Brasseur was fortunate in having access to the Aubin Collection of manuscripts,[1185] which had originally been formed between 1736 and 1745 by the Chevalier Lorenzo Boturini Benaduci; and that collector in 1746 gave a catalogue of them at the end of his Idea de una nueva historia general de la America septentrional, published at Madrid in that year.[1186] Unfortunately, the labors of this devoted archæologist incurred the jealousy of the Spanish Government, and his library was more or less scattered; but to him we owe a large part of what we find in the collections of Bustamante, Kingsborough, and Ternaux. Mariano Veytia[1187] was his executor, and had the advantages of Boturini’s collections in his own Historia Antigua de Mejico.[1188] Boturini’s catalogue, however, shows us that much has disappeared, which we may regret. Such is the Cronica of Tlaxcala, by Juan Ventura Zapata y Mendoza, which brought the story down to 1689, which Brinton hopes may yet be discovered in Spain.[1189] One important work is saved,—that of Camargo.
Muñoz Camargo was born in Mexico just after the Conquest, and was connected by marriage with leading native families, and attained high official position in Tlaxcala, whose history he wrote, beginning its composition in 1576, and finishing it in 1585. He had collected much material. Ternaux[1190] printed a French translation of a mutilated text; but it has never been printed in the condition, fragmentary though it be, in which it was recovered by Boturini. Prescott says the original manuscript was long preserved in a convent in Mexico, where Torquemada used it. It was later taken to Spain, when it found its way into the Muñoz Collection in the Academy of History at Madrid, whence Prescott got his copy. This last historian speaks of the work as supplying much curious and authentic information respecting the social and religious condition of the Aztecs. Camargo tells fully the story of the Conquest, but he deals out his applause and sympathy to the conquerors and the conquered with equal readiness.[1191]
Other manuscripts have not yet been edited. Chimalpain’s Cronica Mexicana, in the Nahuatl tongue, which covers the interval from A. D. 1068 to 1597, is one of these. Another Nahuatl manuscript in Boturini’s list is an anonymous history of Culhuacan and Mexico. An imperfect translation of this into Spanish, by Galicia, has been made in Mexico. Brasseur copied it, and called it the Codex Chimalpopoca.[1192] In 1879 the Museo Nacional at Mexico began to print it in their Anales (vol. ii.), adding a new version by Mendoza and Solis, under the title of Anales de Cuauhtitlan.[1193]
Bancroft’s list, prefixed to his Mexico, makes mention of most of these native Mexican sources. Of principal use among them may be mentioned Fernando de Alvaro Tezozomoc’s Cronica Mexicana, or Histoire du Mexique, written in 1598, and published in 1853, in Paris, by Ternaux-Compans.[1194]
Brinton has published in the first volume of his library of Aboriginal American Literature (1882, p. 189) the chronicle of Chac-xulub-chen, written in the Maya in 1562, which throws light on the methods of the Spanish Conquest.
There was a native account, by Don Gabriel Castañeda, of the conquest of the Chichimecs by the Viceroy Antonio de Mendoza in 1541; but Brinton[1195] says all trace of it is lost since it was reported to be in the Convent of Ildefonso in Mexico.
Perhaps the most important native contribution to the history of Guatemala is Francisco Ernandez Arana Xahila’s Memorial de Tecpan Atitlan, written in 1581 and later in the dialect of Cakchiquel, and bringing the history of a distinguished branch of the Cakchiquels down to 1562, from which point it is continued by Francisco Gebuta Queh. Brasseur de Bourbourg loosely rendered it, and from this paraphrase a Spanish version has been printed in Guatemala; but the original has never been printed. Brinton (in his Aboriginal American Authors, p. 32) says he has a copy; and another is in Europe. It is of great importance as giving the native accounts of the conquest of Guatemala.[1196] An ardent advocacy of the natives was also shown in the Historia de las Indias de Nueva España of the Padre Diego Duran, which was edited by Ramirez, so far as the first volume goes, in 1867, when it was published in Mexico with an atlas of plates after the manuscript; but this publication is said not to present all the drawings of the original manuscript. The overthrow of Maximilian prevented the completion of the publication. The incoming Republican government seized what had been printed, so that the fruit of Ramirez’s labor is now scarce. Quaritch priced the editor’s own copy at £8 10s. The editor had polished the style of the original somewhat, and made other changes, which excited some disgust in the purists; and this action on his part may have had something to do with the proceedings of the new Government. Ramirez claimed descent from the Aztecs, and this may account for much of his stern judgment respecting Cortés.[1197] The story in this first volume is only brought down to the reign of Montezuma. The manuscript is preserved in the royal library at Madrid.[1198] Duran was a half-breed, his mother being of Tezcuco. He became a Dominican; but a slender constitution kept him from the missionary field, and he passed a monastic life of literary labors. He had finished in 1579 the later parts of his work treating of the Mexican divinities, calendars, and festivals; and then, reverting to the portions which came first in the manuscript, he tells the story of Mexican history rather clumsily, but with a certain native force and insight, down to the period of the Honduras expedition. The manuscript of Duran passed, after his death in 1588, to Juan Tovar, and from him, perhaps with the representations that Tovar (or Tobar) was its author, to José de Acosta, who represents Tovar as the author, and who had then prepared, while in Peru, his De Natura Novi Orbis.
E. The Earlier Historians.—José de Acosta was born about 1540 in Spain; but at fourteen he joined the Jesuits. He grew learned, and in 1571 he went to Peru, in which country he spent fifteen years, becoming the provincial of his Order. He tarried two other years in Mexico—where he saw Tovar—and in the islands. He then returned to Spain laden with manuscripts and information, became a royal favorite, held other offices, and died as rector of Salamanca in 1600,[1199] having published in his books on the New World the most popular and perhaps most satisfactory account of it up to that time; while his theological works give evidence, as Markham says, of great learning.
Acosta’s first publication appeared at Salamanca in 1588 and 1589, and was in effect two essays, though they are usually found under one cover (they had separate titles, but were continuously paged), De natura Novi Orbis libri duo, et de promulgatione evangelii apud barbaros, ... libri sex. In the former he describes the physical features of the country, and in the latter he told the story Of the conversion of the Indians.[1200] Acosta now translated the two books of the De natura into Spanish, and added five other books. The work was thus made to form a general cosmographical treatise, with particular reference to the New World; and included an account of the religion and government of the Indians of Peru and Mexico. He also gave a brief recital of the Conquest. In this extended form, and under the title of Historia natvral y moral de las Indias, en qve se tratan las cosas notables del cielo, y elementos, metales, plantas, y animales dellas; y los ritos, y ceremonias, leyes, y gouierno, y guerras de los Indios, it was published at Seville in 1590.[1201]