Testaments of Toluca

"Pizzigoni's edition is an important contribution to the study of the corpus of Nahuatl-language wills, and it suggest new directions for the future study of Nahuatl language and culture. The author's contribution is fundamental to what has been until today a neglected research topic in Nahuatl studies. The result is a specialized reference tool that will help to redefine socio-historical studies on the Nahuatl language and culture by guiding the research toward issues of material culture in Mexican colonial society." - Raul Marrero-Fente, Canadian Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Studies "Testaments of Toluca is the first of its kind. The book is a critical edition of 98 Nahuatl-language wills in English translation from the Valley of Toluca, a region due west of Mexico City. The exegesis of the content of the testaments reveals surely as much as can be known about the individual testators and their lives. But just as important, Testaments of Toluca furnishes a meticulous analysis of the Nahuatl spoken by the dying ... We can only be greatful that Pizzigoni has taken on the task of translating and commenting on thse hundreds of wills, which guarantees one of the most intensive and complete studies of Nahua life anywhere." - Journal of Latin American Studies "Testaments of Toluca does for the eighteenth century in central Mexico what The Testaments of Culhuacan did earlier for the sixteenth: provide a basis for studying everyday indigenous life at the household level." - Sarah Cline, UC Santa Barbara, author of Colonial Culhuacan and editor of The Testaments of Culhuacan "The transcribed and translated primary documents are highly significant in their own right, but the extensive commentary transforms Testaments of Toluca into an important and accessible scholarly monograph." - Robert Haskett, University of Oregon, a "This may be the single most significant volume of transcribed and translated testaments from colonial Latin America published to date. The quantity and quality of the material and its analysis make the book a treasure trove of information on late-colonia