The history of Mexico – a resource page featuring many aspects of Mexican history

A comprehensive presentation of Mexico’s history including timelines, famous people, ancient history, modern history, the peoples of Mexico, ethnic origins, Indigenous Mexico (Mayan, Huichol, Tarahumara) Mexico’s historical traditions and many other articles of significance to the Mexicophile. The Time-Line View: from 3500 B.C. to the present day. This view is fully integrated allowing the reader […]

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Cholula: Traveling the Central High Plains of Mexico

On a huge hill, covered with weeds, small trees and debris, was built a church overlooking the city, the Sanctuary de los Remedies. It is a beautiful site, with the towered church silhouetted against the blue sky and the snow-capped peaks of Popocatepetl and Ixtaccihuatl in the background. It was discovered that this was not […]

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Early pictorial and written sources of Aztec history

The pre-Hispanic history of Mexico is contained in the numerous pictorial codices or painted hieroglyphic books produced by the Aztecs, the Maya, the Mixtecs, and others. Unfortunately, very few pre-Conquest codices survived the Spanish Conquest and the destruction of the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlán in 1521. Of course we have the early writings of the […]

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Primary sources

The Maya, Aztecs, and other peoples of ancient Mexico had a very strong sense of their own history, which they went to great lengths to preserve. But in some ways, their concept of history differed radically from that of the invading Spaniards and later historians who wrote the history of Mexico from the European viewpoint. […]

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Writing and history

The history of Mexico has generally been written by outsiders, Spanish Conquistadors, Catholic missionaries, and most recently by archaeologists and anthropologists. Consequently Western ideas of historiography have dominated the writing of this history. Our concept of history, along with its method and purpose, begins with the ancient Greeks, although different historians may approach the subject […]

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What is history?

History is generally written from the standpoint of the victors or the dominant society. Consequently the other side of the story is hardly ever told in full. This is especially true of Mexico, although the balance is now being redressed to some extent through improved translation and interpretation of native sources. Advances in the decipherment […]

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