Il Manoscritto Messicano Vaticano 3773

Donated to the Smithsonian by the Duc de Loubat, who funded its publication, this small book is a chromo-photographic facsimile of a Nahua manuscript describing the 260-day ritual cycle of the Aztec calendar. Also identified as Codex Vaticanus B, it is the only hand-painted book of the Borgia Group (primarily religious manuscripts from central Mexico) to retain the complete original appearance of a Pre-Columbian codex which the facsimile faithfully reproduces: painted on both sides in an accordion-fold format with a wooden cover.