From Codex to World Heritage: The Relevance of Sahagún’s Work in the Study of Indigenous Cultures

Abstract

The work of the Spanish friar Bernardino de Sahagún is widely recognized in the field of anthropology, primarily due to his methodological contributions. The research techniques he employed—such as learning the native language, placing emphasis on linguistic aspects to understand the culture and worldview of “the others”, carefully selecting informants from all social strata, and designing open-ended questionnaires—seem more akin to those of modern British social anthropology than to practices from 500 years ago. In 2015, his work was designated as part of UNESCO’s Memory of the World program, an acknowledgment aimed at highlighting his cultural contributions and preserving the world’s documentary heritage as a symbol of humanity’s collective memory. This designation has renewed Sahagún’s prominence as a precursor of this discipline. This study explores the impact of such recognition and the enduring value of his work. In a time like the present, where interethnic tensions and rejection of difference are on the rise, Sahagún’s work stands as an unquestionable legacy against intolerance and ethnocentrism.

1. Introduction

The study of Mesoamerican Indigenous societies during the colonial period has been profoundly shaped by the figure of Bernardino de Sahagún, a 16th-century Spanish Franciscan friar who, through his monumental work, was centuries ahead in anthropological methodology. His work, primarily composed of the Florentine Codex and the Matritense Codex, meticulously documents the worldview, religion, language, and customs of the Indigenous peoples of Mesoamerica. These works, written in collaboration with Indigenous informants, stand out not only for their historical value but also for the depth with which Sahagún immersed himself in the cultures he studied, making him one of the first to employ what we now recognize as the ethnographic method.

By learning the Nahuatl language and consulting informants from various social strata, Sahagún laid the foundation for a methodology that is still used today in the anthropological study of societies. His focus on participant observation and the use of open-ended questionnaires closely aligns with contemporary anthropological methods. Indeed, Sahagún is commonly acknowledged as one of the precursors of modern anthropological methods, despite the centuries that separate us from his studies.

Studying Fray Bernardino de Sahagún represents a considerable challenge. However, while the task may seem daunting, his work offers an opportunity to approach and reinterpret it from different perspectives. For this reason, as Eudave Eusebio (2023) argues, there has been a continuous interest in uncovering new aspects of his work with each publication.

In this vein, some of the most prominent previous studies on Sahagún, such as those by León-Portilla (1999, 2007, 2010), argue that in the Historia General de las Cosas de la Nueva España, Sahagún employed the resource of analogy to analyze and classify cultural phenomena from different peoples. This approach, according to Alfredo López Austin (2010), involved identifying similarities and parallels among various elements such as myths, rituals, traditions, and social practices. In this way, a narrative about the Americas is constructed, rich with Western references, as Máynez (2002) suggests. Thus, according to Hernández (2007), it was about establishing relationships and categories that allowed for a deeper understanding of the cultural diversity of Indigenous peoples.

For his part, Frost (2002), using Sahagún as a case study, highlights the pressing need for friars to logically and coherently integrate the understanding of the so-called New World into Christian history.

Recently, various uses of Sahagún’s work have been addressed, going beyond its function as a tool for justifying evangelization. One possible explanation is that the figure of Sahagún could be analyzed as representing two distinct personas: the Sahagún who addresses “the others”, whose idols are described as demons, aiming to persuade them that these are merely fallen beings posing as deities to be worshiped, and the Sahagún who writes for his Spanish and European peers, where he states that these deities are false without the need to demonize them, given that his audience already operated within a Christian framework.

This distinction is significant, as he addresses two different audiences: Christians and those in the process of becoming Christian. Another perspective highlights Sahagún’s effort to record Indigenous customs and traditions, not with the intention of preserving them, but to understand them in order to eradicate them more effectively. This is what Eudave Eusebio (2023) argues when explaining that the friar sought to equate ancient pagan Europeans with Indigenous peoples to compare, classify, dominate, and evangelize them. As a self-proclaimed “doctor of souls”, Sahagún believed he needed to thoroughly understand the disease to uproot it at its source.

The recognition of his work by UNESCO in 2015, through its inclusion in the Memory of the World program, highlights the importance of his contribution to the understanding of Indigenous cultures and the preservation of global cultural heritage. This research analyzes how this recognition has reinforced the relevance of his legacy at a time when the study and preservation of cultural diversity are crucial to combating ethnocentrism and promoting intercultural dialogue.

2. Materials and Methods

This study employs an interdisciplinary approach, combining historical and anthropological research methods to analyze the life and work of Sahagún, with a particular focus on his contribution to the development of the ethnographic method. The methodology is structured around three main axes:

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Contextual Biographical Analysis: To provide a comprehensive view of Sahagún, a detailed biographical analysis has been conducted based on secondary sources. This analysis follows the guidelines of classical historiography, prioritizing a chronological reconstruction of the most relevant events in his life and work, with particular emphasis on the colonial Novohispanic context. In this regard, the primary sources used include texts by historians who have examined his life in relation to the conquest of Mexico and the process of evangelization, situating his work within the sociopolitical dynamics of his time.

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Analysis of Primary Texts: The Florentine Codex and the Matritense Codex: This research is grounded in a thorough analysis of Sahagún’s principal works, the Florentine Codex and the Matritense Codex, which represent a key ethnographic corpus for the study of pre-Hispanic Indigenous cultures and the contact period. The textual analysis has focused on the data collection methods employed by Sahagún, highlighting his use of observation, interviews, and the collection of oral testimonies, which have been recognized as precursors of the modern ethnographic method. The processes of translation and cultural mediation in which Indigenous informants participated have also been analyzed, along with how these influenced the final work.

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UNESCO Declaration as a Memory of the World: To underline the contemporary relevance of Sahagún’s work, texts issued by UNESCO have been used as sources, recognizing the value of the Florentine Codex and the Matritense Codex through their inclusion in the Memory of the World program. This recognition has been integrated into the analysis to emphasize not only the historical importance of these texts but also their ongoing significance in the preservation of Indigenous knowledge and cultural memory. A review of UNESCO reports, publications, and official statements has been conducted to support the relevance of this recognition in the current context of anthropology and history.

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Sources and Analytical Techniques: The analysis is based on a critical review of primary and secondary sources. The primary sources include editions of the Florentine Codex and the Matritense Codex, accessible through digital repositories and published editions. The methodological approach applied to these works involves textual and comparative analysis, identifying elements that anticipate the development of the ethnographic method in later centuries.

Secondary sources, on the other hand, include contemporary historical and anthropological studies that have examined the impact of Sahagún’s work from various perspectives, especially regarding his focus on cultural translation and collaboration with Indigenous informants. In addition, texts and materials from UNESCO have been used to contextualize the current importance of Sahagún’s work in terms of documentary heritage.

The analytical technique adopted is critical, interpretative, and comparative, seeking both the historical contextualization of Sahagún’s work and its methodological relevance within the field of anthropology. This article presents a historical investigation highlighting the ethnographic method used by Sahagún as a precursor to this method in the modern era. This study aims to conduct a historical investigation into the use of the ethnographic method by Sahagún. This work has been carried out within the framework of the Research Project “Violence, conflict and control mechanisms in the Northwest of the Iberian Peninsula (16th–19th centuries)”, of the Ministry of Science and Innovation (Ref. PID2021-124970NB-100).

3. Bernardino de Sahagún: Some Biographical Notes

Martínez García (1982, p. 120) notes that, although Sahagún did not write creative works or works with Leonese themes, he is a prototypical example of a Leonese peasant, born in Tierra de Campos. According to Martínez, the character of the people from this region is defined by specific traits such as certainty in personal religious convictions, determination, resilience, steadfastness, perseverance, and an unwavering resistance to discouragement. Sahagún was a man of strong personal convictions, both religious and scientific, and with such great perseverance that he never wavered in his investigative and evangelizing work. His writings are part of the so-called “Chroniclers of the Indies”, establishing a precise and valid line within Leonese literature, on a par with Sampiro, Lucas de Tuy, and other chroniclers and historians.

Fray Bernardino de Sahagún (b. 1499–d. 1590), born Ribera, came into the world at the end of the 15th century in the town of Sahagún, in the former Kingdom of León (Chavero 1877). The first third of his life was spent in Spain, and the remainder in Mexican lands. According to Ballesteros Gaibrois (1973), his family was likely neither peasant nor artisan, as they must have had the means to provide him with primary education and, later, university studies at the most prestigious university in the former Kingdom of León: Salamanca, renowned throughout Europe as a leading humanist center. At Salamanca, he studied Latin humanities and theology, and it was there that his religious vocation emerged, leading him to take his vows as a Friar Minor of the Observance in the Franciscan convent of Salamanca. At that time, the Franciscan friars were already established in the New World, and the wonders they spoke of regarding New Spain must have stirred Sahagún’s desire to evangelize Indigenous peoples, compelling him to join the mission.

Ballesteros Gaibrois (1973) points out that, despite being a religious man, the journey to the Indies would not have been easy, likely requiring him to travel first to Seville and then to Cádiz to embark for New Spain. He traveled as part of the second Franciscan expedition, and, following the Franciscan custom, he erased his family name and replaced it with that of his hometown, Sahagún, thus shedding the surname Ribera. Upon his arrival, he had two main tasks: to preach and to baptize. Since he did not yet know the Nahuatl language, he initially focused on baptizing, simplifying the ritual and conducting mass baptisms. Later, he would become fully proficient in the “Mexican language”.

According to the renowned scholar of Sahagún, the recently deceased León-Portilla (2007), Sahagún had no idea that much of his life would unfold at the Imperial College of Santa Cruz de Tlatelolco, under the patronage of Charles V, where he was entrusted with teaching Latin. This institution, which belonged to the Franciscan order, was established to educate Indigenous children and served as a boarding school for the most capable sons of the Indigenous nobility, drawn from the local pre-Hispanic elites who had already been subjugated by the Spanish in New Spain (Solórzano Fonscea 2023).

Sahagún lived to be over ninety years old, spending more than sixty of those years in Mexico, where his primary occupation was evangelizing as a Franciscan missionary. However, this did not prevent him from pursuing two of his main endeavors: writing Nahuatl-language works to instruct the Indigenous people and researching the culture and language of those he was catechizing. Sánchez-Perry (2021) states that in central Mexico Nahuatl became a sort of lingua franca. Government officials and clergymen learned it as adults, while Indigenous children were educated to be trilingual and versed in Scholasticism and Humanism, which was essential for the success of Christian instruction.

According to León-Portilla (2005, 2007), Sahagún spent two well-defined periods at the College, from 1536 to 1540 and from 1545 to 1558. During his time there, in addition to teaching, he dedicated himself to his greatest passion: researching the culture and history of the Nahua peoples of Mexico. Referring to the Indigenous youths he taught, Sahagún himself stated: “I was the one who worked with them during the first four years and introduced them to all the subjects of Latin” (Fray Bernardino 2000, p. 930).

4. Precursor of the Ethnographic Method

Throughout history, Sahagún has been regarded as a precursor of the human sciences and even as a precursor of anthropology. Trained at the University of Salamanca, one of the premier humanistic centers of the 16th century, Sahagún was well versed in the most advanced scientific currents of his time. According to Ballesteros Gaibrois (1973, p. 96), although Sahagún titled his principal work General History of the Things of New Spain, history at that time did not encompass subjects such as economy, society, ideological movements, or religion, nor did it treat rituals as cultural manifestations. Sahagún, however, approached phenomena such as the political and social structure of the ancient Mexicans, their rituals, ecclesiastical organization, and the use of natural medicine from a scientific perspective. His methods and approaches can today be considered characteristic of anthropology, moving beyond the exotic curiosities prevalent in Europe at the time.

It is important to note that the concept of anthropology is relatively recent. While humanity has long studied itself and its creations from a humanistic standpoint, it was not until the 19th century that scholars began attempting to understand other cultures or delve into the mindsets of those outside Western civilization. For this reason, Sahagún’s work can be considered the first anthropological encyclopedia of all time. Palerm (2005) even suggests that Sahagún represents the clearest example of a new trend in ethnology: the growing inclination to adopt the perspective of the colonized rather than the colonizer. At times, this inclination results in a genuine attitude of rebellion, influencing subsequent missionaries and colonial officials.

In this sense, León-Portilla (1966, p. 20) notes the following:

“Sahagún’s research comprised an enormous collection of folios with paintings and texts in Nahuatl, covering all the fundamental aspects of the material and intellectual culture of the Nahuas: rites, priests and gods, festivals and customs, the heavens, the count of the years, the afterlife, human affairs, kinship, customs of the lords, crafts, insignias, legends, education and upbringing, sexual morality, astrology, craftsmanship, sages, philosophical ideas, law, medicine, food, botany, animals, metals and precious stones, ethnic origins, literature, moral and theological speeches, hymns and songs, and even a purely indigenous version of the history of the conquest”.

One example of this encyclopedic nature is Sahagún’s description of cacao in Book XI of the General History of the Things of New Spain. He extensively details the customs surrounding cacao consumption, the tree that produces it (cacahuacuahuitl), the different types of cacao, methods of flavoring it, its economic and social significance, and even fraudulent practices in its trade (Arpide 2006). Additionally, Sahagún was the first to document pre-Hispanic techniques for creating feather textiles and mosaics, as described in the Florentine Codex. González Tirado (1996) highlights his account of the Aztecs’ use of a glue called tzhautli or tzacuhtli, derived from Mexican orchid bulbs, in crafting these artworks.

Sahagún’s meticulousness extended to the medical information he compiled. Book XI, titled “On the Properties of Animals, Birds, Fish, Trees, Herbs, Flowers, Metals, and Stones”, contains detailed remedies and descriptions, such as the following:

“There is another medicinal herb called chapulxíhuitl. It has round and very green leaves. It is not a vine but rather stands tall. With the leaves and ground root, abscesses such as boils and sores are healed. By applying the powder mixed with water on the abscess, some abscesses open, while others resolve. This herb grows in the mountains”.

(Sahagún 1985, p. 213)

Cordero del Campillo (2000) argues that while the ethnographic value of the General History has been widely recognized, the medical information it contains remains underappreciated. For instance, the Florentine Codex provides insights into the role of Nahua midwives, studied by Badillo-Zúñiga and Alarcón-Hernández (2020) Midwives held high status in Mexican society and performed roles such as organizing the pregnant woman’s family activities, offering prayers to deities during childbirth, and bestowing blessings. The Codex thus contains instructional discourses on the midwife’s responsibilities, highlighting her cultural importance.

Among Spanish sources for understanding Aztec history, Sahagún’s work stands out. By actively seeking informants, collecting hymns, and striving to document Indigenous heritage—often writing in Nahuatl—he created an invaluable record of pre-Hispanic life. Escalante Gonzalbo (1992) notes that Sahagún’s Indigenous informants, including elders and sages, provided the most authentic window into life in Mexico before the conquest. Johansson (2007) emphasizes Sahagún’s interest in Nahuatl proverbs and their alignment with Spanish sayings, demonstrating his appreciation of Indigenous thought.

Sahagún’s original research methods, including linguistic immersion and reliance on oral testimony, allowed him to bridge cultural divides and record Indigenous voices authentically. Hernández (2007) argues that Sahagún was the first person in history to “document a culture in the language it was created in, and in the voices of its speakers”, a hallmark of modern anthropology. Fieldwork in anthropology is typically composed of three elements: long-term residence, linguistic immersion, and participant observation (Metcalf 2006). By these criteria, Sahagún’s decades in New Spain, his mastery of Nahuatl, and his dedication to preserving Indigenous culture make him an early anthropologist.

While Sahagún’s primary task was evangelization, his investigative methods often went beyond this mission. Ballesteros Gaibrois (1973, p. 99) notes that Sahagún faced criticism within his Franciscan order for straying from his assigned duties. Nonetheless, his direct consultation of elders, aided by bilingual Iindigenous students, ensured the authenticity of his findings.

For authors such as Outram Anderson (1999), Sahagún’s General History should not be viewed solely as an ethnographic document. It also served as a manual for missionaries, as evidenced by his sermons against idolatry and other evangelical works like La Psalmodia and El Manual del Cristiano. However, scholars such as Aspe Armella (2021) argue that Sahagún’s evangelization sought to separate positive elements of Indigenous culture from negative practices like human sacrifice.

Another key aspect of Sahagún’s work was his study of Indigenous codices, most of which have since disappeared. These codices contained a complex symbolic system shared across Mesoamerican cultures, reflecting a common worldview despite regional differences (León-Portilla 1998, p. 328).

5. Bernardino de Sahagún’s Work Recognized as a Memory of the World

The Memory of the World program was launched in 1992 as a response to UNESCO’s concern for the state of conservation of documentary heritage across different parts of the world. Due to a lack of resources, neglect, or even wars, documentary heritage has often been damaged, forgotten, or destroyed. At other times, looting by antiquities traffickers or the indifference of public or private institutions has resulted in the loss of heritage. While nothing can be done to recover heritage that has disappeared forever, it is still possible to safeguard, valorize, and, in many cases, rediscover documentary heritage at risk of extinction. This is precisely the intention behind UNESCO’s creation of this distinction. Based on the vision that documentary heritage belongs to everyone and must be preserved while recognizing cultural aspects and customs, UNESCO has outlined basic objectives.

These objectives are as follows: firstly, to facilitate the preservation of the world’s documentary heritage using the most appropriate techniques; secondly, to promote the creation of digitized copies and catalogs both on the internet and in other formats; and lastly, to raise global awareness of the existence of this documentary heritage. This includes the development of the Memory of the World Register, which encourages preservation work and the creation of access copies.

Among the criteria outlined by UNESCO for the register is the evaluation of the global significance of the documentary heritage and whether its influence is international, regional, or national. These criteria are laid out in the Guidelines for the Preservation of Documentary Heritage (Edmondson 2002). This evaluation is comparative and relative, and the cultural significance cannot be measured in absolute terms. However, the material’s authenticity and its uniqueness—the fact that its disappearance would constitute a loss to the heritage of humanity—are essential for its cataloging. As noted, the evaluation is comparative, and the criteria include the following: age; the place of creation or influence; the people involved, taking into account the social and cultural context in which the documents were created; the subject matter, which may pertain to historical or intellectual facts related to the natural, social, and human sciences, politics, ideology, sport, and art; and, lastly, the form and style, which may have aesthetic, stylistic, or linguistic value. Rarity, integrity, threat level, and management plan are also considered.

In relation to these criteria, the work of Sahagún, which was included in this list in 2015 and is shared by Mexico, Italy, and Spain, fully meets all of them. According to the resolution, it constitutes one of the principal historical sources on ancient Mexico and is considered a pioneer in the field of anthropology. For Andrade (2003), the fact that many scholars have seen Sahagún as a precursor of the ethnographic methods that the discipline would perfect centuries later underscores his relevance as an author whose influence goes beyond the history of Mexico, Latin America, or the conquest. Thus, Sahagún is a topic of discussion for anyone interested in transcultural encounters. In a way, he can be seen as having laid the groundwork for modern anthropology, which is one of the reasons his work received this recognition from UNESCO. His work includes the Matritense Codex, which contains important ethnographic research conducted in New Spain during the 16th century, and the Florentine Codex, a manuscript with texts in both Nahuatl and Spanish. These codices are housed in Madrid and Florence, respectively. The Matritense Codex, also known as the Primeros Memoriales and Tepeapulco Manuscripts, is preserved in the libraries of the Royal Academy of History and the Royal Palace of Madrid (Spain). The Florentine Codex is located in the Laurentian Library in Florence (Italy). It is important to note that the proposal was spearheaded by the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) of Mexico.

The richness of Sahagún’s work as ethnographic material is immense. For instance, in the Primeros Memoriales or Matritense Codex, he provides a description of the festivals of the ritual calendar, accompanied by paintings depicting specific elements of the celebrations. The Florentine Codex, on the other hand, is the culmination of the General History of the Things of New Spain. It describes a wide range of aspects of Mexican culture, such as deities, festivals, cosmology, food, government, society, the calendar, flora and fauna, the ethnic origins of the peoples, and the conquest, making it a true ethnography. This makes the Florentine Codex one of the key works for understanding Mexican culture. It is a bilingual text composed mainly of two columns, with the left in Spanish and the right in Nahuatl, though the Nahuatl text is more extensive (Barbero Richart 1997). Sahagún is also regarded as a pioneer in lexicographic work in the New World. If Sahagún had a mission to convert the Indigenous people to Christianity, he needed some means of accessing their mindset. According to Máynez (1999), in order to achieve this connection with “the others”, Sahagún believed that language was the gateway to understanding Indigenous culture. For this reason, he had a great interest in discovering the morphosyntactic structures and lexical components of the language. Sahagún authored a trilingual vocabulary and a Nahuatl grammar, laying the foundation for the creation of a calepino containing information on Mexican culture (Máynez 1999, p. 191).

Sahagún’s work emerged at a time when the culture of the New World had been destroyed, and he had to reconstruct it with the help of his informants. Litterscheid (1985) points out that the Aztec past was revived through Sahagún’s efforts, and that his work stands apart from that of his contemporaries precisely because of the dialogue between two cultures. By collaborating with the Aztecs, his knowledge of the language, arts, and customs of the Indigenous people grew, and thus the gap between him, as a European, and the New World diminished.

6. Research Results. Sahagún’s Legacy: Revisiting Indigenous Knowledge and Colonial Tensions

We can consider Sahagún’s work in general, and the General History of the Things of New Spain in particular, as a key source for interdisciplinary studies: not only in anthropology and history but also in linguistics, cultural studies, theology, and philosophy. A contemporary reading allows us to revisit the primary sources used by Sahagún and, through his methodology, not only reinterpret the data but also place his work within the framework of current debates, such as the recognition of Indigenous epistemologies and the decolonization of knowledge. It is important to note that Sahagún compiled his work with the assistance of high-ranking Indigenous informants, including Nahua scholars, nobles, and elders who still preserved pre-Hispanic traditions. Furthermore, it is significant that these sources were compiled in Nahuatl before being translated into Spanish, in a process of cultural mediation that incorporated both Indigenous knowledge and Sahagún’s interpretations.

In analyzing these sources, it is essential to consider two vital issues. On the one hand, the agency of Indigenous informants is an issue to be considered: they were not merely data transmitters but active participants in the reconstruction and transmission of their culture. Their narratives present us with a Nahua worldview that survived the conquest. In this sense, the General History could be considered, from a modern perspective, a collaborative cultural resistance project where orality and collective memory played a fundamental role. On the other hand, even though it was not Sahagún’s original intent—since we know he sought to support evangelization—he identified cultural practices considered idolatrous, resulting in an unprecedented ethnographic corpus that has preserved invaluable cultural wealth. This raises questions about the extent to which the colonial context influenced the selection and presentation of the data. A new reading should critically examine the tensions between Indigenous accounts and Christian interpretations.

The current value of Sahagún’s work spans various disciplines. As previously mentioned, Sahagún’s methodology anticipates modern ethnographic techniques such as participant observation, data collection, and the structuring of questionnaires. His contributions are useful for understanding responses to domination, cultural resistance, and identity adaptation. From a historical perspective, Sahagún’s work can be a key tool for understanding the conquest as a multifaceted process of cultural negotiation. Moreover, it provides a window into pre-Hispanic Mexico and the process of cultural exchange during the 16th century. In linguistics, it contributes to the study of Indigenous languages, as it is a bilingual Spanish–Nahuatl work that offers a model for lexical, morphosyntactic, and semantic analysis. Lastly, regarding contemporary studies of cultural diversity, it serves as a reminder of the importance of intercultural dialogue and respect for difference.

From a decolonial perspective, the General History of the Things of New Spain operates on multiple levels of colonial dynamics and resistance. Although Sahagún worked within the framework of Christianity and colonization, his work reflects a desire to preserve Indigenous memory. Indigenous knowledge was integrated and resisted the total erasure of pre-Hispanic epistemologies. Through the Nahuatl accounts recorded in the Codex, we have inherited the ways in which Indigenous communities expressed their worldviews despite colonial oversight. This demonstrates that Indigenous people were far more than passive subjects in this colonial project. From the same decolonial perspective, we can recognize the important role Indigenous informants played in preserving their cultural heritage. Therefore, we can conclude by stating that the General History of the Things of New Spain is more than a historical document: it is a symbol of the continuity of Indigenous cultures in the face of oppression, allowing us to understand the forms of cultural resistance practiced by Indigenous peoples.

7. Conclusions: Sahagún in the Present Day

Bernardino de Sahagún’s greatest contribution was the research method he employed, which today can be considered a pioneering approach in anthropology. As León-Portilla (2000) notes, Sahagún’s investigations, which began with the identification and eradication of idolatries among the Aztec people, or Mexica, as they called themselves, ultimately led to a profound understanding and admiration of “the other”. Throughout this process, he consistently based his knowledge on what was directly communicated to him by elders and chiefs. In this sense, he addressed core issues within anthropology, such as the diversity of human social life. Anthropology is, after all, the discipline tasked with observing, describing, interpreting, understanding, and translating “the other” in a scientific manner. At the historical moment when Fray Sahagún lived, from the perspective of Western Europe, “the other” referred to those beyond or on the fringes of the Old World.

Sahagún’s contribution to the field of interethnic dialogue and cultural understanding can even be seen as an inspiration for global initiatives such as the Alliance of Civilizations, sponsored by the UN (2005). This initiative focuses on priority areas such as teacher training in cultural diversity and the World Forum for Cultural Innovation. More recently, in 2020, when the International Council of Museums (ICOM) dedicated International Museum Day to the theme Museums for Equality: Diversity and Inclusion, and the Museum of America in Madrid joined the celebration, Sahagún’s influence was evident. The goal was to create a meeting point to celebrate the diversity of perspectives that shape museum communities and staff and to promote tools for identifying and overcoming biases in the way museums display exhibits and tell stories.

Looking at Sahagún’s work in perspective, we can affirm that his approach to “the other”, his efforts to understand their way of thinking, and his willingness to challenge many of the prejudices of the Western world remain relevant today: especially considering the era in which he lived, a time dominated by conquest, evangelization, and the subjugation of “the other” by the Old World.