Item 31 is a history of Mexico's Our Lady of Guadalupe by Ignacio Carrillo y Perez: Pensil Americano florido en el rigor del invierno, la Imagen di Maria Santisima de Guapalupe. Published in 1797, this book recounts the history of the vision of Our Lady and the building of the sanctuary and later structures in her honor. According to the story, Juan Diego, a Mexican Indian and recent convert to Catholicism, saw an apparition of the Virgin Mary on a hilltop. Mary instructed him to have the local bishop build a small sanctuary on the spot, but when Juan Diego followed the instructions, the Bishop informed him that he would need a sign. That would come when, in a later meeting, Mary provided Juan Diego with Spanish roses in the dead of winter, and also an image on a cloth. Juan Diego saw his vision in 1531, and over the next six years, it would inspire massive conversions to Catholicism among native Indians and a merging of Spanish and native culture. Almost five centuries later, in 2002, Juan Diego was canonized as an American saint. $2,500.

The smaller insert of 30 Mexican rarities includes such items as a 1783 edition of Antonio de Solis' Historia de la conquista de Mexico, one of the best histories of Cortes' conquest of Mexico, and an 1868 calendar honoring the memory of Emperor Maximillian, a surprising Mexican imprint for the time since he had recently been overthrown and executed (Calendario historico de Maximiliano para el ano de 1868).

Libreria de Antano may be reached at (5411) 4822-7178 or info@antano.com.ar.