juan de tovar and the history of the indians

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Juan de Tovar and the History of the Indians

J. H. Parry

Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, Vol. 121, No. 4. (Aug. 12, 1977), pp.316-319.

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JU AN D E T O V AR A ND T H E H I S TO R Y O F T H E IN D I A N SJ. H. PARRY

Gard iner Professor of Oceanic History a nd Affairs, Har var d U niversity (Read Nmember 12, 1976)

THE "HISTORY" of my title is a manuscriptwritten in Mexico between 1582 and 1587 andnow in the John Carter Brown Library in Provi-dence.l It includes all the known surviving worksof the Jesuit missionary Juan de Tovar : a historyof the ancient Mexicans from their first migrationinto the central valley of Mexico, to their conquestby the Spaniards, with an appendix on theirreligious beliefs and practices; and an annotatedCalendar, describing the ceremonies appropriate toeach month of the ancient Mexican year.2 It isa handsome manuscript, carefully written, prob-ably a holograph (though with a trained formalhand of that period it is hard to be sure). It isillustrated by some thirty fresh and lively water-color drawings, clearly the work of a tlacuilo,an Indian scribe trained in the traditional methodsof pictographic recording. The author, Tovar,was born in Mexico and lived there all his longlife. He entered the Society of Jesus as a novicein 1573, being already in priest's orders. He mayhave been the first American-born Jesuit. He wascertainly among the first two or three. In theSociety he became noted for his work amongIndians and for the eloquence of his preaching inNahuatl. Admiring contemporaries called himthe Mexican Cicero ; but he was more than a giftedlinguist and a popular preacher. He was a cap-able ethnologist and a sympathetic but clear-headedstudent of Indian tradition, who made critical useboth of Indian painted codices and of oral evidencesupplied by Indian informants.

Tovar was not alone, of course, in pursuingthese researches; we know of about a dozen his-tories of pre-Conquest Mexico written in thesixteenth century, some by Spanish officials, some1 "Relacion del origen de 10s Yndios/que havitan enesta/Nueva Espana/segun sus/historias."2The text of the two parts of the Tovar manuscripthave been published separately in recent years: GeorgeKubler and Charles Gibson, "The Tovar Calendar,"

~ e m o i r sof the Connecticut Academy of Ar ts andSciences 1 1 (1951) ; Jacques La Faye, Manuscrit Tovar;Origines et croyances des Indiem du Mexiqlbe (Graz ,1972).

by missionaries, some by Hispanicized Indians.They vary a good deal in literary merit, insophistication of method, and in content. The dif-ferences in content reflect the fact that the authorsworked in different parts of Mexico: Sahagun inTlatelolco, Duran in Texcoco, Tovar in Tula, andso on; and that they employed different infor-mants. But also, the authors wrote from differentmotives and with different purposes. The Indianwriters wanted to preserve the memory of theirforebears and to refute accusations of barbarismleveled against them. The officials were requiredby their instructions to apply Indian custom,where not repugnant to Civil or Canon Law, injudging suits between Indians, and in assessingtribute; so they needed to know what Indian cus-tom was. Th e missionaries also had a practicalpurpose: "know your enemy." Ostensibly atleast, they studied Indian religious beliefs andpractices, the better to eradicate them ; and since,in the mental world the Indians inhabited, godsand demons intervened in every human crisis,knowledge of traditional history assisted theunderstanding of traditional theology. Yet, inmost of the authors, one senses intellectual curios-ity taking charge. Tezoz6moc the Indian chief,Zorita the Spanish judge, Sahagun the Franciscan,Dur6n the Dominican, Tovar the Jesuit, all studiedIndian history because it fascinated them. In thebest of these writings, respect and even affectionfor traditional Indian society, at least in its secularaspects, is combined with a remarkable scholarlyobjectivity in describing it. All the more curious,therefore, that-with the partial and indirect ex-ception of Tovar, as we shall see-none of theseworks was allowed to be published. To be sure,they were controversial, even polemical in somerespects; but none of them could, in any ordinarysense of the word, be deemed subversive. Theyall-including those by Indian writers-madethe explicit assun~ption hat the Crown of Castilleruled the Indies by a just title, and that in itssupport of Christian proselytizing it discharged asacred duty. None was an incitement to rebellion,


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VOL.2 1 , NO . 4, 19771 J U A N DE TOVAR 317or even to discontent. What possible harm couldbe apprehended from the ~ublication of suchworks ?

The attitude of the Council of the Indies, and ofSpanish high officialdom in general, towardsIndian studies was always ambiguous. It variedfrom decade to decade, with the political situa-tion and with the personality of the president ofthe Council for the time being. There wereperiods of blanket prohibition, when anyone knownto be engaged in such studies might have his papersseized. This happened to Sahagun, who lost thefruit of twenty years' Such prohibitionswere never enforced for long. Usually the Councilwas guardedly sympathetic. I t appreciated thepotential value of researches into the Indian past ;it often encouraged them; sometimes it actuallycommissioned them; yet when the resultingtreatises were submitted, it locked them away.The history of the Indians was, so to say, aPandora's box. The box tantalized the highofficials, and now and then they peeped inside;but what they saw so alarmed them that theyhastily closed the box again and sat on the lid.There was no scandal. The authors were notprosecuted, either by the civil authorities or bythe Holy Office. Some manuscripts-Duran's forexam~le-never attracted official attention at all.and, apart from private circulation, remained un-known; but those which did come under officialscrutiny disappeared into the limbo of the archivesand were not seen again until our own day, somenot even then ; some have disappeared completely.What, then, were these clever, influential, con-scientious bureaucrats afraid of? The Tovarmanuscript suggests some answers to this ques-tion ; or at least offers some clues.

In 1570 a new president of the Council of theIndies took office: Juan de Ovando, an outstand-ingly able administrator who constantly complainedthat his office was inadequately informed and con-stantly pestered colonial governors with question-naires. One of his inquiries concerned the historyof New Spain, and the viceroy was told to collectoriginals or copies of all significant documents.'

3Luis N. d 'Olwer, Fray Bernurdino de Sakaghn(Mexico, 1952), pp. 96-102. None of Sahagun's workswas published in his lifetime; but the manuscript of theHistoria general s urvi ved, and h as k n published inrecent years : Bernardino de Sahagun, Historia generalde las c o s a de Nueva Espaiia, ed. A. M. GaribayKintana (4 v., Mexico, 1956).4 Coleccidn de documentos ine'ditos relatives a1 des-cubrimiento, conquista y colonizacidn de l a posesiones

The viceroy, Martin Enriquez, also an able andenergetic officer, interpreted this as includingIndian records, and the archiepiscopal provisor,one Doctor Portillo, was set to work assemblingcodices. I t is a little surprising, after the activitiesof destroyers and collectors over fifty years, thatany considerable number of codices remained tobe assembled ; but the painting of pictorial recordswas still in the fifteen-seventies a living art, andthe codices Portillo found were not necessarilypre-Conquest examples; some may have beenquite recent. In any event, they seem to haveformed a significant collection. By themselves.however, they would have been unintelligible tothe Council's officials. The Mexican tradition ofrecording was an oral tradition, and the paintingswere mnemonic devices to assist the memory ofsingers and reciters. An accon~panying arrativeand commentary was needed, and Tovar wasappointed by the viceroy to compile one. I t tookhim six years. In 1578 the result of his labors,a substantial book, with the supporting sourcematerial, was sent to Spain, where it disappeared.There was no explanation, no comment; only animpenetrable silence. Ovando was dead by thattime; a new president, presumably, meant a newpolicy. We know that Sahagcn's papers hadbeen impounded in the previous year. Tovarmust have suspected that something of the sorthad happened to his own work; but he kept hiscounsel, resigned himself to his loss, and by hisown account, dismissed the matter from his mind.

About five years later Tovar was approachedagain, this time by an eminent member of his ownOrder, JosC de Acosta, later known as the authorof the Na tura l and Mora l Hist or y of the in die^.^This justly famous book was the most serious andcomprehensive attempt, in the sixteenth century,to set the Americas as a whole within the frame-work of European knowledge, experience andbelief ; to assess the intellectual implications of aNew World. Probably, though we have no evi-dence, Acosta wrote with official encouragement:probably, after many disappointments, the Coun-cil of the Indies saw the need for a comprehensivework which should be reliable, scholarly, andimpeccably orthodox ; and Acosta, with his learn-espaiioles en Ame'rica y Oceania, sacados en stc mayorparte dcl Real Archivo de Indias (4 2 v., Madrid, 1864-1884) 1 : p. 361.

5 Jose de Acosta, S. J., Historia nutural y moral dc ZasIndim (Sevilla, 1590) ; modern edition, ed. E. O'Gorman(Mexico, 1962).


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318 J. H. P A R R Y [PROC. AMER. PHIL. SOC.ing, his clarity of mind, and his knowledge ofofficial ways, was admirably qualified to write it.In dealing with the peoples of Mexico an d theirhistory, Acosta sought the advice of Tovar, andTovar, doubtless flattered, hastened to oblige.In the interval since 157 8 the Do minican mission-a ry Dur6n had completed his own volun~inous,well-informed, sensitive and somewhat naive his-tory. Th is work, happily, survived in manuscriptand was published in 1967.6 I n the sixteenth cen-tury it was almost unknown outside the small circleof the author's friends, except through the usemade of it by Tovar. Tovar was Duran's kins-man. H e borrowed Duran's manuscript , con-densed it, supplemented it with material derivedfrom his own Tula informants, and so producedthe short "History" contained in our manuscript.This work, and almost certainly the very copy weare considering, was delivered to Acosta in 1587,Acosta being then in New Spain on a visitation toenforce the rule s of the Council of Tr en t. Le tte rspassed between them, Acosta enquiring into thevalidity of o ral evidence, T ov ar explain ing hiscritical methods. These letters, in fair copy, areincluded in ou r manuscript a s an introduction.Acosta was clearly satisfied, for he used theTo var manuscript as the source-almost the solesource-of the sixth an d sev enth book s of his ow ngreat work, incorporating long passages almostverbatim, with han dso n~ e acknowledgment .Here, then, we have a clearly established se-quence : DurAn, Tovar, Acosta. W e have more.Duriii was a dedicated nlissionary. H e had cometo Texcoco in childhood and spent his whole adultlife among the Indians he loved. H e was a s imple,trustin g sou l, an d had no notion of th e pitfalls tha tbeset those who wrote books about Indians.To var , through h is disappointment of 1578 andthrough his contact with Acosta and other prom-inent Jesuits, was more worldly wise. Prude ntly,he not only condensed Durin's work, but alsoexpurgated i t . As he told Acosta, he omit tedcertain cosil las dudosas, doubtful propositions.Tovar 's own work then underwent fur ther l ightexpu rgation at Acosta's hands. If, therefore, weset these three accounts side bv side and trace theseprogressive excisions, we can compile a probablelist of propositions that were unacceptable toSpanish high officials and which, if incluclecl, wou ldhave prevented publication.

6 Diego D u r i n , Historia de las Ijrdias de Nztrva Espaiiae islas de la Tierra Firme, ed. A. M . Garibay Kiatana(Mexico, 1967).

The first proposition concerned the remoteorigins of the Indians. I t w as common groundanlong all our writers that the Indians were fullyhuman ; the contrary opinion, though prevalentin some settler circles, was patently absurd, andhad been co nde n~ ned n 1537 by no less an instru-men t than a papal bull. Bu t if the Ind ians wereto be considered a branc h of th e tree of A da m ,questions arose about their origin in the OldWorld and the reason for their banishment to theNew . DurAn thoug ht that they were the descencl-ants of the Lo st Tr ibes of Israel, and to p rove itadduced analogies between the Indian traditionswith which he was familiar, and ancient Jewishcustoms and beliefs as described in the O ld T esta -ment. Th is was a popular and widespread theory,which croppe d up repeated ly in discussions of th eAmerican Indians for more than two hundredyears. I t did not require much imagination to seethat such a notion would be wholly unacceptableto Spanish officialdom. T h e Spanish governmentworried incessantly about the political loyalty andreligious constancy of its converso subjects. "NewChristiansM--Jewish con verts an d the ir descen d-ants-often reverted to Judaism , or we re sus-pected of doing so. T h e Spanish authorities tried,though without much success, to prevent suchpeople from going to the New World and leadingthe Indians astray. T h e last thing high officialswanted to be told, was that the Indians were Jewsalready; so Tov ar cut i t out . H e took the originof th e Indian s no furth er back than the old Tolteclegend of the Seven C aves of A zt lin , or Te o-tuluacAn, that mysterious region in the Northwh ere the seven lineages of Mexico w ere tra -ditionally supposed to have originated. Acos tawent further: he devoted several pages to expos-ing the Lost Tribes theory as frivolous and base-less conjecture, and he linked Aztlin to the OldWorld by insisting that somewhere there must bea land bridge connecting America with some re-mo te and barbarou s region of Asia. In this, ofcourse, he was very nearly right.Another doubtful proposition concerned theidentity of that m ysterious god-h ero-king of To ltecmythology, with many naines and attributes, mostcoinillonly known as Quetzalchatl, whose symbolwas a feathered snake. DurAn thought that theQuetzalcbatl legend arose from a hazy folk recol-lection of a Christian apostle, analogous with St.Thomas who was supposed to have evangelizedIndia. Like man y of his conten ~pora ries,Dur6nfound it difficult to accept that a whole branch of


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VOL 121, NO 4, 19771 JUAN DE TOVARthe human race could have been left isolated,cut off from the possibility of salvation, for fifteenhundred years. To believe this would be toimpute ignorance or injustice to God. DurAnpreferred to think that Christianity had reachedthe Indians in ancient times and subsequently hadbeen forgotten or debased. In support of thistheory he cited a number of apparent similaritiesbetween Indian and Christian beliefs and rituals,and pointed out that old Indian drawings showedQuetzalcbatl, or a priest impersonating him, witha headdress somewhat siillilar to the triple tiaraworn on ceremonial occasions by the Pope. Thiswas at best a daring and dangerous syncretism, atworst a diabolical barody; it was partly for ad-vancing similar ideas that Fray Alonso de laCruz, that ill-fated mystic, had been arraigned be-fore the Peruvian inquisition in 1577. Tovar, ac-cord.ingly, omitted all reference to St . Thomas,though, surprisingly, he retained the allusion tothe triple crown. Acosta-who had been presentat Fray Alonso's trial-removed that too. Forhim Quetzalcbatl-feathered serpent, patron ofwisdom and learning, introducer of maize-wasmerely a demon of cupidity, worshiped becausehe was supposed to give riches to his devotees,"like a new Pluto or another Mammon."

Quetzalcbatl was suspect for other reasons.About forty years after the Conquest, a story be-gan to circulate to the effect that Indian traditionhad foretold the conling of the Spaniards, eventhat CortCs had been received as a reincarnationof Quetzalcbatl. This story is unsupported bycontenlporary evidence; neither Bernal Diaz norCortCs himself makes any reference to it; itprobably originated with SahagGn, or with in-formants telling SahagGn what they thought hewanted to hear. Obviously the Crown could notaccept a story which conferred on Cortks an au-thority, in Indian eyes, independent of royal com-mission and of the powers granted to the Crownby the bulls of Alexander VI. CortCs had beenthe very type of overmighty subject, never fullytrusted, and since his death the political activitiesof his decendants had deepened royal suspicion.In 1566 a settler rebellion in the name of his sonDon Martin had been bloodily put down. There-after, any publication which tended to glorifyCortCs or to support the claims of his successors

had been liable to suppression. This had been thefate, for example, of the Hi sto ry of the Conq uestwritten by CortCs's secretary, G6n1ara. Cortks,whether froin piety or policy, had been a goodfriend of the friars, and most of the missionary-historians wrote glowing tributes to his memory.Durin expatiated at length on the significance ofthe Quetzalcbatl prophecies, and wrote a fulland dramatic account of the capture of the cityof Mexico, presenting Cortes as the man provi-dentially selected to open the way for the con-version of the Indies to the Faith. Tovar was tooskeptical or too cautious to fall into this trap. His"History" presents Cortts as a capable, successfuland sometimes ruthless military conqueror. Thereis no reference to the identification with Quet-zalcbatl. His detailed narrative ends with themassacre of unarmed Indians by Alvarado's menat a ceremonial dance in the temple courtyard, andwith the Noche triste, the ignominious retreatalong the causeways in which Cortes lost a thirdof his men and most of his baggage, and in whichhis Tlaxcalan allies were cut to pieces. Only afew curt and colorless sentences at the end describethe return of the Spaniards and the final success-ful siege of the city. Tovar's narrative is repeated,with only a perfunctory tribute to CortCs's cour-age, by Acosta.

Acosta's Natttral and Moral History wastriumphantly published in 1590. This brief paperis, first, an attempt to trace how the informationabout ancient Mexico in that great work was col-lected and transmitted; secondly an attempt torender justice to Juan de Tovar, the forgottenman, so to say, in the sequence. One day, per-haps, we may find in some remote corner of thearchives his first big history, and be able toappreciate him at his full worth. Thirdly, andperhaps most important, this is an attempt toillustrate and explain the extraordinary paranoidsuspicion with which Philip 11's advisers re-garded a wide range of apparently harmless aca-demic studies. Of course the Spanish Realmswere beset with enemies within and without; buteven so this degree of suspicion would be hard tocredit, were it not that we have become all tooaccuston~ed o similar paranoia in some parts ofthe world in our own day. For the paranoid,History is dangerous stuff.

juan de tovar and the history of the indians

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