PREFACE. xiii 



the moft corre<51: ; but among thefe I have not found even 

 one that is not full of errors, as well in regard to the 

 latitude and longitude of places, as in refpecl to the 

 divifion of provinces, the courfe of rivers, and the direc- 

 tion of the coails. 



To make known what dependence may be placed on 

 any of the charts hitherco publiihed, it will be fufficient 

 to mention the difference between them concerning the 

 longitude of the capital, notwithftanding it ought to have 

 been better afcertained than any other city of Mexico. 

 This difference is not lefs than fourteen degrees, as by 

 fome geographers the city of Mexico is placed in two 

 hundred and fixty-four degrees of longitude from the 

 ifland of Ferro ; by others, in two hundred and fixty- 

 five ; by others, in two hundred and fixty-fix, and even 

 in two hundred and feventy-eight, or rather more. 



To give fome ornament, however, to my hiflory, as 

 well as to facilitate the underflanding of many things 

 defcribed in it, I have added twenty plates. The Mexi- 

 can chara£lers, the reprefentauons of the cities, of the 

 kings, of the armour, of the dreifes, of the fliields, of the 

 century, of the year, and of the deluge, have been copied 

 from different Mexican paintings. The figure of the 

 greater temple was taken from that of the Anonymous 

 ■Conqueror, his dimenfions of it, however, being correc- 

 ted, and additions made to it according to the defcription 

 of other ancient authors. The figure of the other tem- 

 ple is a copy of that which Valades publiilied in his 

 Christian Rhetoric. The portrait of Montezuma was 

 taken from a copy which Gemelli publiflied of the origi- 

 nal, in the poiTelTion of Siguenza. The portraits of the 

 conquerors are copies of thofe which are found in the 

 ;Decades of Herrera. All the other figures are defigns 



from 



