Chicomoztoc, Historia Tolteca Chichimeca, ca. 1550.
Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, France.

This manuscript painting, from a set of annals written in Nahuatl called the Historia Tolteca Chichimeca, shows one scene in a long indigenous history. Set four centuries before the annals were created, the painting depicts two Toltec leaders at the bottom, calling out to warriors residing in the flower-shaped cave dominating the page. This cave, with its seven lobes, was a place of primordial origins among indigenous people living in central Mexico. The spotted curling form at the top of the painting is a sign for the Nahuatl name, Colhuacan, or Place of the Ancestors. As a portrayal of a time long ago and a place far away, this painting shows one way the Nahua world of the ancestors could take form in the mid-16th century.

This manuscript was probably created at the behest of an indigenous noble, don Alonso de Casteñeda, who lived in the town of Cuauhtinchan in central Mexico. It includes alphabetic writing, glyphs, and painted images—a combination often used in the sixteenth century to remember and record pre-Hispanic history.

In New Spain, pre-Hispanic history had political uses. Because don Alonso could trace his ancestry to this primordial cave, he could justify his status as one of the ruling elite of his community. Pre-Hispanic history also had social uses. Because this history painting carefully distinguished among the different ethnic groups inhabiting the cave, it provided a historical rationale for ethnic divisions between Cuauhtinchan and neighboring communities, and within Cuauhtinchan itself.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Kirchhoff, Paul, with Lina Odena Güemes and Luis Reyes García, trans. and eds. 1976. Historia Tolteca-Chichimeca. Mexico: CIS-INAH.

Leibsohn, Dana. 1994. "Primers for Memory: Cartographic Histories and Nahua Identity." In Writing without Words: Alternative Literacies in Mesoameria and the Andes. Edited by Elizabeth H. Boone and Walter D. Mignolo. Raleigh: Duke University Press.

	Nahuatl: (Nahuatl) The language spoken by the Nahua, an ethnic group from Central Mexico whose pre-Hispanic empire, the Aztec empire, was defeated by the Spanish in 1521. The language, whose name means “clear speech,” is spoken today in some towns in Mexico. back to text
	New Spain: (English) The name that Spain gave to her northern Viceroyalty, which comprised the modern regions of Mexico, Central America, Venezuela, and the Caribbean. The capital city was Mexico City.  back to text
	Pre-Hispanic: (English) The time before America's discovery and conquest by Spain; synonymous with pre-Columbian (before Columbus). back to text
	Toltec: (Nahuatl) A pre-Hispanic ethnic group whose center was the city of Tula. In the 15th and 16th centuries, both before and after the conquest, Tula and the Toltecs were understood as paragons of high culture by indigenous people of Central Mexico. back to text

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