The Codex Escalada of 1548

Learn more about the Codex Escalada, also known as Codex 1548!

The Codex 1548, as explained on Wikipedia "is a sheet of parchment on which there have been drawn, in ink and in the European style, images (with supporting Nahuatl text) depicting a Marian apparition, namely that of Our Lady of Guadalupe to Juan Diego which is said to have occurred on four separate occasions in December 1531 on the hill of Tepeyac north of central Mexico City. If authentic, and if correctly dated to the mid-16th century (as tests so far conducted indicate), the document fills a gap in the documentary record as to the antiquity of the tradition regarding those apparitions and of the image of the Virgin associated with the fourth apparition which is venerated at the Basilica of Guadalupe. The parchment first came to light in 1995, and in 2002 was named in honour of Fr. Xavier Escalada S.J. who brought it to public attention and who published it in 1997. Above the central landscape is the date "1548" beneath which are four lines of Nahuatl text written in the Latin alphabet which can be translated as: "In this year of 15[0]31 there appeared to Cuauhtlatoatzin our dearly beloved mother Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico". Below the landscape and a little off-centre to the right, is the imposing signature of Fray Bernardino de Sahagún (ca. 1499-1590), the renowned Franciscan missionary, historian and pioneering ethnologist. High in the cliffs above the kneeling Indian is a much smaller depiction of a man on the hill. Directly beneath the kneeling Indian is more Nahuatl text written in the Latin alphabet, the first part of which can be translated as: "Cuauhtlatoatzin died a worthy death"; and the second as: "in 1548 Cuauhtlatoatzin died." From other sources, this is known to be the native name of Juan Diego, although the normal orthography for the mid-16th century is "Quauhtlahtoatzin"."