Huexotzinco Codex, 1531
Huexotzinco Codex, 1531
Plaintiff testimony and pictographs
of the products and services provided
as tribute
Page 2, 3,
4, 5,
6, 7,
8
Amate paper
Manuscript Division (2.7, 3.7)
Gift of Edward Stephen Harkness, 1928
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The Huexotzinco Codex is an eight-sheet document
on amatl, a pre- European paper made in Mesoamerica. It
is part of the testimony in a legal case against representatives
of the colonial government in Mexico, ten years after the Spanish
conquest in 1521. Huexotzinco (Way-hoat-ZINC-o) is a town southeast
of Mexico City, in the state of Puebla. In 1521, the Nahua Indian
people of the town were the allies of the Spanish conqueror Hernando
Cortés, and together they confronted their enemies to overcome
Moctezuma, leader of the Aztec Empire.
After the conquest, the Huexotzinco peoples became part of Cortés'estates.
During 1529-1530 when Cortés was out of the country, Spanish
colonial administrators intervened in the daily activities of
the community and forced the Nahuas to pay excessive taxes in
the form of goods and services. When Cortés returned, the
Nahuas joined him in a legal case against the abuses of the Spanish
administrators.
The plaintiffs were successful in their suit in Mexico, and later
when it was retried in Spain. The record shows [in a document
uncovered in the collections of the Library of Congress] that
in 1538, King Charles of Spain agreed with the judgement against
the Spanish administrators and ruled that two-thirds of all tributes
taken from the people of Huexotzinco be returned.
Additional Views:
Nahua Numbering System
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