Convenciones y estrategias en la iconografía del rango de la nobleza indígena del centro de México en el siglo XVI

Abstract

The extant corpus of 16th-century pictorial manuscripts from Central Mexico has great potential for various lines of research on the images of native nobility that they contain, with implications for the complex process of cultural survival and transformation that accompanied Spanish-indigenous interaction. This paper explores certain regional conventions of the iconography of rank, inherited from the pre-Hispanic past but now often combined with European elements. In particular, it focuses on issues of continuity and change, ‘plays of meaning’, and strategies for expressing political/cultural messages, differences in rank, or both together.