Fray Bernardino de Sahagún's account of the process by which the Aztec rulers edited their past indicates the magnitude of bias that we may expect to find in historical accounts of pre-Columbian Mexico. Even if this holocaust, and later official manipulation, did produce a single, authorized version of Aztec history, there are many conflicting accounts of events extant today. This is the result of several processes. First and foremost, all of the surviving histories were written in the Roman alphabet after the Conquest. None were direct “translations” of pre-Conquest books; rather, they were new versions of the inherently flexible oral traditions that accompanied these books. Second, different accounts reflect differing regional biases. Itzcoatl may have destroyed conflicting Mexica views of their own past, but many of the chroniclers were from places that were historic enemies of the Mexica, or at best uneasy friends, such as Tlatelolco, Tetzcoco, and Chalco. Each of these accounts preserves some local bias. Third, “history” was consciously recast to reflect current needs. This happens in all cultures, even the Western European tradition, which has traditionally claimed to seek objectivity in the recording of past events. Yet even if exact events are recorded, it is never possible to eliminate all selective bias: at the very least, one cannot record everything that happened. The historian's job is to record what he judges to be important, and structure it within a coherent narrative. In Mesoamerica, this narrative reflected the present as much as it did the past. Because of the cyclical nature of time, future events were bound to reflect past ones. Therefore, written histories were structured so that this was so. Exactly what happened and what should have happened blended into each other, and no need was felt to distinguish between the two.

Perceptions of provision for health care in colonial Spanish America are invariably influenced by commonplaces familiar from the comparative history of pre-modern medicine. There is a danger that the reproduction of facile a priori judgements–such as lack of adequate provision, institutional underfunding, deficient nutrition, insanitary conditions, concomitant high mortality rates, and “Dickensian” institutions functioning as workhouses and death-traps for the poor–will distort our understanding of Spanish American health-care systems, such clichés being all too often simplistic, anachronistic, or culturally purblind. Moreover, the whole system, such as it was, may at first sight appear to have depended largely upon the desultory charity of some religious orders and a few pious individuals, with the royal exchequer occasionally rescuing financially-straitened institutions from the brink of bankruptcy and foreclosure. Like most such formulations, there is enough truth to this simplistic scenario for it to be a plausible enough portrait of health care not only in colonial Spanish America but in early modern Spain itself; indeed, of any pre-modern system of health provision. Some of these pejorative impressions–e.g., lack of adequate provision, underfunding–are hardy perennials that even today retain their currency in the wealthiest of welfare states, and are writ especially large in Third World countries. Then as now, such strictures, well-founded or not, are but part of the picture, and overlook considerable institutional achievements in making the best of available resources. Much of this criticism is of course susceptible to quantitative analysis, though statistical data on colonial health care are difficult to come by. As in so many spheres of colonial Spanish America, such figures as are available cluster in the second half of the eighteenth century, a product of the insatiable appetite of Bourbon ministers and bureaucrats for a quantitative dimension to policy-making.

The obrajes of the Sierra and the plantations of the Coast are the poles around which, in different eras, the economy of the Audiencia of Quito seems to revolve. Woolen cloth and cacao are the two products that allowed this territory to participate in regional and international commercial circuits, and have attracted the most attention from historians in the last two decades.

In a region lacking large mining centers, encomenderos were from early times compelled to develop activities that would allow them to move in the Andean colonial sphere, which was dominated by the “Rich Hill” of Potosí, the actual force behind the formation of this great interregional market, as Carlos Sempat Assadourian has demonstrated. The inter-Andean corridor and its plateaus, suitable for the raising of sheep and a source of ready Indian labor, facilitated the development of the obrajes that were set up in Indian communities, on private haciendas, and in urban areas.

The years following World War Two produced a strong resurgence of U.S. intervention in Central America and the Caribbean couched in Cold War terms. Although the U.S. intervention in Guatemala to overthrow the government of Jacobo Arbenz in 1954 has generally been seen as the first case of Cold War covert anti-Communist intervention in Latin America, several scholars have raised questions about U.S. involvement in a 1948 Costa Rican civil war in which Communism played a critical role. In a 1993 article in The Americas, Kyle Longley argued that “the U.S. response to the Costa Rican Revolution of 1948, not the Guatemalan affair, marked the origins of the Cold War in Latin America.” The U.S. “actively interfered,” and achieved “comparable results in Costa Rica as in Guatemala: the removal of a perceived Communist threat.” Other authors have argued, even, that the U.S. had prepared an invasion force in the Panama Canal Zone to pacify the country. The fifty years of Cold War anti-Communism entitles one to be skeptical of U.S. non-intervention in a Central American conflict involving Communism. Costa Ricans, aware of a long tradition of U.S. intervention in the region, also assumed that the U.S. would intervene. Most, if not all, were expecting intervention and one key government figure described U.S. pressure as like “the air, which is felt, even if it cannot be seen.” Yet, historians must do more than just “feel” intervention. Subsequent Cold War intervention may make it difficult to appraise the 1948 events in Costa Rica objectively. Statements like Longley's that “it is hard to believe that in early 1948 … Washington would not favor policies that ensured the removal of the [Communist Party] Vanguard,” although logical, do not coincide with the facts of the U.S. role in the conflict.

The celebration of the entry of the viceroy was the most lavish, costly civic ritual in seventeenth-century Puebla de los Angeles. Staged by Puebla elites to honor the viceroy, this ritual event was orchestrated to assert and display the religiosity and superiority of Angelópolis (the literary title for Puebla). Invoking the journey of Hernán Cortés, the routing of the viceregal entry through Puebla prior to Mexico City heightened the competitive spirit of the Puebla Cabildo. The Puebla Cathedral, erected on the main plaza largely under the influence of Bishop Juan de Palafox y Mendoza from 1640-49, functioned as the centerpiece and scenographie backdrop of this civic spectacle. Ephemeral, triumphal arches featuring allegorical, political emblems framed and gated the ritual entry. Designed by members of the oldest builders’ guild in New Spain, some of these arches were placed within the main portal of the Cathedral marking its role as the sanctum sanctorum of the city.

Scholars have debated the effects of the Guatemalan Revolution (1944-1954), i.e. the political and social changes carried out during the decade, on the closed corporate community. Many scholars, including the anthropologists Carol Smith and Ralph Beals, have looked at the political pressures and changes during the Revolution in attempts to explain the decline of the traditional community during the decade. Meanwhile, the historian Jim Handy has challenged the common political explanations for the downfall of the community and questioned the degree to which the communities are “closed” and “corporate.” Most scholars agree, however, that the revolutionary period witnessed a breakdown in the traditional village structures.

Despite the voluminous body of historical literature devoted to the Mexican Revolution (1910-1920) and U.S.-Mexican diplomatic relations, few works address the subject of revolutionary propaganda. During this tumultuous era, however, factional leaders recognized the importance of justifying their movement, publicizing their activities, and cultivating favorable public opinion for their cause, particularly in the United States. In this regard, Venustiano Carranza was especially energetic. From the inception of his Constitutionalist revolution, Carranza and his adherents persistently attempted to exploit the press to generate support among Mexican expatriates, protect Mexican sovereignty, secure recognition from the administration of Woodrow Wilson, gain the acquiescence–if not the blessing–of key sectors of the North American public for his Constitutionalist program, enhance his personal image, and defend his movement against the criticism and intrigues of his enemies–both Mexican and North American.

By comparison with the rest of Latin America, Mexico's post-revolutionary political stability has long fascinated historians and social scientists. One explanation for relative political peace is the comprehensive land and labor reforms President Lázaro Cárdenas implemented in the 1930s. These created a base of social support for post-revolutionary elites. In contrast, the absence of significant land reforms and the failure to devise hegemonic labor regimes in South America resulted in class stalemates, forcing elites to fall back on the militarized state. Land and labor explain the difference between Mexican stability and South American instability since 1920.

Simón Bolívar, soon to become an icon of Latin American independence, wrote a celebrated document, dated from Kingston, his place of temporary exile, on September 6, 1815. Bolívar's document, later known as the Jamaica Letter, made prophesies for Latin America's future, appraised its contemporary political conditions, and justified the region's current rebellions against the Spanish crown. Chief among the justifications for rebellion was the exclusion of American-born Spaniards, or creoles, from administration, government, and politics. Wrote Bolívar:

On the morning of November 19, 1659, the Inquisitors of the Tribunal of the Holy Office in the City of Mexico celebrated Mass. Then, the prisoners were fed and lined up for the procession of the auto de fe that was to be celebrated that day. The procession of the familiares (officers of the Inquisition) and those to be reconciled or relaxed went by some streets, and the Tribunal of the Inquisition by others. The parade of gentlemen, including more than 500 individuals on horseback, was comprised of the nobility, the knights of the military orders, the Consulate, the University, the Cathedral Chapter, the municipal authorities, the Audiencia, and, finally, the Tribunal of the Holy Inquisition with the viceroy riding in their midst.

“Unlike some Latin American mainland societies which still contain large numbers of indigenous peoples,” Jorge Duany observed, “Caribbean societies are immigrant societies almost from the moment of their conception.” Médéric-Louis-Élie Moreau de Saint- Méry likened the latter to “shapeless mixtures subject to diverse influences.” Their population, Dawn I. Marshall reminds us, “is to a large extent the result of immigration—from initial settlement, forced immigration during slavery, indentured immigration, to the present outward movement to metropolitan countries.” Throughout their history, David Lowenthal noted, limited resources and opportunities kept West Indian societies in a constant state of flux, impelling continuous transfers of people, technology, and institutions within the area. Despite the frequency and importance of these population movements, the bulk of scholarship on American migration history has traditionally concentrated on areas favored by European settlement. Moreover, the overwhelming quantity of research on immigration to the United States, Canada, Argentina, and Brazil has tended to overshadow the study of similar processes in other American regions. Due to its historical association with the arrival of involuntary settlers, migratory currents in the Caribbean have been too narrowly identified with bondage, penal labor and indentured workers. Nowhere is the imbalance more conspicuous than in the study of trans-Caribbean migratory streams during slavery. Discussions on pre-1838 population shifts have centered largely on inter-island slave trading and the exodus prompted by Franco-Haitian revolutionary activity in the Caribbean. The parallel legacy of motion hinted by Neville N.A.T. Hall's “maritime” maroons and Julius S. Scott's “masterless” migrants has attracted noticeably less attention.

In considering acts of military intervention by foreign powers which occurred in Mexico during the Mexican Revolution, one is apt to think of the years 1914, 1916 and 1919, when U.S. forces invaded or occupied portions of Mexican territory. There was, however, one case of intervention of this sort during the revolution in which U.S. military personnel were not involved–the landing of a small party of British marines belonging to the H.M.S. “Shearwater” at the port of San Quintín on the northwest coast of the Baja Californian peninsula in April 1911.

The British landing at San Quintm constituted a vestige or remnant of "gunboat diplomacy", an aspect of English foreign policy that had originated in the age of Palmerston and which reflected the unrivaled naval supremacy enjoyed by Great Britain during the period extending from the defeat of Napoleon in 1815 to the end of the Second World War. The episode represented, in a rather overt way, the hard-nosed attitude characteristic of British foreign policy at that time with regards to Latin America in general and other so-called "backward" regions of the globe.

Despite its vital role in Latin America's ongoing struggle for economic development, Latin-American scientific and technical education remains a neglected topic among historians. Authors also tend to view it in simplistic terms. While some have seen scientific and technical institutes as agents of Latin America's “dependency” on the North Atlantic world, others have seen them as vehicles of Progress, or have stressed the way in which graduates (scientists and technical professionals) have acted as “anti-dependency guerillas.” Evidence from Colombia, however, confounds any simple view. The founding of the country's first program for geological and petroleum engineers at the National School of Mines in Medellín reflected nationalistic desires to increase Colombian control over the oil industry and subsoil resources in general. Yet, Colombia's national energy policies have not led to state control of the industry as in the case of other major oil-producing countries, i.e., Mexico. What explains this apparent gap between desires and deeds? The following essay seeks an answer by tracing the origins of the geological and petroleum engineering program as well as the ideas and activities of graduates who have been directly involved in developing their country's oil and other resources. Above all, it highlights Colombians' pragmatic approach to development concerns.

On November 4, 1640, a ship two months out of Cádiz entered the harbor of Veracruz and dropped anchor opposite the fortress of San Juan de Ulúa. On board was the new Viceroy of the Kingdom of New Spain, the Duque de Escalona, Diego López Pacheco. The viceroy’s arrival in Veracruz was but the first act in the elaborate drama of colonial government. Escalona and his party tarried in the port, passing the time inspecting the king’s troops and fortifications while they recuperated from the crossing and prepared for the journey to Mexico City. Accompanied by a mounted escort, gentlemen from the towns and cities of New Spain, a retinue of priests, servants and relatives, a herd of sheep, cattle, and other livestock, and by a baggage train carrying the stores of food and wines he brought with him from Spain, the viceroy would climb from sea level to the central meseta of New Spain, an ascent of nearly 8000 feet. The trip to Mexico City was a time for introductions, feasts, toasts, and pageants; but, it was also a time for politics, as the local notables, merchants, and government officials who accompanied the viceroy’s party vied for a favorable processional position and attempted to arrange a place at court for themselves, their relatives, and clients. Each village or town through which the viceroy passed would welcome him according to local custom and means. In larger towns like Puebla, this meant sumptuous entertainment, a procession to the cathedral followed by a reception and banquet. The viceroy could expect a more humble, but no less colorful reception when he passed through one of the dozens of smaller Indian communities along the route.

Unique sources of historical, demographic, toponymic, and linguistic information, the mission registers (baptisms, matrimonial inquiries, marriages, burials, and census) of Baja California have been used in varying degrees to good effect by Carl Sauer, Peveril Meigs, Sherburne Cook, Homer Aschmann, and Pablo L. Martínez, among others. What is, alas, not so unique, but true of many parochial archives in Mexico, is the fact that until quite recently they were often left exposed to the elements, rodents, insects, and looters. Gerhard attempted to make an inventory of the known surviving registers in 1952-1953, when he found some of them totally unguarded and uncared-for. This work was followed by Woodrow Borah in the 1970s, and since 1971 Mathes has brought this calendar upto-date, and has obtained or personally produced microfilm of the entire corpus, including certain folios which have since disappeared. Here we shall summarize the tortuous history of the dispersal of these documents.

Kind, gentle, humble, mother to all. This is the traditional Catholic image of the Virgin Mary. Beginning in the fifth century A.D., the popular devotion to the mother of Christ increased rapidly in Europe. Numerous apparitions and accompanying shrines during the late Medieval and early modern period demonstrated her new role in folk Catholicism. In Spain, as in other areas of Europe, the Virgin Mary became one of the major intercessional images, protecting believers from drought, floods, and sickness. Considering her role in the popular belief system of the Iberian peninsular, it was only logical that the sacred image of Mary would travel the Atlantic to New Spain and appear to Native American neophytes who years earlier had worshipped Tonantzin, mother earth, among other female deities. The image of the Virgin Mary could easily incorporate diverse groups under a single symbolic entity. Catholicism held that she was open to all, listened to all, aided all of pure heart. Mary was a force of integration; yet, depending upon the circumstances and the believers, such devotion could also fragment society This study analyzes the history of one such symbol; an integrating force that is best remembered as being one of the most divisive: the Virgin of Remedies of Mexico City.