés Tetepilco **Map of the Founding of Tetepilco, found in 2024, "about the foundation of San Andrés Tetepilco and includes lists of toponyms within the region" ** Inventory of the Church of San Andrés Tetepilco, found in 2024, "a pictographic inventory of the church and its assets" **Tira of San Andrés Tetepilco, history of

from foundation to 17th century * Tira de la Peregrinación see

Legacy

Continued scholarship of the codices has been influential in contemporary

Mexican Mexican may refer to: Mexico and its culture *Being related to, from, or connected to the country of Mexico, in North America ** People *** Mexicans, inhabitants of the country Mexico and their descendants *** Mexica, ancient indigenous people ...

society, particularly for contemporary

Nahuas The Nahuas ( ) are a Uto-Nahuan ethnicity and one of the Indigenous people of Mexico, with Nahua minorities also in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica. They comprise the largest Indigenous group in Mexico, as well as ...

who are now reading these texts to gain insight into their own histories. Research on these codices has also been influential in

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

, where there is a growing interest in Nahua language and culture in the 21st century.

References

External links

Bibliography of Mesoamerican Codices

* ttp://www.famsi.org/research/graz/ixtlilxochitl/index.html Page-by-page views of Codex Ixtlilxochitlbr>Complete scan of the Tovar Codex
from the

John Carter Brown Library The John Carter Brown Library is an independently funded research library of history and the humanities on the campus of Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. The library's rare book, manuscript, and map collections encompass a variety of ...

{{Aztec mythology 16th century in the Aztec civilization 16th century in Mexico 16th century in New Spain

Codices The codex (: codices ) was the historical ancestor format of the modern book. Technically, the vast majority of modern books use the codex format of a stack of pages bound at one edge, along the side of the text. But the term ''codex'' is now r ...

Manuscripts by language A Pictograms Lists of manuscripts

History

Formats

Writing and pictography

Style and regional schools

Survival and preservation

Classification

Important codices

List of Aztec codices

Legacy

See also

References

Further reading

External links