TRANSLATION OF THE NARRATIVE OF CASTANEDA 



Account of the Expedition to Cibola which took place in the year 1540, in which all 

 those settlements, their ceremonies and customs, are described. Written by 

 Pedro de Castafieda, of Najera. 1 



PREFACE 



To nie it seems very certain, my very noble lord, that it is a- worthy 

 ambition for great men to desire to know and wish to preserve for pos- 

 terity correct information concerning the things that have happened 

 in distant parts, about which little is known. I do not blame those 

 inquisitive persons who, perchance with good intentions, have many 

 times troubled me not a little with their requests that I clear up for 

 them some doubts which they have had about different things that 

 have been commonly related concerning the events and occurrences 

 that took place during the expedition to Cibola, or the New Laud, which 

 the good viceroy — may he be with God in His glory 2 — Don Antonio de 

 Mendoza, ordered and arranged, and on which he sent Francisco Vaz- 

 quez de Coronado as captain-general. In truth, they have reason for 

 wishing to know the truth, because most people very often make things 

 of which they have heard, and about which they have perchance no 

 knowledge, appear either greater or less than they are. They make 

 nothing of those things that amount to something, and those that do 

 not they make so remarkable that they appear to be something impos- 

 sible to believe. This may very well have been caused by the fact that, 

 as that country was not permanently occupied, there has not been any- 

 one who was willing to spend his time in writing about its peculiarities, 

 because all knowledge was lost of that which it was not the pleasure 

 of God — He alone knows the reason — that they should enjoy. In truth, 

 he who wishes to employ himself thus in writing out the things that 

 happened on the expedition, and the things that were seen in those 

 lands, and the ceremonies and customs of the natives, will have matter 

 enough to test his judgment, and I believe that the result can not fail 

 to be an account which, describing ouiy the truth, will be so remarkable 

 that it will seem incredible. 



1 There were several representatives of the family of Castafieda among tin- Spaniards in America 

 as early as the middle of the sixteenth century, but the only possible mention of this Pedro, of the 

 Biscayan town of Najera, which I have seen outside of the present document, is the following item 

 from a Relacion de los pesos de oro que estan sefialados por indios vacos a los eonquistadores de 

 Nueva Espana y A sus hijos, cuyos nombrea se expresan (afio 1554), in Paeheco y Cardenas, Doc. de 

 Indias, xiv, 200: "A los nueve hijos de Pero Franco, conquistador, e su mujer, que son: Maria de 

 Acosta, niadre de todos, Pero Francisco de Castafieda, Juana de Castafieda, Ines de Castafieda, Fran- 

 cisco de Castafieda, Lorenzo Franco, Marta de Castafieda, Anton de Vargas y Juana ^<- Castafieda, les 

 estan sefialados dv entretenimiento en cada un afio duzientos y setenta pesos. CCLXX." 



2 Mendoza died in Lima, July 21, 1552. 



470 



