The Anonymous Conqueror.—The identity of this writer is unknown. That he was a companion of Cortés during the Conquest is undoubted. His account is confined to the dress, arms, customs, buildings, &c. of the Mexicans. The original document has never been found, and what we now possess was recovered from an Italian translation.
Motolinia.—Fray Toribio de Benavento, a Franciscan monk, known best by his assumed name of Motolinia, left Spain in January 1524 and arrived in the City of Mexico in the month of June of the same year. From that date until his death in August 1569 he lived an active missionary life among the Indians in many parts of Mexico and Guatemala.
He was in fullest sympathy with the Indians, and used his utmost efforts to defend them from the oppression of their conquerors.
Motolinia appears in the books of the Cabildo in June 1525 as “Fray Toribio, guardian del Monesterio de Sor. San Francisco”; so he probably resided in the City at that date, and must have been familiar with what remained of the ancient City.
Sahagun, Fr. Bernadino de, was born at Sahagun in Northern Spain about the last year of the 15th Century. He was educated at the University of Salamanca, and became a monk of the Order of Saint Francis, and went to Mexico in 1529. He remained in that country, until his death in 1590, as a missionary and teacher.
No one devoted so much time and study to the language and culture of the Mexicans as did Padre Sahagun throughout his long life. His writings, both in Spanish, Nahua, and Latin, were numerous and of the greatest value. Some of them have been published and are well known, but it is with the keenest interest and with the anticipation of enlightenment on many obscure questions that all engaged in the study of ancient America look forward to the publication of a complete edition of his great work, ‘Historia de las Cosas de Nueva España,’ with facsimiles of all the original coloured illustrations under the able editorship of Don Francisco del Paso y Troncoso. Señor Troncoso’s qualifications for the task are too well known to all Americanists to need any comment, but all those interested in the subject will join in hearty congratulations to the most distinguished of Nahua scholars and rejoice to hear that his long and laborious task is almost completed and that a great part of the work has already gone to press.
Torquemada, Fr. Juan de.—Little is known about the life of Torquemada beyond the bare facts that he came to Mexico as a child, became a Franciscan monk in 1583 when he was eighteen or twenty years old, and that he died in the year 1624. He probably finished the ‘Monarquia Indiana’ in 1612, and it was published in Seville in 1615. Torquemada knew Padre Sahagun personally and had access to his manuscripts.
Duran, Fr. Diego.—Very little is known about Padre Duran. He was probably a half-caste, born in Mexico about 1538. He became a monk of the Order of St. Dominic about 1578 and died in 1588.
His work entitled ‘Historia de las Indias de Nueva Espana y Islas de Tierra Firme’ exists in MS. in the National Library in Madrid. The MS. is illustrated by a number of illuminated drawings which Don José Ramíres, who published the text in Mexico in 1867, reproduced as a separate atlas without colour. Señor Ramíres expresses the opinion that the work “is a history essentially Mexican, with a Spanish physiognomy. Padre Duran took as the foundation and plan of his work an ancient historical summary which had evidently been originally written by a Mexican Indian.”
Tezozomoc, Don Hernando Alvaro.—Hardly anything is known about Tezozomoc. He is believed to have been of Royal Mexican descent, and he wrote the ‘Cronica Mexicana’ at the end of the 16th Century, probably about 1598.