BERNARDINO da Sahagún. – Illustrious missionary and ethnographer of Mexico, b. at Sahagún (Spain) in 1500, d. at Mexico on 23 Oct. 1590. While studying at the University of Salamanca he entered the Franciscan Order in that city. In 1529 he sailed for New Spain (Mexico) and remained there until his death. He perfected his knowledge of Nahuatl, the most widely spoken language of the country at that time, and served as professor and at times rector of the famous college (for noble Indians and indigenous clergy) of Santa Cruz de Tlatelolco, where he spent 40 years. He was also visitor of the province of Michoacán and definitor of that of the Holy Gospel. Of gentle and patient disposition, yet tenacious in his literary undertakings—which he pursued for the sake of missionary formation—he had to endure various difficulties, especially in connection with his great work, the *Historia general de las cosas de Nueva España*, written in Nahuatl and then translated, or rather paraphrased, into Spanish.
It consists of 12 books on the pagan, sacred, and profane antiquities of pre-Cortesian Mexico, collected from indigenous sources, checked and verified by the author through three successive redactions. It is a most precious work, now highly valued by ethnologists both for its content—being the best source for Mexican antiquities—and for the method employed in gathering its material. The Spanish text has been published five times: by C. M. de Bustamante, in 3 vols. in 4°, Mexico 1829–30; by Lord Kingsborough, *Antiquities of Mexico*, V, London 1830, pp. 345–93; VII, pp. 1–464; by Ireneo Paz, 4 vols. in 8°, Mexico 1890–95; and recently in 5 vols. in 8°, ibid. 1938, which is the best edition though it does not fully meet the strict demands of criticism; and by M. Acosta Saignes, in 3 vols. in 12°, Mexico 1946, with many illustrations, a rich bibliography, and indices. The Nahuatl text remains unpublished. F. del Paso y Troncoso, however, reproduced some codices in facsimile, Madrid 1905 ff. A French version was prepared by D. Jourdanet and R. Siméon, *Histoire générale des choses de la Nouvelle-Espagne*, Paris 1880. E. Seler translated certain parts into German from the Nahuatl text: *Einige Kapitel aus dem Geschichtswerk des Fray B. S.*, Stuttgart 1927. Of the first two books the author sent a summary to St Pius V in 1570: *Breve compendio de los ritos idolátricos de Nueva España*, edited by L. Oliger in *Antoniamum*, 17 (1942), pp. 3–38, 133–74, and separately, Rome 1942.
Other works are: *Pláticas o Coloquios*, i.e. discourses of the first missionaries addressed to the indigenous people, edited, so far as it survives, by Giuseppe Pou y Martí in *Miscellanea Fr. Ehrle*, III, Rome 1924, pp. 281–333 (Spanish text, and Nahuatl in facsimile); *Evangeliiarium Epistolarum et Lectionarium aztecum sive mexicanum*, ed. B. Biondelli, Milan 1858; *Psalmodia christiana y sermonario de los sanctos del año en lengua mexicana*, Mexico 1583, the only work published during the author’s lifetime. Other works, including a life of St Bernardino of Siena in Nahuatl, have been lost.