Spanish and Nahuatl Dialogues on Disease: The Nine Texts of the Florentine Codex

The Nahua scholars who worked with Fr. Bernardino de Sahagún deftly crafted three interlocking texts within what scholars customarily refer to as a singular source, the Florentine Codex. Studies of the Florentine Codex must include an analysis of the three texts, the Nahuatl-language text, the Spanish-language text, and the third text found in the images. Recent scholarship highlights the differences between the texts of the Codex in order to detect different priorities for various authors and audiences. This paper advances our understanding of the three texts with an analysis of two additional texts that were initial drafts for the Codex project: the Primeros Memoriales and the Segundos Memoriales (often called Codices Matritenses). By adding evaluations of these two sources to studies of the Florentine Codex, my research reveals new insight into the process of negotiation between the Nahua scholars and their Spanish colleagues. The two predecessor texts, when compared with final draft of the Florentine Codex, display the hidden history of the negotiation in regards to the content, the images, and the translation process. Specifically, comparisons between the disease-related content of the nine texts uncovers Sahagún's direct intervention in Primeros Memoriales that was ignored in later versions. The creation and placement of the images evolves throughout the text and decidedly favors an abundance of images found the last-known copy of the Codex. Finally, in the translation process, the Nahuatl language is obviously primary and the clear focus in all nine texts. By bringing this negotiation process to light, I clearly show that the Nahua scholars demonstrate unmistakable control over the project. The influence of the Nahua writers, translators, and painters is only visible when we examine all nine of the texts that resulted in the Florentine Codex.