Suma Indiana [Biblioteca del Estudiante Universitario, No. 42]

Fray Bernardino de Sahagun; Mauricio Magdaleno (Selection and Introduction by). Suma Indiana [Biblioteca del Estudiante Universitario, No. 42]. Mexico: Ediciones de la Universidad Nacional Autonoma, 1943. First edition. Octavo. XXXIV, 197, [5]pp. Full spotted calf. Raised bands. Marbled endpapers. Ribbon marker. Illustrated headpieces. Bernardino de Sahagún (1499-1590) was a Franciscan friar, missionary priest and pioneering ethnographer who participated in the Catholic evangelization of colonial New Spain (now Mexico). Bernardino is perhaps best known as the author of Historia general de las cosas de la Nueva España (in English: “General History of the Things of New Spain”). This book is a selection of Bernardino’s work, and documents the culture, religious cosmology (worldview), ritual practices, society, economics, and history of the Aztec people. In the process of putting together the “Historia general,” Bernardino pioneered new methods for gathering ethnographic information and validating its accuracy. The Historia general has been called “one of the most remarkable accounts of a non-Western culture ever composed,” and Bernardino has been called the father of American ethnography. Moderate rubbing on spine and along edges of binding. Binding in overall good+, interior in very good condition. vg. Hardcover. (31275) $45