Huexotzinco Codex

It is an eight-sheet document[1] on amatl, a pre-European paper made in Mesoamerica, and consists of part of the testimony in a legal case against members of the First Audiencia (high court) in Mexico, particularly its president, Nuño de Guzmán, ten years after the 1521 Spanish conquest.

In 1521, the Nahua Indian people of the town were the allies of the Spanish conqueror Hernán Cortés, and together they confronted their enemies to overcome Moctezuma, leader of the Aztec Empire.

While Cortés was out of Mexico from 1529 to 1530, the First Audiencia intervened in the daily activities of the community and forced the Nahuas to pay excessive taxes in the form of goods and services.

Several indigenous witnesses testified to the fact that the lord of Huextzinco was compelled to participate, but that until a horse was procured for him he refused to serve.

The horse, according to the testimony of one Esteban, previously named Tochel (or Tochtli, "rabbit"), cost "twenty-one small gold ingots."

[4] A document later uncovered in the collections of the Library of Congress shows that in 1538, Charles I of Spain agreed with the judgement against the Spanish administrators and ruled that two-thirds of all tributes taken from the people of Huexotzinco be returned.

According to the testimony of one Lucas, formerly known as Tamavaltetle, an indigenous lord of Huexotzinco, the image of the Virgin was "broad and as long as more than half an arm.

Next to it with a bundle of reeds and a divided rectangle is the depiction of "400 small [cotton] mantles to purchase food en route."