Marvels and Miracles in Late Colonial Mexico: Three Texts in Context by William B. Taylor (review)

This book is a sourcebook and companion to William B. Taylor's Shrines and Miraculous Images, also reviewed in this issue. It consists of an introduction and three primary sources describing miraculous happenings in late colonial Mexico. Each document is expertly translated into English and situated in context with introductory comments. The translations reveal interesting and relatively understudied aspects of popular piety in the eighteenth century. Collectively, these texts demonstrate the tensions between popular piety and elite attempts to reign in the miraculous, a process that started with the Council of Trent (1545-1563) and deepened with Latin America's uneven embrace of Enlightenment thought and practice in the eighteenth century.

The introduction provides a brief overview of miracles and their importance in colonial Mexican Catholic culture and brings out the interpretive challenges faced by historians seeking to recover this history. Although Taylor sees in the documents a "family resemblance to European miracle stories," they also reveal the specificity of local practices in Mexico, where in contrast to Europe "miracle stories . . . focused on images that showed signs of life and wielded power over nature" (p. 3). In addition, the documents reveal complex blends of Mexican indigenous and Spanish folk Catholicism, gendered aspects of devotional practices, and the role of priests in both repressing and promoting local cults, depending on the circumstances. The richness of these texts resides in their revelations about the beliefs and practices of ordinary people during the eighteenth century.

The three primary sources include the "Summary investigation concerning the marvel that Our Lady of the Walnut Tree worked for Doña Maria Francisca Larralde, wife of Sergeant Major Don Antonio Urresti, residents of this city of Monterrey [ . . . ]" [1758]; "Account of the prodigious miracle by Most Holy Mary in the village of Santa María de la Asumpción Tlamacazapa, parish of Acamixtla, appearing as the figure of Divine Grace (Alta Gracia) in a kernel of corn to an Indian woman about to give birth (1774); and "History of Miracles Worked by the Image of Our Lady of Intercession which is Venerated in the Monastery of Nativitas of Tepetlalzinco Pueblo, by Fray Francisco de la Rosa Figueroa" (1776). These are all distinctive examples selected from the "eight hundred or so miracle stories from the colonial period" collected by the author (p. 11).

These historical documents can all be considered composite texts. The first two contain multiple testimonies, while the final one reveals multiple influences despite its single author. Though all of them deal with miracles or claims of the miraculous, each has a different emphasis. These range in subject, respectively, from debates over the obligations owed for a miraculous cure, to specific and even subversive religious practices within a poor, rural indigenous household, and to the lifelong campaign of a parish priest seeking official recognition of the miraculous power of a locally venerated image of the Virgin.

This collection will be of interest to scholars of Mexican religious history and colonial culture more generally. The English translations of rare colonial-era primary sources will be a useful addition to the undergraduate classroom.