Sources and Methods for the Study of Mixtec History

américa prehispánica.1 I noticed that nearly all the chapters focused on the Nahuas of central Mexico, with the exception of one on the Mixtecs of Oaxaca and another on Michoacan. Whereas many of the chapters on the Nahuas made use of Nahuatl-language documents, the two on the Mixtecos and Tarascos did not use native-language sources. I had just begun to learn older Nahuatl using what we called the “packet, ” an early form (with the examples only) of Jim’s Nahuatl as Written, and despite my interest in this language, I wondered aloud whether native-language writings existed for other groups of highland Mexico. “Good question, ” Jim replied (he insisted from the beginning on a first-name basis). He encouraged us to compare findings on the Nahuas of central Mexico with other areas of Mesoamerica, and I knew that my fellow first-year doctoral student and friend, Matthew Restall, intended to use Maya-language writings for his project on Yucatan. Whereas the existence of Maya-language writings was certain, the case for alphabetic writings in other Mesoamerican languages was unclear, at least to us at the time. A logical place to look for native-languag